friends? foes? frenemies?

why do people say when they break up, "let's stay friends" or "i do love you...as a friend." i laugh at these statements. statements people say to alleviate their own guilt. these words are to make the person doing the dumping or breaking up feel justified. of course, i didn't know all this back then. back then, i was a wide eyed, well, as wide-eyed as my slanty eyes can get girl.

college is when i was allowed to date. if you have kept up with my blog, you can refer back to the blog entry about how my mom broke a brick in half in front of my prom date, and hence, ended my first and last date in high school. nice huh? college is where i got to meet people who were different and the same as me. for me, college was the first place where i actually met my first love. here, i got my BFA and my first BF. having a boy pay any attention to me was freaky. no one talked to me in high school. i was the quiet girl who sat under a tree sketching comics or reading. no boy pursued me or wooed me. that was reserved for girls who flirted and dressed the part. not girls who played the violin and listened to dead milkmen. being in college, i got to paint, have an art show and also got told for the first time that i was pretty. i don't need to hear compliments. i am not a fisherman of compliments, but it was touching to hear. it is an asian cultural thing not to call your kids pretty. superstitious. if you call your daughters pretty, the devil would come snatch them away. it's an asian thing to just value education/intelligence over physical beauty. i excelled in school. i failed at dating.

i hung out with the artsy punk crowd. the poets. the writers. the thinkers. nothing mainstream. everything edgy. my friends were witty, funny, extraordinary. we would hang out, party, listen to records, watch movies. i was the disheveled one. hands usually black from charcoal drawing, overalls and vans covered in paint or clay from the potter's wheel. no makeup. hair in pigtails or just down. nothing fancy. nothing glamorous.

i figured if or when i did get a boyfriend he would be an artist, a writer, something like that. instead, the dating gods played a cruel trick on me. my first love turned out to the polar opposite of me. a frat boy.

handsome chiseled face. tall. dark hair. a nice rich tan in the summer from sailing on the cape. strong jawline. a deep voice. he was an art history and history buff. his trousers always pressed. he knew how to tie a tie.....well. he sported blazers with the greatest of ease. he wore vans when sailing. he wore dock siders every day. glasses. his one vice. he smoked. but that was given up quickly.

this is who would be my first love?! he approached me in the courtyard. i knew some of his brothers. he walked me back. we talked. he asked if he could call on me again. manners. diction. complete sentences. he built furniture. other girls wanted to date him. why the hell is he after me? i made him laugh and i was so different from him.

i dont wanna rehash details. it didn't work out. i never felt comfortable with him. meaning, when we first started dating, he would bring up the fact that i wasn't white. i felt at times that who i was was not who he wanted me to be or wasn't enough. the feeling of inadequacy is the most horrible feeling.

the comic "post it note" documents my heart/breakup. i read it now and i laugh. this was all before the sex in the city post it. i never knew such a little yellow note could shatter my heart. who knew the girl above would have her heart ripped out by a product of 3M. (i had to scan it in 2 parts).