The group I spent most of my time with in high school consisted of three guys and two girls: myself and a gorgeous girl named Jade. While I was horsey and self deprecating, Jade oozed sex appeal — combined damsel in distress/street smart. The guys: touchy-feely Cameron, Art, new agey with a mean streak , and Mac, a brilliant wise-ass. We were tightly knit, especially after a method acting class during which we did improvs where we had to confess little secrets assigned by the teacher like, “I have AIDS,” “I slept with your boyfriend and he gave me AIDS,” and “My mom is dying. Of AIDS.” Though the circumstances were imagined we bonded like Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves in Speed through intense, near death experiences. So when Jade took Cameron’s flower one night in a number of positions he described to me the next day, it shook the group core a little. This was the 90′s, before online dating, or before we knew about it anyway. The options were limited and we spent a lot of time naked in hot tubs, talking about the meaning of life and love and things that can sexually bond you if you’re attractive. Long-limbed and gawky, I was never in danger of this. I was like a sarcastic spider you made friends with, but with whom you wouldn’t consider going to second. Their romance was over quickly and when summer ended we all went our separate ways.
About 12 years later we came back together to drink legally and feel each other out for traces of our former selves. Jade was living back in our hometown, as was Art. She was staying at her mom’s to save money. He was living in a house with some Freegans (Vegans who scavenge for free food). He’d sometimes eat nothing but Brie from the Trader Joe’s dumpster and eggs from the free-roaming chickens that laid in various hiding places like his shoes. Jade and Art quickly bonded over their less than glamorous homecomings and starting sleeping together. It was a little strange to imagine it working, but it made sense. They were both starting over, scrapping old lives, and what better place to start then a time when we were young, hilarious, and had everything ahead of us. “I’m myself with him,” Jade told me, “And I had forgotten who that was, I think.” If I’d found any of these guys remotely attractive, I might’ve had similar inclinations. The part of dating that terrifies me is the beginning. I try so hard to impress the person that I run the risk of not showing them my true self and end up dating someone who only knows a version of me. Skipping all that was enticing, if not slightly regressive. But whatever bond they had, fell away when they realized they had become adults (well, Jade had) in the time between, and those adults had little in common.
A few weeks later I got a call from Jade. “I’m dating Mac.” Jade and Mac were the heartbreakers of the group. That they had turned that magnetism on each other wasn’t totally surprising, though I did think to myself that reunions were sure to be somewhat awkward from here on out. The past is so appealing. I’m a Past junkie, liable to drown myself in old journals and letters and memories all night, only to wake up the next morning with my cheek stuck to a page that reads, “Our souls entwined like fingers, I hate my life,” and thank God it’s now.
More desirable then the people from our past is who we were. I’ve had late night impulses to call an ex, reconnect, resurrect a self I worry is dead. It’s tempting because no one comes to the funeral of dead selves, so we worry they won’t be remembered. But hopefully, if you can force yourself to show up as your less-than-perfect self with someone new, they’ll still get a sense of the old you, even if you never sat naked with them in the Best Western hot tub throwing around the term soul mate like it was going out of style.
