Rush of blood

The past two nights I fell asleep on accident

in bed wearing my winter jacket
it is 66 degrees in my house
 I feel a subtle sense of dread because of it
I feel cold all over
and the blankets make it worse

I'd lay in bed with the thoughts of all my past relationships
with a sense of overwhelming urgency and regret
unsure if it all meant anything at all

I thought of the time when I broke up with Brooke because she wanted to kiss me
I wonder if I would be different had I gone through with it
but at the time I thought I was too young to kiss a girl
who's to say what that even means though
a year later she told me she missed 6th grade
i told her i had moved on
i did miss 6th grade though

I thought of the time when I was dared to hug Christie at her birthday party
and subsequently messaged her on facebook, telling her i liked her
she told me she liked me back, but only because i was really nice
I thought that was a good thing
i wanted to think that was a good thing
but it bothered me
i was right to be bothered

I thought of the time I had foods class with rose
We became friends quickly, and grew closer over the next month
one day I told haley in my art class I had a crush on rose
she wrote "i love rose" all over my foods binder and art folder
rose saw it the next day and thought it was me
and she thought it was a little creepy
I usually kept to myself after that, too shameful to talk to her
that shame followed me whenever I saw her in the halls for the next 3 years of highschool
I wanted to take my art folder home but when i got it to my locker i was already being mocked by my friends
I put it in the trash can to prove to my friends i didn't care, so that they shouldn't laugh at me
I checked that trash can a year later, thinking about how badly i messed up
I still remember the projects in the folder and wonder about how great it would be to see them now

I thought of the summer after I graduated High School with Beth
a long time friend that I had started to get really close with
her best friend mckayla told me I should kiss her at the the end of senior celebration
I told her I was unsure about it
she said beth wanted me to kiss her
I decided not to, I didn't want her to know I'd never kissed anybody
one night after rafting in the creek behind my house at midnight
we snuck into my neighbors clubhouse in their backyard
which was just a shed, and the upstairs had a carpeted room with a vhs player and couches and each wall was a different color
Mckayla fell asleep on the second couch within minutes
Beth and I talked for an hour, and then she layed her head on my lap
I wanted to kiss her but it didn't feel right with Mckayla in the room
I still don't know kissing norms
We just kept talking and talked until 4:45am, when we thought we heard our neighbors walking up the steps to the backyard
i had never felt as happy in my life as i did that summer
we hung out almost every day
until she moved back to moab
without her i moved back into old habits
and the second half of summer was dreary and numb
clearly i wasnt in a good state if i couldn't take care of myself without her
i didn't see her until last january
i visited her in cedar city
i remember lying on her couch in her basement, it was completely dark except the moon was shining through a small square window in a way it never had before
I lied there and could hear the second half of mouth wooed her by animal collective playing in my head
I lied there and just felt completely floored by emotions in which I honestly can't describe
it was a spiritual experience i hope to never forget
im in tears listening to the song right now thinking about the experience
something about this experience and mine and beths relationship are related
it seems as though if everything felt natural and perfect together but there was some kind of undertone that made it not feel right
and thinking about it makes my heart ache so god damn badly

I thought of the time with eden
she was into art and her jaw dropped when i said my favorite movie was moonrise kingdom
she seemed really nice, and usually was
she lived in utah valley and i was at snow so i only saw her on the weekends
she wanted me to text her every day, but i didn't have much to say
i thought it would make it more special to see her if i hadn't been talking to her constantly inbetween weekends
after watching a few movies with her, she texted me and said "when are you ever gonna make a move on me?"
i had felt kinda glad that she was into me, but also felt awful that i wasn't able to pick up on the signs she was into me
3 weeks later I still hadn't kissed her
I had started to notice a lot of things about her bothered me a lot, but i had never had a girl been this into me so i continued with it
I was driving back to college by myself feeling horridly low self esteem about my lack of confidence to kiss her
I listened to the glow part 2 by the microphones and when he said "i faced death, i went in with my arms swinging" I remember just crying for the next few minutes and having to wipe my face so i could see the road clearly
the next weekend i walked her to her car after watching a movie and finally kissed her
but it started to go downhill from there
at that time i started to realize i didn't want my friends/family to know about her
I wasn't really proud of the lifestyle she was living and wasn't really proud to be in a relationship with her, but I just would remind myself of how awful i would feel almost all the time, thinking about how i had never kissed a girl until now, and feeling like I've been alive for 19 years but haven't experienced a basic human interaction.
i still feel awful today thinking that I thought that that mindset was justifiable

she started to be a lot more demanding
the first time we made out, she gave me two huge hickeys which I didn't know really what those were since I'd never made out or anything
the day after, I told her that wasn't cool
she said she wasn't sorry about it
she told me to cut my hair
She knew i was growing it out as a way to try something new
but still told me its not what she wanted
she tried to pressure me multiple times into smoking with her
but I wasn't about to
she would sort of make fun of me for having access to friends with weed and not smoking
she also wanted to get tattoos together
and was upset with me when i said that was definitely not something im gonna do
the last thing that happened in our relationship was a week after i moved back home for the summer, she cut contact with me completely for five days, and finally when she got back to me, she seemed irritated that i tried to reach out to her for so long
she then had a sort of meltdown and started apologizing like crazy listing all of these personal problems i had no idea about that apparently were causing her to act this way
I told her i wanted to help her, but she said she didn't want my help
that was when i decided to end it

i dont know why i let it go on as long as it did
but fortunately i left the relationship with the understanding that physical intimacy isn't worthwhile without emotional intimacy, and that instead of feeling bad for myself for not having had my first kiss, i should feel bad for not being able to say i love you
and that was something i knew going into it, but i guess curiosity got the best of me


i don't know why i decided to write this
and i don't know how long i will keep it up

all i know is that its still 66 degrees
3:04 am
and that tonight when i fall asleep im gonna mean it