It is 2.47 in the morning. Jessie has just gone to bed. She has work in the morning and should have gone to bed a long time ago, but, like it always does, in the light of the present tomorrow always seems like a later problem. When she finally gave up she left the computer for me to use it if I wanted to.
Jessie has always liked to do things in candle light. This includes checking your email and writing online journals, which has granted her computer two egg-sized burn marks on either side if the display, and the left corner is melted away so badly I am surprised the display still works. It might explain why it takes so long to start. I don't even know why I turned it on. I should be in bed too. I just felt like I had to something to write. Or at least had to write something - two alternatives miles apart in difference.
It has been a good night.
It is hard to tell how Jessie feels about having me back, she has covered two appartments since I last lived here, but to me it has been quite a lot like it used to be back in 2006. When I moved to Lund I barely knew Jessie. We had met three or four times in the preceding autumn when we had attended the same writing course and then a couple of times during the spring when she had been back in Gvle to visit, but truth be told I was a lot closer to her boyfriend, Johan. It was only in the summer of 2006, on a late night during one of her visits that she came with the suggestion that I should move down to her. I was so tired of Gvle I could jump from the city bridge any day now, and I was welcome to share her room with her for as long as I needed.
In a flash of spontaniousness I agreed and six weeks later I had taken my stuff five hundred kilometers south and had my new home in a mattrass in the 19 square meters dorm room that we, although we did not know it at the time, would share for the next six months.
Things could have turned sour pretty fast on those conditions, but instead we got to know eachother rather well and since we left a lot of space for each other we ended up having quite a pleasant time. Both of us had grown tired of school, and being on the virge of giving up completely on both education and relationships we soon came to depend on each other as the closest advisor in life's big questions, and thus - mainly - the Handling of Men.
We did - and we still seem to - fall into the exact same trap at the same time. She had fallen in love with the guy next door who regarded her as "his sister", and I was in love with a guy back in Gothenburg who had just broken up with his girlfriend since eleven years back and was hardly going for the young summer fling that I had been.
"You see, I think of you as more of a friend."
I hardly wrote anything at all during that time. I didn't have to. I kept an oral diary in form of a dialouge with Jessie, processed between midnight and four in the morning and covering every aspect of a could-be-relationship there ever was.
Our nights turned into endless recounts of our experiences and thoughts. Sometimes the object of our feelings had said or done something peculiar that made absolutely no sense and that needed translation. Sometimes we were stranded and overwhelmed by feelings and needed some heartfelt advice on how to get out of there. Sometimes we only had to talk ourselves to peace of mind. Whatever the problem, the other one was always there to listen.What ever the other one had been through we rummaged and dissected and discussed until we had reached some form of conclution or had just run out of words.
The uncountable nights we spend in that dorm room, going over and over again what he had said and what he had done that time, and how could he possibly not know how he makes me feel,,?
We were both miserable. We were both heartbroken.
And in some way it was still the happiest time of my life.
Tonight was almost like going back in time. The setting was different; there was no Giger on the wall, no pile of clothes in the ragged armchair, no patch of trees outside the window stanting together so tightly in a square it looked like a bunch of scared cattle. But there was the kettle of tea. There was The Knife playing on the stereo. There was pistage chocolate, the smell of burning candles and me playing Zuma on the Xbox. There was heartbreak.
Most people would probably find our conversations harsh, bitchy and down right mean to those we talk about. Maybe we are. What I don't think that most people understand is that we need this. We can say those things to eachother because we know that we do not mean them deep down inside. We just need to get it out. And it it better to call the love of your life a "god forsaken son of a bitch, a bloody boneless bunny slipper and a whore" with all the bitterness your voice can muster infront of somebody who you know will solemnly nod without you having to worry about them for a moment thinking that you still do not love him from the bottom of your heart, than infront of anybody - no matter how good a friend - who might take it offensively.
We have a strange friendship, Jessie and I. We are both people who are hard to get close to and our frienship is more based on an intimate knowledge about the other girl's personality and emotional pattern - something that naturally developes when you live close together - than a genuine liking and trust, but some things we do share and will always share.
We always listen. We always nod. And once in a while we will always sit down late at night by the flickering light of a candle, with the Knife on the stereo and a cup of tea in our hands and help carry eachothers misery.
Jessie has always liked to do things in candle light. This includes checking your email and writing online journals, which has granted her computer two egg-sized burn marks on either side if the display, and the left corner is melted away so badly I am surprised the display still works. It might explain why it takes so long to start. I don't even know why I turned it on. I should be in bed too. I just felt like I had to something to write. Or at least had to write something - two alternatives miles apart in difference.
It has been a good night.
It is hard to tell how Jessie feels about having me back, she has covered two appartments since I last lived here, but to me it has been quite a lot like it used to be back in 2006. When I moved to Lund I barely knew Jessie. We had met three or four times in the preceding autumn when we had attended the same writing course and then a couple of times during the spring when she had been back in Gvle to visit, but truth be told I was a lot closer to her boyfriend, Johan. It was only in the summer of 2006, on a late night during one of her visits that she came with the suggestion that I should move down to her. I was so tired of Gvle I could jump from the city bridge any day now, and I was welcome to share her room with her for as long as I needed.
In a flash of spontaniousness I agreed and six weeks later I had taken my stuff five hundred kilometers south and had my new home in a mattrass in the 19 square meters dorm room that we, although we did not know it at the time, would share for the next six months.
Things could have turned sour pretty fast on those conditions, but instead we got to know eachother rather well and since we left a lot of space for each other we ended up having quite a pleasant time. Both of us had grown tired of school, and being on the virge of giving up completely on both education and relationships we soon came to depend on each other as the closest advisor in life's big questions, and thus - mainly - the Handling of Men.
We did - and we still seem to - fall into the exact same trap at the same time. She had fallen in love with the guy next door who regarded her as "his sister", and I was in love with a guy back in Gothenburg who had just broken up with his girlfriend since eleven years back and was hardly going for the young summer fling that I had been.
"You see, I think of you as more of a friend."
I hardly wrote anything at all during that time. I didn't have to. I kept an oral diary in form of a dialouge with Jessie, processed between midnight and four in the morning and covering every aspect of a could-be-relationship there ever was.
Our nights turned into endless recounts of our experiences and thoughts. Sometimes the object of our feelings had said or done something peculiar that made absolutely no sense and that needed translation. Sometimes we were stranded and overwhelmed by feelings and needed some heartfelt advice on how to get out of there. Sometimes we only had to talk ourselves to peace of mind. Whatever the problem, the other one was always there to listen.What ever the other one had been through we rummaged and dissected and discussed until we had reached some form of conclution or had just run out of words.
The uncountable nights we spend in that dorm room, going over and over again what he had said and what he had done that time, and how could he possibly not know how he makes me feel,,?
We were both miserable. We were both heartbroken.
And in some way it was still the happiest time of my life.
Tonight was almost like going back in time. The setting was different; there was no Giger on the wall, no pile of clothes in the ragged armchair, no patch of trees outside the window stanting together so tightly in a square it looked like a bunch of scared cattle. But there was the kettle of tea. There was The Knife playing on the stereo. There was pistage chocolate, the smell of burning candles and me playing Zuma on the Xbox. There was heartbreak.
Most people would probably find our conversations harsh, bitchy and down right mean to those we talk about. Maybe we are. What I don't think that most people understand is that we need this. We can say those things to eachother because we know that we do not mean them deep down inside. We just need to get it out. And it it better to call the love of your life a "god forsaken son of a bitch, a bloody boneless bunny slipper and a whore" with all the bitterness your voice can muster infront of somebody who you know will solemnly nod without you having to worry about them for a moment thinking that you still do not love him from the bottom of your heart, than infront of anybody - no matter how good a friend - who might take it offensively.
We have a strange friendship, Jessie and I. We are both people who are hard to get close to and our frienship is more based on an intimate knowledge about the other girl's personality and emotional pattern - something that naturally developes when you live close together - than a genuine liking and trust, but some things we do share and will always share.
We always listen. We always nod. And once in a while we will always sit down late at night by the flickering light of a candle, with the Knife on the stereo and a cup of tea in our hands and help carry eachothers misery.
I can't really talk about my love life (or lack thereof) with my best friend, because my primary interest is his younger sister and, while he's given me his blessing to ask her out, he's not interested in hearing the particulars and I can't blame him. Fortunately, I have another best friend. The one who lives in Dublin. That Dublin thing, though, does get in the way. Whenever he comes into town it's nice to get his counsel. He's the only objective and honest observer I can get. I need to get him a girl, he never comes to me with his girl troubles because he can't be bothered to go and find one.
I tried it because the girl I mentioned in the above post wanted me to. Well, that's not all, but that's the main reason. I happen to know that she's a big fan, so I bought it for her for Christmas. I also have another friend who's a nightly smoker, and he keeps trying to get me to try it. So now I finally have, and all the people who stare at me in amazement, as if I'd told them that I've never tried ice cream, can shut up.
I'll admit, I was hoping for some developments between the girl in question and myself through this whole adventure, but if anything it left me further convinced that it's never gonna happen. I need to start looking elsewhere.