Tumbleweeds

It was always important for me, that whoever I dated that they be their own person; I had dated girls who had tried to make me into something I was not, and still am not, and I have dated girls who tried to change themselves into who they thought I wanted them to be. All I wanted was a girl that could silence me with a look and put me in my place with a few calculated words, I wanted someone that was strong, someone that was independent.

Then one day, a girl sat down across the hallway from me; I kept peering over the top of my book at her, casually holding a book that she was thoroughly engrossed in and nimble fingers flipped the pages. She seemed not to notice me, but later she would tell me that she often could feel my gaze on her skin. We began to talk, then we began to casually spend time together, then we began to date, and I knew I had found her. It was as though we were two tumbleweeds being thrown across the desert by the wind, the will of Mother Nature, and by some chance we had become tangled together. I was gasoline, and she was my spark, and together we were content to watch the world burn as long as we had one another.

We were two separate individuals, with entirely different desires in life; she wanted to travel and move away while I wanted to stay in Washington, she drank tea and wine while I drank coffee and beer, she was elegant and fashionable while I was grungy and would pull on pants and a t-shirt, you could hear me coming before you saw me and you would often be unaware that she was even there, and so much more. However, despite all of our differences in who we were, who we wanted to be, and what we wanted out of life, we spent so much time together, doing all sorts of different things; reading, watching movies, napping, going to thrift stores, listening to and swapping records, and whatever else we felt like doing. We were in love, for the first time in both of our lives.

After months of being together, it started small, with my hand; it became independent as she told me that she did not like holding hands, then bodily contact in general was halted as she no longer wanted to embrace one another or even sit close to me on the couch, then at social gatherings and in passing she would avert her gaze from mine and disappear into another room as soon as I walked in, and then eventually I was no longer a part of a couple. I was completely independent. We had become untangled and she was blown away from me, and just like I always figured it was in a completely different direction from me, and I found myself stuck in a cactus patch.

That is the problem that comes with dating an independent girl, that sooner or later you yourself are left independent; far more than you ever have been in your life.

Submitted by ttugaw.