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\nIt’s funny, the things you remember. I look at these pictures, casual pictures of me and Mitchell, enjoying coffee on our front steps in Chicago, and if I want to tell the backstory, it involves no less than 4 men. Welcome to my Floozy 20s. <\/p>\n
We lived right behind the Music Box theatre. This is the home where my main flame used to break into my bedroom<\/a> at all hours of the night. It was a happy – and intense – time there. I had fallen madly in love. With this guy,<\/a> referred to from here on out as “74 Facts guy”. It had crashed and burned and I was a wreck. I never got over him, to be honest. Not really. But in the meantime – ah, the weird resiliency of youth – or at least mine – I was still dating other people AND seeing Window-Boy – all at the same time. I keep telling you. I was wild. At the time these photos were taken – why do I remember this? – I was just on the tail-end of this sloth-like “dating” experience<\/a> – the whole “If I go any slower, I will stop” experience – and was feeling a sense of freedom that I had kicked him to the curb. When these photos were taken, I had no idea that within half a year I would be in New York. It all happened very quickly. Here I was, with all the time in the world. But things were intense and I was so sad about 74 Facts guy. He changed my life, my whole world. To this day, I never loved anyone like I loved him. And stopping seeing him was like “sawing off a body limb”, to quote Eminem. But that didn’t mean I ever – not once – stopped seeing the Window-Boy. THAT had nothing to do with falling in LOVE, Window-Boy was my safe place, my comfort zone. I wasn’t emotionally ATTACHED to him, you understand. (Or so I thought. Because I’m smart in some ways and dumb in others.) Somewhere in my head I knew that eventually I would have to drop Window-Boy, obviously, if anything developed in a more serious way with someone else – and I often wondered, “But … how can he and I ever stop doing what we’re doing? Maybe I can still just see him on the side? Who would it hurt?” Oh, young Sheila. MEANWHILE, I had zero idea at the time Window-Boy was the really important one, the one who would last, the one who would have the most impact<\/a>. I mean, it was already HAPPENING and I didn’t realize it. <\/p>\n To complicate things further, I was still saying “Yes” to pretty much everyone who asked me out. With some fun results and some disastrous results, and some irritating results like “I think we should slow down” guy. Dude. I can’t GO any slower. Do you have any idea how fast I am? Seriously. I’m FAST. Your sloth’s pace barely even registers on my over-charged speedometer. I was so over it.<\/p>\n To add yet ONE MORE MAN to the subtext of this picture – see that cup I’m holding? It’s this cup<\/a>, the one I stole, during my brief comforting romance with Michael the previous fall. <\/p>\n So, to recount: simultaneously I was None of this felt like cheating. None of it WAS cheating. Everything was up in the air, un-finalized. The only thing that WAS final – the only thing that was LASTING – only I didn’t realize it at the time – was Window-Boy. <\/p>\n Such were my 20s. I’m still friends with Michael. On occasion I still hear from 74 Facts guy. I never know when he’ll pop up. We’re each others’ Roads Not Taken and What If’s. <\/p>\n And Window-Boy? He’s gone. (Coincidentally, it’s his birthday today.) But we closed our relationship beautifully, with everything said we needed to say, everything out in the open and a clear awareness and gratitude that we found each other. <\/p>\n But to that girl in the picture? With her white plastic barrettes and little polka dot dress and … white leggings? Really, Sheila? White leggings? She thought 74 Facts guy was THE one. She knew she would never get over him and she didn’t. She considered Michael as the next valid option, a calmer option, a more comfortable option. This led to a marriage proposal a couple years later, which I said yes to<\/i>, but that’s another story. And she considered Window-Boy her playmate. Which he was. The girl in the white plastic barrettes had NO IDEA how much more he was. <\/p>\n Thank God I figured it out eventually. Like, last April. No time like the present. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It’s funny, the things you remember. I look at these pictures, casual pictures of me and Mitchell, enjoying coffee on our front steps in Chicago, and if I want to tell the backstory, it involves no less than 4 men. … Continue reading
\n1. madly in love with 74 Facts guy
\n2. mourning 74 facts guy
\n3. fucking around with Window-Boy
\n4. enjoying really my first normal romance with Michael.
\n5. dating around, finding that most men couldn’t hold a candle to the above-mentioned Triumvirate. <\/p>\n