In which Jenny wishes she could suspend time ever-so-slightly....

           There’s something about driving home alone late at night and listening to some generic rock song with acoustic guitar buried somewhere in the background that makes you feel, and I’m sorry to borrow such a now clichéd phrase—infinite.  It’s almost as if you are an actor in the ongoing filming of the movie of your life.  Like you just accomplished something grand and beautiful and here you are, driving away feeling a sense of “wow-everything-is-great”-ness. 

            I can say that the times I was alone in the car listening to said type of music were some of the most perfect moments in my life.  Like searching for that song they played during your favorite part of your favorite movie—because what you saw clicked with what you heard, and those both clicked with what you felt—an awesome triad.  It just feels as if all the planets are in alignment and the world in those few minutes cannot get any better, and that state can last even after the moment is gone. 

The glow can be compared to activating Star Power on Guitar Hero.  Here you are, rocking out strong in the beginning, but as time goes on, the feeling wanes as well.  For me, the terminus of this is an epic crash.  I begin to realize the harsh reality of—well…reality.  I remember that my life is not a movie.  I do not reach a conclusion after the climax and falling action of my story.  My ends are not tied together and I do not have a happy ending, complete with final credits music (which, I might add, is never as good as the climax music).  It took me years to learn how to deal with the feeling I got as a child after a party.  When people left my house after a big party or a dinner, it always made me feel weird.  The same thing would happen upon returning home after a family gathering in another place.  I think now I have to learn how to combat coming home from a magical power drive into the truth of life.    

            Sometimes I wished I knew more people that understood what any of this means.  I feel like we would be instant best friends.   

 

    It was upon listening to a song played on the train ride home following our second date that I remembered why I ever wanted to claim you as my own in the first place.  It was one of those flashbulb memories, you know, the opening chords and bass line to some cheesy indie love song thum-thum away and I am on the brink of ending a torrid spell of adolescence, sheepishly smiling to myself on the subway.  I am recapping by the first line first verse how you wore those shoes that I learned to love you in and how you awkwardly backtracked on your knowledge of psychosexual stages.  Maybe you were flustered by the fact that you claimed to know Freud and yet were now saying, “Well, I did at one point. I guess I’m a bit foggy.”  It was safe to say that I was enthralled to mention penises and anal stages in a socially accepted venue, mostly because I wanted to check your expression when I took a deliberate look into your eyes and talked about sex.  I unconsciously gripped at the fabric of my skirt, noting the glimmer of joy in your eyes.
   
    Its obvious that by the second verse my mind wanders to the first time we made love.  It was premature and desperate.  It was sloppy and drunken.  It was terribly inappropriate, as neither of us was willing.  Back then, we hadn’t found the words to describe what it was that we were to each other and that was made us want to wait.  However, with time we realized our regret lay in the hope that we would be together, and something grander than either of us could comprehend was about to happen.
   
    By the third verse, I realized it was love.  It was this song playing when the first words that dripped from my mouth from day to day were you, and my weeks were scheduled around freezing 2 am romps around town with my hand in your sweatshirt pocket.  When my top five list of people I’ve ever loved most in the world slowly shifted to (finally) contain you.  When I left the country I missed you so much that every day I felt like my heart would just burst right there on Vestergaad 6 and Danes in trendy pashmina scarves would slice through the pieces with spinning bicycle tires.  When I learned that in my lengthy history of sprinting away from commitment, you were the first person I couldn’t leave at the starting gates.
   
    The fifth or sixth verse (I’ve lost count by now) conjures an image of me on yet another train, listening to the same anthem, this time with a different timbre. I remember the glass shard words.  I recall thinking that nothing existed that could plug the dam unleashing my flood of tears.  I think of the different places I cried that spring and summer, how many street corners and cross town buses bore the mark of my pain.  I replay the different times I turned my back on you and made you go home alone.  The times I abandoned all good sense in my head and prayed to whatever deity I previously denied the existence of for things to work out.
   
    But, then, I think of the expression you paint across those gorgeous eyes when you are thinking about how much you love me.  The times we laughed at such stupidity for minutes on end and laughed again for those inside jokes afterward.  I think of the pulse of your hand as you whispered the words to “our” song under the flicker of stage lights.
   
    And then I think that I should have never left you. 
   
    Something about this city feels not-quite and almost.  Something about being away from home makes me long for you and falling in love in a place you love.  Being here does not feel like love.  As a matter of fact, being here doesn’t feel much like anything.  The buildings here don’t hold periods in time.  The streets here don’t smell like our history.
   
    The interesting part of this story is that you never left. You are still here. We left together, yet we’re not the same.  We are not fledgling, squirmy balls of post-embryonic relationship.  We are not new.  I suppose we never changed, but something did.  It feels a lot like wearing a long sleeved button up shirt with a sweater with a blazer. You can wear them all together, and it may make you look nice, but it doesn’t fit right.  Yet, I can say I am happy.  I can say we are happy. 
   
    Perhaps we are a sentence taken out of context.  Perhaps we are polished version of a rough cut demo. (Perhaps we are The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me, but not Your Favorite Weapon?)
   
    Well, whatever the metaphor, we have to make new memories out of where we are.  We’ve finished too much of this wonderfully eclectic LP to end this song once and for all.  I care about you too much to.  I can finally say that I am ready to retire this one to the shelf and start work on our new album.  I know that no matter where I am, my heart will be there as long as you are with me.
   
    I love you, baby.  Thank you for an amazing two years.  I can’t wait for more.