If I Knew Then...

People think I have a good memory. I don't. Not really. There are certain events I can recall, places I can remember, things that I did. But the only reason I seem to remember things? Is because I write them down.

I've kept a journal since I was about 12. And I still have them all. Books with puffy, fabric covers. Sketch books with unlined paper. Composition books. No paragraph markings usually. A kinder, gentler version of Kevin Spacey's nutcase journals in Seven. I never vomited on anyone in the subway, either.

I went to visit my hometown this weekend and started thinking about summers in college. And I could not, for the life of me, remember what I'd done the summer between my sophomore and junior year in college. I couldn't remember if my parents were living in New Jersey or Ohio. I couldn't remember if I worked at the Civic Center or if I was hostessing. I couldn't remember who I hung out with and how I spent my time.

So, when all else failed, I went to the journals.

Last night, paging through them in order to jog my memory, I came upon some entries from college.

I was really stupid.

All these entries about boys I liked but was afraid to tell. Entries about boys I hung out with constantly but who hooked up with other girls. Boys I obsessed about who didn't give me the time of day.

My senior year, I was well and truly obsessed. He was the ying to my yang, the black to my white, the Brendan to my Brenda. But not in the creepy, incestuous way. Maybe, had it worked, we would have ended up hating each other for that reason that we were too alike. But then, it was perfect.

I was convinced that it would never work. I was overweight, as only college girls can get overweight. He liked little ditzy cheerleader types, in my mind, most likely because he talked a really big game without ever showing any results. We were just friends and that would be enough. And it was. He graduated and moved to away. I went on to more school. We've lost track of each other now, which makes me sad.

So I'm reading this journal, all about how he's calling me at 2 a.m. to chat. How he would make efforts to come sit next to me. How we'd be out together. And how he was in the bar, playing with my earring...

Huh? Wait, what? Playing with my earring? In a bar? Like, up in my personal space and all? In front of people?

I'm sitting on the floor of my bedroom, surrounded by these books, and lightening strikes.

My God. I totally could have gotten laid.

Dumb. I was so very dumb.

So I closed the book and put it away and crawled into bed, secure in the knowledge that the summer between sophomore and junior year was the really cold and wet summer when I sold pool passes at the Civic Center.

And also knowing that, while I may have missed an opportunity, it was probably one I was better off missing. Because his friendship was worth more than the sex ever could have.

I hope.