Ho Choi

You were there.

In another life where our lives crossed again.

You showed me a stone rubbed smooth from the adventures it’s seen, once rough when I first gave it to you.

It was tangible, you were right there.

I let myself fall into the facade, not before catching a glimpse of the reality of my world as it was.

Had myself an adventure today. Went to a hike that put me through Pike’s Peak highway. I paid $15 for it so I figured I’d see it through.

The road goes up past Devil’s Playground. That was the insane trail we did when we were here in Colorado last. You pushed me at some point and I just collapsed on the ground. Took you a second to realize I was actually exhausted.

I didn’t end up hiking that trail. Too much for me being by myself. There’s a turnout for Devil’s Playground along the road. did you know that it connects to Pike’s Peak? If we did another mile and a half, we would’ve made it to the summit.

From where I am now, I see Devil’s Playground. It’s really cool to see where we went. I also see the trail that would lead to Pike’s Peak.

Remember how we spent the whole day hiking up, only to spend 15 minutes at the top of the mountain because storm started to roll in?

the weather is better now, sunny, and not a cloud in sight. It’s a lot drier than I remember, but still cold and windy.

It’s peaceful here, this view could last forever.

I hope you’re doing well. This might be my final journal entry I write to you. These emotions were going to resurface sooner or later while I was here, but this too shall pass.

I feel... ugly. Unwanted.

It’s the same process every winter. The sun sets quicker, the weather gets colder, I try to look for someone to spend time with, but the same result always ensues. So I just wait it out, find other things to occupy my time until the summer sunshine forces loneliness into hibernation.

But it always comes back.

It’s been like this for ten years. I feel pathetic. Every encounter I have with a girl never comes to anything. The furthest I’ve gotten was Gemini back in March, but even that was only a product of quarantine. It was never genuine. If you disregard that, then two dates is the furthest I’ve ever gotten with someone. But then she called it off.

I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.

I am under the belief that other girls don’t find me attractive. Once I had mentioned to a girl friend that I was on a dating app and was swiping right on everyone. Her response was of shock, she asked me why I would do that, as she would be overwhelmed with matches.

That’s where the discrepancy lies. It’s just easy for them. Not for me. Oftentimes I swipe right on everyone until I hit the limit, and not a single match.

I know it sounds so, trivial, for me to be upset over this. But it just fucking sucks. Not having created an authentic connection in essentially my entire young adult life, any glimmer of hope is a ray of light in the chasm I’ve found myself in. Every single time I try to climb up towards the top, the rock breaks away, and I’m dragged back to the ground.

I’ve complained about this a million times already, and here I am doing it again.

Spent Saturday night with her. We finally found some time to go to that art gallery, but it was one of those drive through ones and it was pretty short.

Ended up going to her place afterward, watched a few shows. At the end of the night, I asked what I should've the last time I was there. But she said no.

I was disappointed, got a bit ahead of myself.

I know we already talked about it over text, but I apologized the next morning, she said it was okay. Told her about how I'd been thinking about her for a while ever since the one night. And that I would really like the opportunity to take her out.

Thus is the first time I suppose I've really been thinking about a friend in a while. Like, friend to relationship. Will perhaps this isn't the first.

We had hooked up a little while ago, we were both drunk, but she started it by saying that she liked me.

Talked about it the next day, but it was a weird spot for both of us. But I've been thinking about her since.

Really wanted to do the pumpkin patch downtown, with the art gallery installation with her, but she cancelled on me last minute. Said she had a panic attack, can't blame her. But the cynical side of me says it was her way of getting out of it.

I do this thing every few months or so, where I'll go to one of my extra Instagram accounts and see how Treasure has been doing. Probably shouldn't have done that tonight. I guess it's a bit creepy too.

Last I saw her, she had plans to Germany. Little later she was in New Zealand. After that she was back home in New Mexico, but is going to be somewhere in Arizona.

I found out that she's engaged. He seems to be a better fit for her than I'd ever be; I think I'd just weigh her down.

Still waiting on a response from Tesla. Told her I wanted to talk through things before we even gave it a chance at being friends again. Clearly whatever happened was significant enough for us to not be friends for over half a year. She's not said anything back yet.

Doing better. A lot better.

She replied to me, after I said I wasn't okay, that I'd felt a lot of emotions. She said she didn't know what to say, but mentioned a show that we watched before all this blew up.

I said I was looking forward to it, but I hadn't started it incase we had mended things.

I replied finally, it was last night.

Today I left... some peace, finally. That mental barrier, I was causing myself all that pain, but for what? Maybe just some dumb emotional cycle.

I'm going back and forth between feeling anger towards her and just wanting to make things right again. I don't know if the anger is justified, but I'm just conflicted. This thing has been on my mind for days now, tearing me apart.

“Are you okay?”

That’s what she said after I sent that text message and threw my phone. Clearly with all this posting, probably not. But I haven’t responded.

Why not? Why haven’t I said anything? Why haven’t I really responded to any of my friends that have been checking up on me?

It’s the power dynamic. A sense of control.

This whole situation, I’ve felt helpless, normally I’d be able to just roll with a situation like this. But this one is different. It’s felt like I’ve been out of it for so long. Prompting the question puts attention on me, I can dictate what happens after this situation.

I haven’t done anything yet. I’ve left Telsa and my friends hanging. Like a recovering addict in withdrawal, relapsing for the first time, I’m feeding off of this, relishing in sin. It’s why I decided to do this by myself; it’s not that I don’t want the help of others. I want them to know that I’m not okay, but denying them the opportunity to do anything else.

Maybe she’s found it in herself to forgive me. I clearly made her very, very angry. Was it justified? Was it just the kiss? Or was there something else that had been building? I don’t know.

What have we learned from Treasure? Two years later and she’s still in my head, even though I felt like I had to cut her out. There are still times when I think about that trip to Colorado, and what I would’ve done if given another chance. From the beginning, since I met her, there was something different. I didn’t know it, but she was the girl. I went through the whole roller coaster of emotions. The hardest about about Treasure was realizing that there was a life beyond her. I had to cut the anchor to set sail.

We have Diplomat. I hadn’t talked about her in a while. She was an instance where we stopped being friends, and mended our friendship. Given that it was a different circumstance, well, not all of these can be identical. But, we’re friends again. Obviously we don’t talk everyday, I’d say she’s a bit elusive. We’ve worked past that time in our relationship. That day in the cafe, that was the fork in the road. I had to choose between keeping or leaving her. Diplomat was the one to reach out to me that summer, I didn’t think I’d ever hear from her again. She chose that path, to keep me in her life, but I had to meet her halfway on that bridge.

So what do I do with Tesla? Diplomat had the more favorable outcome, and I still look back on Treasure. I think the answer is clear here.

I’m trying to go through these hurdles more on my own, I feel like I’m reliant on my friends for emotional support maybe a little too much. The only time I write on here nowadays is to talk about my feelings, so it only makes sense. 

This is my second time writing this cause I thought I had copied all the text when I went to click out of writing the post, but then it deleted everything.

I am feeling things, that's for certain. Obviously I was not prepared to see her.

We had talked a bit during the protests, there were bigger issues happening then (and now). Back in early June we established that we still cared about each other. I'd looked up how to get someone out of jail; she was among those that got arrested, but subsequently released.

A few weeks after that, I had to take my car into the shop to get spark plugs and a couple other things done. It was going to be a while, so I asked her if she would've wanted to pick me up since she lived close. Never got a response.

Thursday she finally got back to me. Said life was busy. She sent a photo of a trip we took to Arkansas last year, the two of us were there, sitting in my hammock. We're actually enjoying each other's company, can't really say that now.

I hadn't responded when I saw her at the coffeeshop. I didn't know what to say. She took me to one of the lowest places I'd been.

I kissed her on the forehead, everything blows up, but now we can be friends again? We've not really done anything to mend the friendship other than letting time pass. Half a year it's been since I last saw her. In June, during the protests, I had to call her cause we were trying to coordinate. We never ended up meeting up, but hearing her voice, it was nice.

There's a photo I took of her when we went camping once. She mentioned that she could never take a serious photo; I told her that I like thinking of her happy. That's still true, but it hurts to do so now.

Can we go back to being friends? I don't know how that would work out. I am scared of the resurgence of my emotions.

I saw Tesla on Saturday.

Almost drove to get tacos that morning, but stepped out of my car to walk to the coffee shop for bagels, brought a blanket for a picnic on the courthouse lawn. Got myself an iced tea, waited for my order.

Happened to look behind me, that was her walking in with someone. Didn't see me through the windows as she walked in. It's the first time I'd seen her in about half a year. Anxiety set in, heart rate rose up. I was still waiting on the bagel, maybe it'd be done before they were able to order. Kept my head down, maybe she wouldn't see me. Leg was bouncing up and down. What was she going to say? What was I going to say? Should I just walk out?

She called out my name.

I looked up. She looked surprised, I think. Maybe even a relieved disbelief. I certainly wasn't.

I didn't know what to do. She asked how I'd been, I don't remember what I said. Some small talk answer to discourage conversion. She introduced her friend, he looked kinda familiar. They were at the climbing gym together just easier. She noticed the blanket, asked if I was going for a picnic.

"Yeah."

They called my order.

I promptly stood up, grabbed my things. Walked past them, half looking.

"See you around."

I think I am slipping back into a depressive state. There was a time a while back where I thought this was happening, but I think it’s happening again.

I feel so... unmotivated, but frustrated at the fact that I am not doing anything. I haven’t kept up with my 365 photo project as well as I had been since before the protests. The dishes are left out for whole weeks. I leave the laundry to air dry from weekend to weekend and don’t even bother trying to put them up. I want to put in job applications, but that doesn’t happen either.

The whole Gemini thing is still in my head. I saw her the other day when I was driving, and while I thought I had been okay, I just felt sadness and anger. I’m upset with that whole situation not only cause of what she’d done, but because I believe the thing with her only happened as a product of the quarantine. In normal times I wouldn’t have had a chance, so I just feel, unwanted, pathetic. 

Haven’t heard from Tesla in forever. That’s something that has bothered me more as of recently. She followed me back on Twitter, not that social media is an indicator of the health of a friendship, but she did. Although I had her muted because I would see tweets from time to time pop up, and I didn’t want to be reminded of her while we still hadn’t figured things out between us. A few weeks back I asked if she’d want to pick me up from the mechanic while I had work done on my car, since she lived close, but I didn’t get a response. Every few days I will go through her tweets to see if she’s said anything that could remotely be about me; it’s kind of obsessive in a way, probably not in a healthy way. I think this one is because it’s a loose end. From this, I suppose I just want a mended friendship.

Dating apps aren’t helping much either. Some other friends have an easy time getting matches, and having conversations on there. But it’s a struggle for me, I don’t think people find me attractive. For others, going on those apps has a somewhat real expectation of being able to meet someone, but it’s just a shot in the dark for me. I don’t have much choice, and at times I am letting too attached to a face on a screen, not healthy either. For anyone that gives me the time of day, I clutch onto that feeling, it is nice knowing that you are wanted.

Seems like the running theme for all these is a lack of attention. Loneliness is one of my biggest fears, normally I get get away from that feeling by travelling and just doing things, but the pandemic doesn’t help. And it’s too hot be outside and get away from my phone and the internet.  It feels like I don’t matter; I’m not wanted. And that discourages my motivation, because what’s the point in taking care of myself if there isn’t any payoff?

Saw that Gemini posted a video on her Instagram. Tried to avoid tapping on it but it scrolled over to hers as I was watching someone else’s. So I went to her profile and decided to see if she was still following me, but she wasn’t.

I don’t know why, but that just made me really upset. I had her tupperware that she gave me for banana bread once, wrote a note that said, “I hope you’re learning.” Left that on her front door, but I was debating whether or not to put a note there in the first place. I thought about it a little later and decided maybe I should take it back, but when I passed by again, it was already gone.

She texted me a few days later telling me happy birthday, even though she had it written on her calendar on the day of. Then she asked she didn’t understand what the note meant. I didn’t reply. A week later she asked if I was ever going to reply. I was not.

I hadn't seen her for a while. I believe we were driving through Colorado, passed by a house that I knew was hers.

So we stopped. Found myself in the bathroom, washing my hands.

That's when she walked in. Her hair, she looked different. But joyous to see me.

I was hesitant, but holding a grudge was just so exhausting.