middle school boys suck

I talked to my mom today and she was full of hometown gossip. Apparently one of the guys I grew up with is engaged. Normally I would just roll my eyes and bitch about it. But this guy is different. He single-handedly scarred me for life. I can blame two guys for my destructive relationship behavior. This is one of them. He was a spoiled brat and a huge jerk. Even in elementary school. But we went to the same school, pool, our parents were friends, etc... When we were in 7th grade, we were hanging out at the pool and he looked me dead in the eyes with a strait face, and said "No one will ever love you because you're fat." If that doesnt hurt a middle school aged girl, I dont know what does. I'm not fat now, and I wasn't fat then. But I can still hear his voice and every time I'm rejected by a boy, I think it's because of my weight. I was very insecure in my younger years. I'm a lot over that now, but that moment is one I will never forget. And when I heard he was engaged, I just thought "Poor girl. I hope she knows what she's getting into."

the ex engagement

I got a text message from R one afternoon that said "_____ just got engaged. I might jump off a bridge." _____ was R's high school love and she was convinced they were destined to be together. We all have one (or two or three) of those. And even when you haven't talked to that boy for several years and even when you know he's been dating someone seriously, it still feels like a knife to the heart when you hear the news.

A few months later, I was able to fully understand what she meant. One of my boyfriends (for lack of a better word) in college had gotten engaged. And this one hurt even worse because he had cheated on me with the girl he was engaged to. He cheated on me with her IN FRONT OF me. While that incident did involve a lot of alcohol, it still happened and it was still painful.

Aside from the bitter jealousy that they found happiness before us, we are still left with the realization that we're old enough to be getting married. It's not weird anymore. We're not too young. In fact, it's kinda normal and expected to start getting engaged. So where does that leave us? With several bottles of wine.