In theory these mementos serve to bring back the moment.
In fact they serve only to make clear how inadequately I appreciated the moment when it was here.
-Blue Nights by Joan Didion
Tonight was the last night for South Street Seaport. It will be demolished and replaced with a more modern looking structure. I will miss seeing its red truss-like structure when I cross the Manhattan Bridge by train. Most of all, I will miss its shops and food court where I shared moments with my ex-girlfriends. I brought Angela to the candy store two years ago and I brought her to the food court one night where we got into a little argument. I won't forget buying her a blue bow at this boutique makeup store on the second floor. We won't be able to spend time there anymore once the boards come down and the wrecking ball claims the building.
My homegirl just started teaching. She leaves work a little bit after 9 P.M. This is unexpected; I had always expected my friends to find 9 to 5 jobs that would afford them a peace of mind and adequate time for maintaining a social life. I guess the 9 to 5 routine is still a dream sequence. There are friends who are on call and have to wait for their schedules to arrive or wait until their bosses call them. Some of my friends even work two to three jobs and forsake sleep time just to make ends meet. And I have the nerve to ask their friends why they have disappeared on Facebook...because they are too busy working and cannot afford to waste time doing other things. To some people, money is priority. Obviously money is not a priority to me because I am not working and am not desperate to find work, therefore I'm not in a desperate state, yet I emphasize that I am in dire need of a job. Beggars can't be choosers, my friends remind me. If I really wanted a job, I would be working right now as a waiter, busboy, janitor, anything, instead of complaining. Complaining is a luxury. Some people don't get to complain; they only get to hunch their backs over and sweep floors or do stockroom over night.
There are so many memories floating around in my head, still finding themselves. Two nights ago I had a dream about her. It was the first time I had a dream about her: we were spending time with each other in our dream as if we had never broken up. This makes me sad. I wonder if I will get an opportunity to sit in the LIRR train car again and observe the city fade into trees and woods and shrubs. Just thinking about the changing of scenery makes my heart ache. It makes me feel weak and queasy, perhaps how she felt when I hurt her four times. In essence I played with her emotions by bringing her up and then letting her down, so high and so low that her hopes collapsed. I feel guilty, still. I will miss going to Penn Station and looking at the time, and asking the Information booth what track her train will arrive on. Seeing her with her luggage and her dangling earphones, I would greet her, help her carry the suitcase up the steps and then cuddle with her until we reached Canal Street. These moments continue to haunt me whenever I pass Penn Station. I am tempted to cross the concourse level and buy a bag of popcorn, relive those moments we shared when we hugged each other in tears, but I know that I should not bring myself misery and pain. I won't forget that night we had noodles together at this noodle house right across the street from campus. I won't forget speaking to her as my train pulled away. I kept her company as she walked back to her dorm---I was worried about her safety that I kept communicating with her. She told me she saw a cute bunny in the bushes, but I told her to race back to her dorm, especially because the walk is long and the path is covered by bushes. I really worried about her because I wanted to see her the next day and talk to her.
Do I fall in love with women too quick? Do I attract a certain type of women? I always think to myself, why do I not learn from my mistakes? It's because I'm stubborn. But to say that I'm stubborn is a way of not actually digging deeper into my problems. I'm stubborn to investigate. Stubbornness leads to more stubbornness. That's why she insisted that I face my problems instead of avoiding them. I've spent most of my life avoiding my fears instead of facing them head on. Take math for example. I've always feared mathematics ever since I failed my pre-calculus class twice in high school. Ever since those two low grades I loathed numbers so much that I took sociology in college just to avoid taking necessary mathematics courses. I was frightful of numbers. But I know that in order to excel I must take the GREs which involves mathematics questions. Revisiting math is inevitable: it is unavoidable in any job that I take up. Why do I keep digressing? I think I fall for a certain type of women, women who are vulnerable, weak, sensitive, emotional, and traditional. This is strange because I state that I want an independent women who does not conform to society, yet the type of women I fall for are traditional, cloistered, and subservient women who don't mind letting me do all the work around the house. Perhaps it's true that I want someone who is vulnerable and needs a knight in shining armor. But this is unrealistic because my potential wife cannot be sad at all times of the day; I cannot wait for her to break down in order to show my love for her. Hollywood moments are all I care for; music video moments are all I crave. I want that existential touch of connection---the moment a woman looks at me on the train is a moment of possible romance. This is rather unrealistic, idealistic, and blatantly silly. I project my romantic ideals into my everyday filter of the world. I see the world as my playground and I try to shape my romances with women. However, women know that I am sensationalizing them and romanticizing them, making them less real and more ideal. This immediately lets them know that I am flirting with them. Every woman I meet I potentially flirt with them and I use my excuse that I am simply affable and gregarious. Women know the real trick---when a man is easy, he is not worth chasing. As Bruno Mars sang, "Easy come, easy go." Nothing in life comes easy, not even romance. My Dad always asks Where in the world will there be a large hen walking the streets? Where can a farmer find such a plump chicken? Opportunities don't come that easy---you have to work for them!
I'm reading a Susan Walsh article about nice guys attracting zero women. She explains that bad boys score women and keep reeling them at a flirtatious distance because they give off charm, something to mold, and a particular thrill that nice guys cannot offer women. Walsh also explains that bad boys attract weak women. Bad boys do not bother with confident women because they know that confident women will not want them. She also adds that nice guys are being converted into bad guys just so they can get that thrill from chasing a woman who likes to be chased just for the hell of being chased. There are so many qualms about immature women this, women that, but the truth is women in their twenties want to do the same thing that men in their twenties do: they want to "sleep around" and "explore" their options. This increases the wait time for a partner who is willing to "settle" or not sleep around. Patience is eventually a virtue because men will have to wait until women are in their thirties: once they are out of that phase they will settle down with one man and start a family. Not only does the biological clock restrict a woman from being lascivious, it also acts as a double standard to obstruct women from escaping reproductive obligations. A woman is perpetually a child-bearer, and it is "abnormal" for a woman to keep sleeping around after her thirties, especially if she has her mind set on marriage and forming a family.
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