Conquer the world

Love isn’t always spectacular and everlasting, especially in youth. At the time an eighth grade relationship seemed infinite. It feels like you’ve found the person that will love you for the rest of your life, and if by chance, maybe in the life after this. She and I look back on that time, and just laugh. How ignorant we sounded in the grand scheme of things, acting as if our love could conquer the world.

             A few days ago, I texted my ex-girlfriend Taryn. A chance to catch up and talk about what idiots we used to be. The day of our first break up is a bit foggy to both of us. I mean it sort makes sense, it’s been four years since that day and so much has changed. For the record, she broke up with me, and it stands as the worst break up of my young adult life.

            The day before she broke up with me we got into our biggest fight to date. Neither of us can remember what we were fighting about, which probably shows how ridiculous and irrelevant that reason must be. However, I remember her exact words, “Do you want to break up?” I thought she was asking not demanding. I told her no I don’t want to break up, she said ok and the fight was over.

            The next day I walked into class, and people swarmed around me, “OMG you and Taryn broke up?” that was the question of the day, everywhere I went I was bombarded with that question. My explanation to each person was, “no we just got into a fight,” and everyone would say, “That’s not what she’s telling everyone.” I was devastated, why was she saying this? Was the fight really that bad? Was she asking if I wanted to break up or stating that she wanted to? I couldn’t find her at lunch, and I didn’t have her for class until the last two periods. So I was left in silence on her part all day, left to deal with the onslaught of preteen gossip. When I finally saw her at the end of the day, all hell broke loose.

            I screamed at her about love, honesty and about how she embarrassed me beyond belief. She was no stranger to confrontation and began to yell back at me. I told her that she betrayed and how much it hurt to hear from half the school that we had broken up before hearing it from her. She said, “I thought you understood what I meant last night.” She had wanted to break up but didn’t have the heart to tell me directly.

            Since then we’ve had several failed romances and have found our way back to each other several times. Although our “love” wasn’t storybook ready, it was a real experience that we both took a lot from. Love does not conquer all, but it seemed like a nice idea to try, and to continue trying.