To All the Girls I've Loved Before

To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before and how they shaped me. Yes! guys have feelings too, guys could break too, we are hurt by the things girls say also — it’s Vic-versa, it’s a paradox, it’s a never-ending story when it comes to our emotions romantically. If all we do as human is just point fingers to the other gender and blame each other about he said she said and categorizing all male and female to be the same as the last ones. How can we progress emotionally? If we could sit down and listen to others and their stories then maybe emotionally we can build a bridge to the hearts of each other and become more educated emotionally and spiritually. Here are some old memories that shaped me to become someone better, breaking me, making me, and completing me. These are my trials and tribulations with my emotions romantically with others. ***Read at your own emotional risk***

-Kaitlin, She came first, definitely was the most Tomboyish — she played middle school Basket Ball and was really good at it too. This story was a prime example of why Boys and Girls can’t be friends because someone will catch feelings sooner or later. She’s the most relatable; all of our classes we had together, we had the same type of humor, exchanged funny jokes, we’ve even become locker neighbors. That’s how close we were; We were able to talk to each other about our problems even math problems. She would pummel me because she was the toughest and I would steal her stuff — After all, sleight of hand was my specialty; don’t freak out I always give her stuff back after she realized that it was gone. These memorize are the best because we were at a time where careless fun was still just fun. I never really thought much about it just that we were close — I was dumb, I think I’m still pretty dumb I can’t read signs, understand gestures. If there was ever any gestures. She would often ask me to stay and watch her games and we would support each other special events like birthdays and whenever we received straight A’s in our class, although she was much cooler than me in every way. Like come on yeah we’re cool with everyone and made lots friends but she but she was an upcoming athlete; crossed me out during free-time playing basketball after lunch. She was much more famous and knew more people, I was that Asian kid that everyone knew can draw and want as their artist in projects. It was after class and we were headed to our lockers to swap out books, everything seems like a normal day till a classmate of ours sexually harassed her by grabbing her from the back and verbally and physically insulted her — she didn’t react or knew what to do. Of cores, this boiled my blood and in an instant, I pushed him on to the wall and defended her because no one should be disrespected like that. That kind of nature is just animal-like and I find it primitive and uncivilized, we’ve come this far only to still disrespect our women? But can you blame her for not knowing how to react, can you blame anyone who was there that didn’t know what to do? I wonder how things would have been if I didn’t step up or if I wasn’t her locker neighbor. We should always help everyone even the strongest people in our life — She was one of the strongest girls I knew even till this day I believe she is still strong and powerful wherever she goes she carries this energy, but it hits a little hard seeing how hopeless or how defenseless and confused she looked. I don’t how much that moment affected her, all I recall was her brushing it off. That’s something that I love about her, is how even when something like this happens to her she held her head up high and kept moving; that’s something to admire.

-Hanna, I can’t say her actual name just because her name was funny enough for the guys to have a debate about it. I recall laughing and she responded, not knowing me and my buddy was talking about another topic. I guess you can call her a Crush; I didn’t think much about crushes or feelings at this age, I was more worried about being top of the scoreboard on Halo3. She was the cutest and into a lot of things I liked — anime, k-pop, and hip-hop; her sister was super ghetto so I can see how she into black culture also. She was the shy type but ghetto when needed to be, I thought that was funny especially with her glasses whenever she’ll fix her glasses during a ghetto debate. Middle school was a time of discovery, I did a lot of drawing as an art major and she would often give me advise on drawing too, she also would compliment me about my crazy taste in fashion inspired by my BIGGEST role model (Kwon Ji-Yong or G Dragon) her being into k-pop she knows very well about Big Bang — Our school had uniforms and as a rebel, I’ll always do a spin on it to stand out. Talk about being a rebel I was still shy on the inside. Have I ever asked her out…..No. Does it seem like all the signs were there? why didn’t I risk it and step up? I was young and I didn’t know anything about feelings, love, emotions and what they were. I was also heavily influenced by my parents — If you don’t know a lot of Hmong parents don’t like Vietnamese people because of the Vietnam/Secret war, they see them as an enemy not knowing a lot of Vietnamese families that are here in the US is also here to escape the war. BUT! enough about politics and war. I didn’t know better I just listen to my parents and I would often hear that voice behind me as guilt to listen and be a good kid. 8th Grade Social came around, It was like prom but for kids taken place in our cafeteria — these were easy and funny times. As it got closer I was pressured to ask her out to our 8th grade social by all my friends and all my classmates; Yes even Kaitlin pressured me to. But would you consider it being pressured when I too wanted this to happen? I contemplated myself, consulted my inner demons and gather all the courage I could, Yes! I would break out of this shell and ask her to the 8th grade Social. I recalled as I was walking down the hallway on my way to ask her, my Best Friend came running down saying someone asked her out someone already asks her to 8th grade social and with as a cherry on top my Best Friend even said “Dang Josh, you suck at this”…….Boy was that a killer. I laugh and played it cool “Nice! I hope the best for her”. — Always The school was ending and well 8th Grade Social happen, I went with all my friends and we just wanted to have a good time but I will always remember how sad and disappointed she was. Dude never showed up, back then there wasn’t a term for it but yeah he flexed on her. How could you ask her to 8th grade social and flex on her? I remember how we try to comfort her and I recall telling her to stay with all of us “Friends” but I can feel how disappointed and let down she was, Yes it's only an 8th grade social but these things mean so much more to us young and our dumb feelings. I will always remember to this day how I don’t ever want this horrible feeling on anyone and I will always remember to not let others determine who I can have feelings for not even my parents not even my culture not even the color of my skin.

--Tiffany,

Always the smartest and the brightest. High School was pretty nice, I played a lot of sports and got to know a lot of people during this phase of my life but Tiffany was a different story. I knew her for a while now — you can say since Middle School in a way. She’s always busy and working on extra credit stuff, always worried about not going anywhere in life which is something amazing about her because she’s always thinking ahead. Something I do adore about her is being able to talk to anyone and be very understanding; like her level of understanding is on another level. We would always talk about Korean Dramas and K-pop (NOTE. this was a time where if you listen to kpop you were considered weird) she wasn’t Asian which was surprising because of how much she knew about other culture. We would often debate about things that happen around the world from social problems to global warming and just about anything you can think of that teenagers would talk about — Lunch was always the best because of it, there was never a dull day when we debated about ongoing topics. Obviously, as a guy, we find this attractive but maybe she found me annoying sometimes. We often walked each other to class, well more like I wanted to walk her to class; she didn’t need me to walk her but we just enjoy the company. I’ve learned so much from her. I thought I was open-minded and understanding but with her, I question myself a lot, not in doubt but more in surprise. Learning more about who I was as a whole, learning to change and adapt, learning how to love not just me but also my enemy. Prom came around in a blink of an eye. Everyone was so excited there was talk about prom and who’s everyone’s date — like usual there I was again a solo with all my friends; some of my friends wanted to do a quadruple date but I had to get a date first. I couldn’t think of anyone else, I spent my time so occupied with school, work, sports, art, and clubs just like any good Asian kid would — I’ve never thought that far to Prom. The only one I could even think of is my friend Tiffany; a girl who’s always been there, someone you could relate too — maybe Prom won't be so boring if she was there. Yet there’s something I could never change about myself; it is how I’m always a few seconds late when it comes to understanding how I feel. Do I really like her with feelings or still just as friends I spent days waiting at our usual lunch spot, days walking our usual path to our classes. Wondering if maybe we can just go to prom as friends and maybe later I can discover myself if I really do feel anything. Yet again I came up short — prom was right around the corner still no sign of her….that’s weird right, only to find out from my buddy that she finished all her credits and went into early college and was planning to finish the rest of the year in our local community college instead of high school. Bummer, I know right…for a guy like me who’s always up to trend and on the latest news I’m always a few seconds late when it comes to these things.

-Mia,

The most impactful and the most painful. Have you ever felt whole one day and empty the next, this feeling sucks but have you ever felt whole and ripped apart in that very moment?

These days were the most difficult, fresh-men in college and everyone was lost not knowing where to go — like as in classes but Yes! everyone didn’t know where they were on an emotional and spiritual level also.

This one was strange. Would I call it Love? I don’t know; Was it Obsession? I don’t know. In today’s world, we may never know…I may never know, But I do know how I felt. It felt very real it gave me a very different sensation it felt warm for a moment.

She was probably the most human, imperfect but also whole. She smiled the most — she smiled whenever we’re together she smiled even when things weren’t the best, it was almost as if she was hiding something…her sadness maybe? She understood a lot of people, she was open-minded, she trusted people too easily — Her weakness was also her strength. She never boasted about herself instead she always encouraged everyone that surrounds her she’s optimistic and delightful around others; gentle with what she said and soft with her touch.

I knew her very well, we both understood each other or so I thought. We’ve known each other log enough we even opened up to each other about our darkest secrets and our deepest thoughts about what hides in the void; I don’t usually cry in front of other people but for her I did. She was the best friend anyone could ask for — but she had to leave because of college. Things weren’t the same after, I guess you can say college changed her or like they say “We’re grown up now”. Change is inevitable; I know that but at the same time I didn’t want things to change yet — it was all so sudden. What can we do but keep moving on.

What was the lesson? Where did we go wrong?

Nothing, nothing went wrong here it was just a process a Chapter-ending. It was a great chapter to remember and reflect, It was a story to build a new foundation. She went her own way — so did I. We’ve learned so much together, maybe we can cross paths again changed but still holding on to the great memories we’ve made, maybe we can be truly honest and truly authentic to ourselves the next time we meet again.

-adearest

There’s nothing new about love that we don’t know, but life is making what is known our own.