To Tyler:
A day-stale memory wants me to tell you,
"I'm sorry."
I mean,
I don't know you personally,
Or even at all,
But I think I experienced you being put in a very particular compartment in a woman's life:
Friend-zoned.
It... Well.
This is as awkward as it was for her.
I don't know her name.
I don't even know where she was from,
But my idle eyes and dispassionate attention tuned in on her through some seats -
Only because my battery ran dry and desperation to communicate my safe travels
Proved more significant than entertaining myself on the journey.
Plus, it's nice to open your eyes for a bit.
But, nevertheless, I'm apologizing
Not because I coerced her to
Or that I knew exactly what was going on and could have stopped it but
Namely because
She pities you.
You're a prime example of
Social conditioning,
Routine ambition and
Something outstandingly ordinary.
I watched her,
Intrigued because
She danced over the surface of her phone
Tender and delicate like she was tickling at your eyelashes
Or like she was testing your tendons
And making sure your joints were not to snap.
She retraced every word, every letter that she pressed,
Analyzed and tried to channel
Prize-worthy comforts.
Ones that would set you on a bed of clouds,
Ones that would not chip her nude-matte nails
Or ones that would keep her honey-gray eyes from watering.
She knew exactly what she wanted to say from the moment you declared
Defeat.
Again and again and again
You asked her
Again and again and sometimes when she switched pages
She over-analyzed it.
She told her friend
And another friend
And another.
But she did not poke fun.
She did not tease you.
Instead, she justified herself.
She felt bad and honestly so,
Because no sensibly wholesome woman,
On a train coming from sandy beaches
And routinely checking her latest instantly-filtered photo of her
Acknowledgment that men fight and women fight
And this country fights
But she does not wish to fight,
Would spend half a train-ride
Thinking of what to say.
How does a person lay them down easy?
How does a woman distract herself from her favorite, bright triangle-patterned shirt
And from the sensual alto two rows behind her
And the overtly observant owl-like eyes one row behind her
And the train that threw her in a multi-directional, multi-dimensional
Spiral of her heart?
She gave you her full attention
With every syllable making sense.
She erased and deleted and repeated
She even let herself sit
And think
And sift
And drink from a tall bottle of Poland Spring,
Fulfilled of its duty for her sunkissed day down by the
Surely these things mean nothing to you.
While she was deliberating her concentrating great debating,
You grew disinterested.
From walls of laughter at a time
To suggestions and prepositions and
Updates on what she meant to you,
To a simple, quirky declaration of your disappointment.
She followed through with her friend, two friends, three friends.
Thankfully she didn't share it in a group that she also was responding interspersedly to.
She told her friends that you were disappointed
She told them that she wished your friendship would be a bridge unburned,
A stone already turned
But not washed away by the current situation.
Her words were always dancing.
Dancing all through minefields of life.
Things we, as human beings, rarely consider.
She knew what she wanted to say, from the moment you declared defeat,
From the moment you chose to be
Interested in her in the way she was not interested in you.
Sometimes it not a bad thing -
To be put in a particular divide.
Sometimes it's better than nothing.
Consider the benefits. Consider your losses.
In the end, friends are hard to come by,
Especially ones who care so greatly for your welfare.
Especially ones who care so greatly.
Especially ones who care.
Especially ones who
Carry a great load of burden and cannot find the words
Or cannot stomach the thoughts
Or cannot bear the truth.
You got the truth.
She told you how she felt.
Even though she tugged and rolled with her feelings, she did not fight,
She did not fight. She did not.
She was truthful to you.
Honest to herself.
Honorable to your friendship.
Which, by the way, she strongly, intuitively believed in.
Take these words, Tyler, and consider them as understanding and complimentary.
You didn't get friend-zoned,
You got a friend who knew what was best for you both
And would always look out for you before she looked out for her Self.
The Self is a private entity.
It is not to be shared brightly
Or trekked over lightly:
It's to stay private until private includes another soul and
Private means another part to become whole.
Your "Ouch!" made her giggle.
It made her one friend laugh.
Another blessed your sweet little heart.
The last talked about a lobster fest, or a seafood fest,
I couldn't read half the things and superimposed my perspective in this scene to a rationalization that may not be all that accurate.
But she was.
Accurate.
Precise.
Intentional.
Like an unstuck nail.
She looked out of the window, watching greens blur into golds and the sky roll over on itself.
Her messy bun was tickled by my receipt of this sojourn, which she was not bothered by.
The ring on her right pinky twirled a few times in her duress,
In her distressed mind processes,
And let's keep something between you and me,
I think she's a great lady, a wonderful one, even
Because of the energy she gives off.
So take her friendship.
Take it in stride.
And win her heart, if that's what you're truly after.
Because they always say,
And I don't know exactly who they is, but they always do say,
The best relationships start off as great friendships.
Good luck, Tyler.
You deserved the nicest rejection I've ever witnessed through an irregular means of occupying my over-stimulated brain
That that woman gave you.
Thank Jane. Or Bridgette. Or Whitney. Or Sarah.
Maybe her name was Michelle. Or Deborah.
Or Anna. Amanda, maybe?
Whatever it was, thank her.
And sorry. Maybe next time.
