I am Colin Singleton

I'm not sure where Brad is. I emailed him yesterday and haven't heard anything. I let him know that we were worried and if he needed to take a break to deal w/ life that would be fine, but we want to make sure he's okay. I'll let you all know if I hear anything back.

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I wrote an entire blog about being the one that got away and how we never look at it from that perspective; rather, we always lament lost loves and attribute it to circumstances. I just deleted it because, well, it sucked. But while I was writing it, I learned a lot.

I like to explain things. I also seem to think that all things can and should be explained. That's why I teach and that's why I am in a leadership position in almost everything I do. Even when I don't understand something, I reach out to the internet to search, and learn, and eventually, to explain.

So I was going to write a blog about being the one that got away. It seemed like a logical way to explain and understand some things going on in my life. I was listing all my theories about relationships (i.e. the only 2 ways people can go from friends to something more) and then I got to the turn. You may have noticed that I like turns. It's when the cheesy music starts playing and I try to drive home the moral of the story. I swear it's totally unintentional, but I am completely incapable of controlling it.

So I get to the turn and I can't make it. I don't know what the moral of the story is. Here I am, trying to boil down why relationships don't work and somehow trying to weave in this extended metaphor about the wizard of oz (yes, really), when I realize that it's pointless. Oh no! I'm Colin from An Abundance of Katherines! I am trying to create an exact cause and effect situation by which all relationships can be measured when there are far too many factors involved.

The fact remains that I have been the one that got away. In this situation, I was sent away. Only now, years later, am I deemed the one that should have been. And it's not circumstances or timing that is causing me to stay the one that got away, it's me. I know what that relationship means and I don't want it.

But that isn't always the situation. I've been rejected and I have been the rejector. Usually it was for a good reason: I couldn't see a future with the person in question or there was some other deal breaker. But sometimes, it was because I was scared. And there were times, even, when the timing was just wrong. The reason that relationships are so confusing and stressful (when they happen and when they don't), is because there is no way to get an easy answer. What does help, I think, is the reflection.

Putting thoughts to paper separates you from your ideas. The idea has it's own identity at that point. Through the process you are able to examine the idea in a more neutral setting. Changing your opinion and drawing conclusions becomes easier because it is no longer a judgment on yourself. The idea is separate from you now. I first started thinking this way when I read the Jessica Darling series by Meg McCafferty (specifically Perfect Fifths). The main character started a writing project in high schools. Part of the project involved writing a true story from your life in third person. The third person story allows you to comment on actions that were taken without feeling like you're admitting to faults. It's like looking in a mirror but pretending it's a picture.

The ability to reflect is the most important thing I have learned in college. Reflecting on volunteer experiences and lessons that I taught has helped me analyze and criticize myself in a non-threatening environment. But the thing to remember is that while you gain insight, you don't always discover the moral of the story. Sometimes it is more important to accept that you don't have the answer about life or love or relationships than it is to calculate who/what/when will work.

I haven't always made the right decisions when it came to relationships in my life. I think a lot of us have people who we might term as the one that got away. Sometimes we need to buck up and make it happen. But sometimes the timing is gone and you're moving away and you just need to learn from it.