I came for my woman, he came with a razor blade

I'm wearing a pair of older shoes today that are very durable, comfortable, and boot-like in construction. I've had them for 5 years now, and I've worn them across the world in the worst weather conditions and they've always held up fine. The reason I'm bringing this up is because recently I had a conversation with someone about an ex-girlfriend of mine. I told him I ran into her recently (she actually lived right around the corner from me for a little while), and she happened to be wearing an old shirt of mine that I thought I had lost. I really liked this shirt. I told her to give it back to me. I think it surprised her, but I was pretty adamant about it. Since she was close to my house, I got her another old t-shirt of mine, gave it to her, and made her change.

My friend asked me why I did that. He said don't you know that everytime she puts that shirt on she's going to think of you?

I hadn't thought of that, and after a while it sunk in that all these things really are artifacts. Whenever she put that shirt on (she swam in it, it was mostly for wearing at home or for running errands) she likely at least in passing thought of where it came from. This morning that happened to me. I don't wear these shoes all the time because they're kind of heavy, but they're perfect for winter. These shoes were probably one of the only good things that came out of that relationship. I started thinking about all the other things I have from previous relationships, and there are favorite boxers and t-shirts, books, a painting, and even a vase an ex threw for me.

There are definitely sad things associated with these things, but at the same time I realized that much of my history and how I defined myself was through these people, for better or worse. At first I thought that most of my artifacts were from ex-girlfriends, but I have artifacts from intense friendships as well. I carried a key chain that a friend of mine gave me 12 years ago that I carried daily until just recently, for example.

Even last names are artifacts. Someone I know divorce his wife two years ago, and his wife still carried his last name to his dismay. He said that he didn't think his wife deserved his last name, and he wanted it back. It's a funny thing. I never even really considered myself that sentimental, but I guess I am in my own way.

We would go dancing underneath the city and the catacombs

After church, we went to get my haircut in Annandale. There was this kid there, well, what I consider a kid nowadays, like 19-20 or something, and my wife was saying "Do you want to get your haircut like that?" in a tone implying, please don't get a tight haircut, please! I replied, well, maybe ten years ago I would've gotten a haircut like that. God, the years just fly by. I'm going to be 33 soon, though I'm fortunate that I'm a young-looking 33, ha ha. It's funny how when you start getting old, everyone thinks they look younger than they are, but you know it might be a twisted kind of thing, getting compliments on how young you look, because if everyone perceives themselves as looking younger than they are, then of course your old ass is going to look young! I look 33, who am I kidding! I've got a wicked widow's peak nowadays, along with a receding hairline, but honestly widow's peak=cool. It's cool having this pointy little thing on my forehead, though you really can't see it since the shine of my forehead blocks it out, haha.

So, anyway, on a track to nowhere the woman cutting my hair and my wife start having a converstaion about what should be done with my hair, never mind what I want, because I guess I only care in a sort of passing manner anyway, and the woman cutting my hair makes the remark, 'He must look really cute in the morning', which whoa, kind of threw me off, but my wife just shrugged it off at the time anyway. Koreans these days, so modern! Where was I? Yeah, so getting my haircut yesterday set the gears spinning a little bit, thinking about being young and text messaging cute girls (well, I'd like to imagine that the strapping Korean lad that was sitting next to my wife and I was messaging cute girls) and also this cute Korean hair stylist making comments about how I look in the morning.

Which got me to thinking. My wife mentioned to me one of her friends in NY seems to have a crush on me, because she talks about me everytime she's with my wife. Having a crush on the married guy is the safest road possible. The married guy=safe. It doesn't matter how I look, really, just that I'm kind of nice and taken speaks highly for me, and I'm easy to like, because I'm unattainable. Because even if I reciprocated, that'd fuck everything up and I'd end up on the loser's table, or something, where the losers are.

So there I am. I just want to be 19 again. I'll take the pain, just let me be that young again.

Lame!

Like I was telling E-word!