July 15–16, 2002 — A part that I could understand

I am squeezing my right eye closed, hoping that this will encourage some tears to build up and that these tears might dissolve or otherwise remove the sour candy coating that I accidentally wiped in my eye a few seconds ago. I am also reflecting on the fact that it hasn’t been the best of days.

Alex broke up with me last night. It is impossible to be upset with her, and I can more than understand her reasons, but it still hurts. And I’m convinced that I need to take a very long break from any interactions with the opposite sex that might be considered anything more than just friendly.

So I guess I should try to explain why things ended. I’ve never been very good at this.

As it turns out, Alex isn’t very convinced that I’m completely over Kerry. And she might have a bit of a point there, though I still think it’s up for debate.

I had stopped reading Kerry’s online journal the day she broke up with me, something that I was very proud of and that probably helped me to get through things a lot better than I otherwise would have. But I gave Alex the address when she asked, for reasons I don’t quite remember. I think I just didn’t want to say no.

Alex didn’t read Kerry’s journal very often, but she was reading it one day while talking to me on the phone. She read an entry about Kerry’s new boyfriend, and then read it aloud to me. What she told me added weight to suspicions that I had when Kerry broke up with me, true or not. And this upset me a bit. Not a lot, but enough that I needed to go for a walk.

In turn, all of this upset Alex and made her question a lot of things. She decided that as things stood a relationship between the two of us wasn’t going to work.

For whatever it’s worth, Alex’s decision is making me more unhappy than what I learned about Kerry. But I don’t think there’s much sense in arguing at this point.

I’m not sure if this can be chalked up to self-destructive behavior or simply a sense of irony, but I spent today downtown on my way to apply for a job at the Gap. Amy picked up an application for me because we noticed a sign saying that stock positions were available, and I figured I had nothing to lose but any legitimacy I might’ve had when reading issues of Adbusters on the subway.

I dressed up in my one vaguely respectable-looking outfit (a plain, black t-shirt with plain, gray pants) and worked up the nerve to walk into Baby Gap, where I was promptly sent to a manager working in Gap Kids. She gave me a preliminary interview and told me that I had a group interview the following Monday. Which is about as well as things can go at that stage, as I understand it.

I left feeling not all that punk rock.

Outside, I was stopped on the street by a person not much older than me with a video camera. He asked me if I wanted to introduce a video for MTV. I said yes; I figured I couldn’t possible sink any lower.

Then I realized that my only real option on the list he showed me was Treble Charger.

So, to make a long story short, you may have seen me in my Gap interview outfit introducing a Treble Charger video on MTV on the afternoon after I was broken up with for the second time in as many months.

An optimist would say that things can only get better from here, but I suspect I might be able to prove the optimists wrong on this one.