43-Luke-Things

Luke, I love you and I will always love you. You have been like a big brother figure to me for so long that I can’t believe I sent that email the other week. But, I hope you understand how much it hurts me- that I invest so much in our friendship and you can’t be naffed to explain why you can’t turn up for one single hour or for one cup of coffee. I couldn’t keep being put back to the bottom of the pile and I had to put my foot down! Enough was enough. You cancelled on me when you were able to go out and walk with David and her in the snow. We’ve had that conversation before- SO I’m not going to repeat myself.

If you ever get angry or scared or upset… or you need me at all I will ALWAYS be here to listen and to be a good friend. I love to hear anything about how you are doing or what you are doing BUT in recent years that info has been dwindling. You have gone from being willing to talk to me, to being a silent party- like I’m some sort of spy or enemy. You sit and sip your coffee silently. Occasionally moan about this/that/her but nothing more.

Your girlfriend may hate me! And she may have behaved like a little child for the last few years BUT I accept the choices YOU have made. Maybe she needs to be told that I was the one that pushed you to go and ask her out in the first place!!!! Maybe she needs to be told that I love Ben. Loved my life with the red head and then Heath. Wasn’t after you in any inappropriate way.

I need you to know that I am proud of you! Proud of everything you have achieved over the last few years. How you have grown as a person.

I also need to thank you for all the random excursions and walks. Need to thank you for the thoughtful presents of old and the days spent walking and saying nothing at all because we were ok with it… because we were friends. I need to thank you for helping me through the hard times and for being there to make the happy times even happier. If I was in trouble- you were right there beside me getting in trouble and having a laugh. Hey, we knew life had to change didn’t we.

Always remember all of these things & hopefully- don’t forget me and where I am. I’m just not chasing after you anymore…

Pathetic as it sounds… In the words of Winnie the Pooh… “Promise you won’t forget me, because if I thought you would, I’d never leave.”

Love always
x-K-x

To end on a fun note- because this is positive. You will succeed in your degree!!!! AND you will end up with the kind of job you deserve!!! I have every faith in you! “If I had one gift that I could give you, my friend, it would be the ability to see yourself as others see you, because only then would you know how extremely special you are.”
_{B.A. Billingsly}

I have lost friends, some by death, others through sheer inability to cross the street.
- Virginia Woolf

“There can be no Friendship where there is no Freedom.”—William Penn

These quotes are bitter ones, I guess. BUT they express the way I have felt recently about the lack of response from him. Proof that I don’t matter. He has blamed so many things for his inability to be here- he’s said he wants to be about more often but he hasn’t DONE anything about it! He’s said that he’s been busy (which I was perfectly understanding of). His girlfriend doesn’t like him going out (which I don’t understand AT ALL because a relationship can’t work under that kind of oppression!). He lives around the corner and neither of us have seen one another. I tried and I failed to see him… but at least I did try. Now, I’ve given up on trying because why chase what’s not going to wait for you to catch up every so often???

It upsets me that it’s all faded to grey. However… The truth is that he will always be my friend because… “Many people will walk in and out of your life, but only true friends will leave footprints on your heart.” And that’s what he always was.

38. He cancelled on me the other week for about the millionth time- without a reason… or without giving me one. Once upon a time he had the decency to make sure he was polite and kind… I’m sure he is still polite and kind but maybe it just slipped his mind to explain why he would not be able to make it. I snapped at him and told him not to bother talking to me because I was fed up with being treated like I just don’t matter. I missed the way he used to be here for me and NOT JUST for the bad times! He hasn’t even had the decency to respond, so he’s taken me at my word. I guess things change… and not always for the best.

39. I delivered him his presents the other week (he hasn’t even acknowledged that he got them). I took the photo I got him out of the frame that I made for him. He’s not allowed pictures of us up anyway and probably wouldn’t want it- so… I’ve put that photo in an album for me. I will always look back on the times we spent together fondly. Back at college he was the one thing that kept me sane. He was my rock and for that… I will always be grateful! He was the strongest and probably the only real best friend I’ve ever had or am likely to have.

40. Back at college- we went on a trip together. It was there that our friendship- a little foursome of 3 boys and me was forged. We measured the speed of river flow while standing in our wellies and drew graphs of the depths. They slept uncomfortably in little 4-5 foot beds while I curled up and fitted quite nicely. They stole the remote controls off of small children and we built towers out of random bits of food left in the dorm room fridges. We skimmed stones on the spit and ate all our meals together. At night we sat up late and talked random rubbish in our coats, drinking grainy hot chocolates and blackcurrent with crystal bits in it. The beige cups will always stick in my memory. As will the drives with teachers and the memories which sprung from that day. It was fate.

41. We went to school together for most of our lives. We had some of the same friends but I had my girls and he had his gamers. At school we were worlds apart- except for mutual friends and our appreciation of a legendary Maths Teacher.

42. In 2006 I was probably the most like the person I would like to be. I put that down to the fact that Luke has this inate capability of bringing the best, happiest and most confident traits out in people. I hope this is something that he never loses!!!!

34. We like to ride the bus together. We sit side by side, his knees pressed into the back of the purple plastic seats. Sometimes we’ll talk, other times we laugh and sometimes we just sit silently watching the world go by. It’s a nice way to pass the time.

35. I used to turn to him all the time. There was an ‘over-rely’ function in our friendship because of how close we were. We were inseparable. He came between me and many a boyfriend because he was my bodyguard, keeping all the ‘wrong types’ away. Like a deflector shield he made the ones that just wanted to be with me for the wrong reasons disappear off. Like a fly swotter to the wasps- he sent them to buzz around other sticky little blondes… a buffer between me and the outside world. Our friendship has always been young and vibrant. Peter Pan and Tinkerbell… but maybe now… we’ve left Neverland for the last time and resigned ourselves to the land of grown-ups??? The last time I ran to him with my heartbreaks was when I sustained a sort of sexual assault thing. I ran to him because I needed to tell someone and he has always been the one I trust. It was nothing too serious in the grand scheme of things but enough to knock my confidence and my emotions into hyperspeed. Enough to bring Heath back into the picture and enough to open up all my old wounds. There is a literary theorist that says we tell our stories as a way of making sense of our lives. In that case… it was for that reason that I needed to tell Luke. He is so easy to talk to and I so needed to understand everything that had and would happen. I feel guilty about making him carry the weight of those events on his shoulders!!!! I almost regret sharing it with anyone because I am now almost completely at peace with the world.

36. We used to spend prolonged periods talking on the street corner. One day we watched about 5 buses crawl along the road, so we must have been stood there for over an hour and a half. But now, he doesn’t share his feelings with me. I don’t know what’s going on in his life. Our friendship has faded and I guess that’s why I want this goal to be crossed off so much!

37. My memories are no longer made of him- there used to be so many memories with Luke in them that I could see him everywhere. I can barely remember his big blue eyes and the way they used to make me think of geysers anymore. His eyes are by far his prettiest features. He also has attractive forearms… and a BIG HEAD.

29. I haven’t seen him for a really long time now… he doesn’t come out with me or our friends. He hasn’t returned my last email and any text messages I get seem to be aloof. It is almost like we were never best friends. I don’t mind this though because everyone has to choose their own way in life. I still haven’t given him his Xmas presents and his 22nd Birthday is rapidly approaching. I considered dropping by his house unannounced but I actually decided not to, because I don’t feel like I’d be welcome. I asked Ben to drop them round for me but he said it was my job. I think I may go tonight and then run away. Maybe another day though…

30. I think that the one thing he knows that he truly wants to be, in life, is a dad. Not now, maybe, but in the long run… in the distant future. He wants to make sure he can provide for his family and give them all a steady upbringing.

31. I have a special nickname for him that is reserved only for me. Owing to the fact that he is my all time favourite fairy hunter.

32. He never has any money.

33. He works at the local football club.

23. If you give him a wooden coffee stirrer, he will have to break it into tiny little pieces as he talks to you. He is a fidget and he fiddles with anything within his grasp.

24. He bought himself his first coat the other week. Bless. I’ve been nagging him for YEARS about a coat. He said he didn’t need one. Huhmmm… oh yes, yet again I was proved right HA.

25. He said he wanted to be forever young- wonder if he realises that we’ve actually done a lot of growing up??? He’s playing happy families & I’m being a ‘grown up’ with work and stuff.

26. We went for coffee down the beach over the summer. I sat on his shoulders and he fell over. There is an incriminating photograph of this event and it looks like I’m trying to squash him- He looks genuinely scared and I look menacing. I love this photo!!!!

27. His girlfriend doesn’t like him having pictures of us in his room. That’s fair enough. When I learnt this I took down all pictures I had of him in my room- except for one. It’s half the size of a credit card and it’s on a pinboard next to a cinema ticket and a van gough painting. He is probably unaware of its existence. He was drunk- my exboyfriend’s birthday party & he kept trying to make me buy empty Fosters cans.

28. He once stole my passport photo from my purse so he could put pins in my head :P and got me into a whole heap of trouble because I needed those photos for a meeting with the passport office. NAUGHTY LUKE!

18. I often wonder if he realises how much he has changed from the quiet boy he was when I first met him. I wonder if he’s happy with his life as it is and I wonder where we’ll all be in years to come. I always imagined we’d end up living this life of ‘best friends’ forever. We said when we were younger that we’d move in together if by the time we were 30, one or the other were still living at home. We even decided who would get to decorate what rooms and what colour schemes we’d have. I wonder whether those colour schemes have changed much in our heads over the years!?

19. He is currently immersed in Final Year antics at university. His head is probably fully buried in books at this moment- and if not- it should be :P.

20. He doesn’t believe I’ll ever replace my broken chest of drawers- SHOCK HORROR- I did it today. Sorry Luke. Memories of chest of drawers broken will have to go to the recesses of memory.

21. I can make my tongue go into a flower shape. He was so jealous at college that he went away and practiced it for HOURS. He twisted his little face up something rotten and finally got it. It is a skill he has acquired – something for the CV LOL.

22. And for this entry- something more concrete… he’s an undergraduate Geography student.

11. He has a triangle of eyebrow fluff between his eyebrows… and his girlfriend plucks them :)

12. We had our first and only proper face to face argument beside the subway one day on our way to college. I don’t think we even had to go to college we were just going on a walk. I remember distinctly the colour of the yellow walls and railings as we walked past and the blackberry bushes as they jutted out in thorny heaps… but I don’t remember what petty thing (and it was merely a matter of semantics) we were arguing about.

13. I once dropped his mobile phone in a puddle on the beach because he put it in my pocket… and neither of us noticed it fall out. We looked for a while between the dappling puddles but it was only a few paces away and was easily spotted when looking back.

14. He once splurged a load of tomato sauce on my ugg boots when we were sat in the bowling alley during 2006.

15. He used to have a basin cut for his hair style and it quite suited him!

16. This summer he accidentally dropped the plastic wrap from a six pack onto the BBQ at the beach. It was wintry cold weather and the wind yanked the plastic flaming as it rolled across the pebbles.

17. He owns some drum stick-beat it out game… that neither of us can work out how to get working. I got it for him for Xmas because I did a 43 things Xmas shopping list to help him fulfil his goals.

6. He has really, really big hands… with girly fingers and girly nails that he has bitten to the quick. He really should stop chewing his fingernails. His hands remind me of Hellboy :)

7. We once had a Xmas film marathon with my little sister. She fell asleep next to him and was snoring lightly as we watched A Muppets Christmas Carol. Luke pinched her nose to stop the snoring. She likes him despite his half hearted attempt at stopping her from breathing :P. That must say something about his character.

8. If I give him the remote control to the TV while he waits several hours for me to be ready to leave the house I can guarantee that he will find Spongebob Squarepants or the Simpsons to keep him entertained.

9. We once had an afternoon in my room where I put light coloured lip gloss on him and took photographs :) YES… I WENT THERE. While we are on the dress up subject… I once left him in the lingerie department after he had tried to put a pink slip over his head and got stuck. He also bought pink stockings that day and then couldn’t fit his big feet in them. I’ve kept one of them in my memories box because it still makes me laugh.

10. Once upon a time he was sooooo drunk that he slapped my arse while I was bent over leaning into a car window and talking to some random guy. Everyone saw it yet no one could believe the quiet boy had done it. Then again he has shouted ‘Whassssuppppp!’ with his head out of the window of a car as it’s moving along the motorway and barked at dogs sat outside the local shop. He is a crazy bloke that you can’t pin down. You never know what he’ll do next and how he’ll act.

I have written 10 entries about this… about Luke thus far… but I guess it’s no longer a proper goal- so I’m going to actually make a list- of 43 things. They will be random and off the top of my head. He may like them. He may not. But… once I have my list of 1-43 I will check this off as done because there is no time for dwelling on these things when they are really a form of procrastination :).

1. His description of himself on MySpace really makes me laugh. Only bits of it sound like it’s actually been written by him.

2. As I have said many times before his smell reminds me of loft insulation. I quite like it. It is a comforting smell.

3. He doesn’t like sweetcorn. Everytime he tells me this I forget about it two seconds later.

4. He once got so drunk that he thought drinking a VAT of vinegar was a good idea. I came to his rescue. He then subsequently decided to go and pee in a bush and then fell over flat on his arse and was so covered in mud that no one wanted to let them in their car to take him home.

5. He has ginger flecks in his beard. No matter how much he hates this fact- IT IS TRUE!!!!