Triple Throwback Thursday!

So the past 2 weeks of my life have been a blur of dresses, breath mints, and Febreeze. Why? It was Spirit Week, and then Rush Week. Thus, Throwback Thursday fell by the wayside. HOWEVER, because I am so very accountable, today is TRIPLE THROWBACK THURSDAY! That's right, I will not be posting one story today, but THREE! Get excited.

Story #1: Falling for Jake.
As I have mentioned before, I used to date a guy named Jake in high school. He was 2 years older than me, and I was completely enamored with him.

I'd known Jake for years--we had been in church choir together since we were kids--but I had never really taken much notice of him, other than thinking he was totally annoying. He would periodically antagonize me throughout my middle school years, usually with some sort of dramatic reaction from me, but no real consequences (though one time when I was in 7th grade I did stomp on his foot while I was in tennis shoes and he was in flip-flops).

When I got to be older though, Jake started to intrigue me a bit more. We became friends--not particularly close friends, but friends all the same. At the very least, I wasn't stomping on his feet anymore. Then, November of my freshman year of high school, Jake started acting differently towards me. He'd make jokes the same as always, but he was paying more attention. I remember the night I first realized I liked him. It was after choir practice, and he playfully pushed me as we were walking near a flight of stairs (he wasn't paying attention, obviously). I almost fell, but he caught me before I could. We were both laughing, and for some reason, it just hit me how much I actually liked him. When I got home, I couldn't stop thinking about him.

A few days later, he invited me to go to Prayer Breakfast with him (which happened once a week), and he said he would give me a ride to school. I was so nervous being in the car with him, and he was clearly nervous as well. I can still remember a very specific moment in the car--the heat was turned all the way up (it was December), and town square looked so pretty lit up with all of the Christmas lights. There was a Relient K CD playing "Mood Rings" very quietly. That morning was a week before my 15th birthday.

A few days before my birthday, Jake asked me what I would want as a gift. Initially, I said he didn't have to get me anything, but he insisted. I wanted a very specific pair of earrings from American Eagle, but I told him chocolate instead (I felt that earrings would seem too romantic, though in retrospect the chocolate was probably way more romantic than earrings.) However, instead of being a normal person and buying me a Whitman's Sampler or something, Jake went out and bought me a box of Godiva chocolate wrapped in gold paper, and he wrote me a really sweet note as well. (I wish I still had it, but I threw it out after some weird fight we had years later.)

On Christmas Eve, Jake asked me to come as his date for a New Year's Eve party at his friend Andrew's house. I honestly thought I heard him wrong, but I hadn't. Getting asked out by Jake was the best Christmas present I've ever gotten.

New Year's Eve was a total FAIL (see story 2), but Jake obviously didn't mind too much, because 3 days later, we went out again, and he kissed me.

After that, it was all over. I had completely fallen for Jake, and he became one the most significant relationships in my life to this point. He and I still talk on occasion--I even went to see Alice in Wonderland with him over Spring Break. We're very different people than we were then, but whenever I talk to him, I still feel like I'm in high school. Which, in this case, is not always a bad thing. :)

Story #2: New Year's Eve 2005, or the night of the Epic Fail.
As I mentioned in the previous story, I was Jake's date to our friend Andrew's party on New Year's Eve 2005. I was so excited--it was my first real date with him! I wanted everything to be perfect. But because this is me we're talking about, and my life is an absolute joke, the night turned into an absolute trainwreck.

First of all, I decided it would be a good idea to try a new blowout technique that I saw in a magazine. I got some spray hairspray (as opposed to aerosol hairspray), sprayed it on my hair while it was wet, and then attempted to blow-dry my hair. This technique not only took twice as long to dry my hair, it also made it incredibly frizzy. So, I tried to flat-iron it. This only made my hair angry, resulting in a sticky, poofy, sort-of-straightish mess.

I thought my outfit, at least, would have a few redeeming qualities. I wore Sperry Topsiders, a denim mini (it was winter in South Carolina...which means not very cold), and a pink sweater. The sweater, though, wouldn't dry. By the time I had to leave, it was still damp (and extremely uncomfortable). I wore it anyways because I didn't have another sweater I thought would be better.

On the way to the party, my mom asked for directions (I still wasn't allowed to ride with Jake unless it was to school). I looked in my purse...no directions. Then I remembered that I had left them on my desk. At home. 20 minutes away.

So, after about 30 minutes of driving around Andrew's neighborhood and trying to call Jake, I finally called Andrew's house. I got directions, and I finally made it--an hour late. Not only was it incredibly embarassing, but Jake was so mad at me that he said maybe 6 words to me the whole night. By midnight, he seemed to have softened a bit, but he still was clearly not happy.

So here I was, hot (there were wayyyyy too many people there), wet (because of the sweater), uncomfortable (because of the skirt riding up), and feeling ugly (because my lip gloss was sticky and my hair was frizzy). On top of all of that, I knew maybe 3 people at the party, and my date wouldn't speak to me.

Oh, and at the end of the night, my mom CAME INTO THE HOUSE and picked me up.
Awesome.

Story #3: The time I accidentally broke up with Jake.
If there's anyone who knows how to mess things up without realizing it, it's me. Case in point: the time I accidentally broke up with Jake.

So, while Jake and I were dating (as in going on dates), I mentioned to our friend Sarah that we had gone to the movies together. She, of course, thought this was fodder for gossip and ran off to confirm this news with Jake. Unfortunately, certain phrases get lost in translation.

Sarah apparently said to Jake, "I heard you and Laura were dating." Jake took that to mean "boyfriend and girlfriend." Sarah meant it as "going on dates." But because it was high school and no one thinks properly in high school, no one conferred as to the actual meaning of these phrases. That being the case, Sarah came back to me, very confused, and said that Jake said we weren't dating, and were we really? Did I misunderstand him on something?

I was crushed. How was this possible?! So, after school, I sent Jake an IM. (Remember, this is back when IMing was cool.) Jake, being the intuitive man that he is, asked if I was mad at him on Friday, and I was said, “Well, yeah, I kind of was, because you told someone we weren’t dating, so I got upset about it, but then I realized I shouldn’t be upset because, after all, we’re not dating.” And then he didn’t say anything, so I was like, “If that’s okay with you.” And he didn’t say anything again for a while, and then he goes, “Yeah, that’s fine.”

After that, Jake started acting really weird. He started dating another girl. Then, about a month later, he told me he took that conversation as meaning that I didn't want to date him anymore! Suddenly, everything made sense. We made up, but things were never quite the same after that incident.

It still amazes me to this day that I was able to accidently break up with someone. Though it explains a lot about how I handle relationships.


Well, lovers, I hope you enjoyed that trifecta of relationship follies. Hopefully your first dates are never that bad, and I very sincerely hope that you never accidentally break up with someone. It causes a lot of confusion.

Keep it classy and fabulous!
xoxo, Laura