I doubt I’ll be able to fit all these people into just 2 parts, so bear with me if this ends up being something like a 5-part series. I’ll try to keep all of these close to 750 words, though. Honestly, it’d probably help me organize things better as opposed to trying to make this one huge post.
Anyway, Cameron was the one I met first. I scrolled through almost 6,000 Facebook messages to see if I could screenshot the ultra creeper message I sent to him when I found out that he would be one of David’s roommates, but apparently those messages only go back to sometime in the spring of 2011. Bummer.
Kudos to past me for being ballsy enough to message these guys in the first place and not care what they thought of me. Part of present me wants to say it was mostly because I had a boyfriend at the time, so I wasn’t really actively trying to make friends and impress people. Or maybe past me truly was more outgoing and bold. Or maybe it was because I was embarking on a new chapter of my life, and having gone through high school just waiting for college where I could meet a wider variety of people, I was just ready to start things with a bang. Anyways, I digress.
I have no idea what Cameron’s first impression of this creepy girl was, but I doubt either of us expected to become such close friends. In fact, I’d say that goes for all 3 of the guys who became my friends. But it’s just a little more surprising with Cameron given our awkward beginning.
I should note that David and I broke up within the first 2 or 3 months of freshman year. Long story short, he was very clingy. And then after we’d been broken up, I heard things that he’d done while we were still together that made it clear that he was clingier than I thought. For example, there was a huge thunderstorm one time, and he randomly showed up to my apartment. My roommates later told me he claimed that I called him over because I was scared or something like that.
Anyway, he was clingy, and he was my first boyfriend, and I had no experience with it, and I don’t like hurting people if I can help it. So the breakup was this huge messy ordeal where I tried to break up with him but he convinced me to do this trial dating period thing (like in Friends, if any of you watched that show). Cameron was there for all of that.
And he continued to be there for me whenever I’d bottled up my stress and frustration for too long and gone into a self-deprecating spiral of depression. He would sit there with me and just wait, even though most of the time I just sat there in silence because everything was too jumbled for me to even be able to vent properly. He’d sit there and hug me and wait, even when he was sniffling and crying and having trouble breathing because I had pets and his allergies are horrible.
And when I’d finally utter something intelligible, he’d give me his thoughts on the matter and not judge me for it.
It wasn’t really until junior year that we really started to become close. Freshman year, it was a lot of hanging out as a group. Sophomore year, we didn’t have any classes together, and as a result, I didn’t see him often outside of the sporadic group hangout. That was also the year I tried figuring out how to study, so I wasn’t very sociable that year, as far as I can remember.
We didn’t talk as often or regularly as I’d liked — mainly because in those periods of non-communication, I start to wonder if I’m being a bother, or if I did something to make the other person dislike me. But Cameron is the sort of friend where the relationship is just as strong as it always was, no matter how long it’s been since the last time you’ve talked to him or seen him. Of course, it wasn’t until the end of senior year that I finally began to believe and trust in that.
Anyway, Cameron also majored in neuroscience, and in junior year we had some of the same classes. Aside from talking about how cool neuroscience was and possible medical and ethical issues that might be applicable, we also talked about a lot of random stuff. Cameron is a pretty open-minded and non-judgmental individual, so I felt comfortable discussing a variety of different things with him.
It’s probably because of him that I’m more open about myself when meeting new people. More open and more capable of putting my thoughts into words (without as long of a waiting time).
He’s also probably the reason why I’ve become more comfortable with singing in front of people — I believe it was him who first heard me singing quietly while watching some other people play Rock Band during freshman year. Anyways, he told me I had a good voice; that combined with his unabashed singing and guitar-playing eventually gave me enough confidence to be comfortable with singing in front of him, which then made me more comfortable with singing in front of other people. (And now some people couldn’t shut me up if they tried.) So comfortable, in fact, that we occupied the gazebo on campus and sang random stuff when he visited during his spring break this past April.
Well, this post is nearing 1000 words and I’ve only talked about one person. I guess y’all can look forward to this being (at least) a 5-part series after all!
Until tomorrow~
DUN.