Boyfriend No. 4

Meet Boyfriend No. 4. Surprise! As you might recall from my introductory post about this whole project, I was expecting to post only four exit interviews, skipping this very boyfriend right here. I hadn't heard from him, didn't expect to hear from him and was in fact SHOCKED when his name appeared in my inbox on the day Boyfriend No. 1's interview went live.

Apparently a mutual acquaintance had sent him a text asking if he was going to be featured, and since he had no idea what this person was talking about he checked out the blog and then checked a rarely used e-mail account, suspecting that was where I'd sent his interview. We e-mailed back and forth a couple of times, I swore up and down I would not use his name, and he sent me back his answers. Ironically this interview displays the most brevity of any of them when our relationship was one of the most, well, heavy-hitting in (I think I can safely say) both of our lives. Let's just say the last time we spoke wasn't exactly on fabulous terms.

Anywho. I knew of Boyfriend No. 4 in the way that you "know of" people who are involved on campus from the time I was a freshman. I later realized that the time we both spent working at The News did overlap slightly in those first weeks of my freshman year, but I don't ever remember formally meeting him then. He held offices in a few campus organizations that were featured semi-regularly in the paper, so I knew his face and his name and had put his words in quotation marks before but that was about it.

One night during the fall semester of my senior year, I'm out at a neighborhood bar with my best friend Jenny and our pal Adrienne, having a Blue Moon and shooting the shit. Next thing I know, Boyfriend No. 4 plops down in the extra chair at our table and starts chatting us up. Jenny and Adrienne both thought we were about to be assaulted, since they had no idea I knew who this guy was. He was drunk, and flirted heavily for a while, wrote us a haiku on a coaster and went on his merry way. The next day I had a Facebook friend request and a message saying we should go out some time. I believe my exact response was "I could be talked into that."

When we got back to school the next semester, a very good mutual friend aided and abetted the whole thing and soon enough we were an item. The relationship moved and grew FAST. Very fast. We vacationed in Florida with his parents at Spring Break, we took trips to Memphis to see my folks, we talked about marriage. We even planned for him to go to London with me and for the two of us to live there together while I got my master's. That plan, obviously, was later scrapped. (By me.)

We moved in together after we graduated and lived in Murray that summer; that's when things started to crumble. We had really just moved WAY too fast, and it was coming back to bite us. Me, in particular, as I started to feel suffocated by the weight of things. The relationship ended just before I left for London in 2007, which would've been early September. When I realize how short the whole affair really was, I can only shake my head at how emotionally invested I was in just a few months. In the end our break-up was spurred on by some other circumstances which I won't go into here for fear of writing a novel; here's what Boyfriend No. 4 himself had to say.

1. Do you remember your first impression of me?

Loud, outgoing and confident.

2. Describe our relationship in three words.

Weird....didn't I just use three words in the first question? I would say: fun, accelerated, educational

3. Did we have a "song"? What was it?

Not sure if it was "official," but I would say "Chasing Cars" by Snow Patrol

4. Why do you think our relationship ended?

Probably my insecurities and your "wanting cake and eat it too" mentality

5. What was the best thing about our relationship?

The laughter.

6. What was the most annoying thing I did within the context of our relationship?

You were always better than me....in everything. And you never let me forget it.

7. Did I hurt you?

One decision hurt me, yes. But overall, no.

8. Do you think I waited the appropriate amount of time to burp and/or fart in front of you?

Yes. And this would probably be response No. 2 for question No. 5 (no pun intended on the No. 2 part)

9. Did you ever entertain the idea of marrying me?

Somewhat, yes, which was a mistake. Too quick. This may also be a factor for why the relationship ended.

10. What did you learn from our relationship? How did the things you took with you influence your dating philosophy, if at all?

I learned to slow down and enjoy the moment, rather than always be looking ahead and worrying about stuff you can't control.