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befriending a former crush

I've met this wonderful individual a few years back, and i come here to tell you my story. I will state my every thought, feeling, and try hard to hold nothing back. Inexchange i ask you to throw suggestions at me.. the story is not yet finished. BUT please keep in mind that these are not my current feelings.. but ones that i've already experienced. In addition, i will try to show you why i lacked self-confidence and maybe you can relate to me one way or another.

My background
I just came to canada 6 years ago and attended only a single year in elementary school. I wasn't sure what to expect that year.. I've been raised differently in my home country and i never knew what to expect. In addition, this was the first time i saw blond girls, so as you can imagine i quickly developed a crush.. but i hated it.. i knew it was based purely on physical attraction. I eventually get used to it and life moves on.

A potential friend
My first day of highschool was filled with new people. Making new friends was imminent. Unfortunately, the same can be said to making enemies. Grade 8 was intense: everyone tried to be cool, funny, some tried to make a great impression and others tried to achieve the 'popular' rank.. but i wouldn't call it popular at the time.. famous is a better word. At the beginning on my first year in highschool i missed my friends. My friends are in the school.. it is just that i was never in any one of their classes. At first i didn't look forward to meeting new people because i was rather shy and found most of them immature. Life was tough in grade 8, thougher than most of us would think. It was a time when everyone looked for acceptance and feared rejection the most. Luckily, i've met this girl who was able to comfort me and support me. She was in 2 of my classes. She was blond, which meant i was slightly more shy towards her than the rest, but that didn't stop my desire to befriend her. Unfortunately, i've made a terrible first impression.. We were both reaching for the scissors and grabbed it at the same time. Both of us refused to let go, and i let her muster up a lot of strength to obtain it. The second time we met was in the drama class and her telling the class her birthday.. i still remember her birthday today because of the crush that will soon develop.

Regardless of the terrible first impression, this person had always brightened my day. I remember running on the track trying to finish 3 laps on time.. She came besides me and gave me the will to keep going.. encouraging me, cheering me on. This is an only example, however i was too shy to befriend this person.. to new to this country.. i didn't know what to expect. I never saw such kindness and spirit before, not even from my own parents. You can safely say that i fell in love that year. However, the problem was that i did not really know her... what was i falling in love with exactly? i wasn't sure. Just as i start to develope the courage to approach this person on a regular basis I began to loose my self-confience for a number of reasons:

I didn't know what to expect.. yes. That year i got into a fight, there were barely any witnesses. I beat the guy up, and he had this long face for the entire day. I didn't expect that he would be an S.O.B and tell everyone the exact opposite of what happened, making me look like a wuss. Later in the year i remember playing on the basketball field and there was a girl playing with us [boys]. She hugged the ball so tightly so i decided it would be an easy steal.. but as i went for the ball she moved and i touched the wrong object heh. I was lucky that the girl turned to have a big mouth and screamed at me. I was so terrified that i did not move nor defend myself. I couldn't even say it was unintentional because i was simply afraid.

It was then when i decided not to approach the person that i grew fond of. It was at this point that i had started to develop feelings for her but i knew that with the way things are going i had no chance.

I didn't get to know her, this year made me even more shy than ever before. I felt rejected from society. I only talked to my friends from this point on, and i thought that things couldn't get worse.

I was mistaken, in the next two years i was bullied on several occasions. Luckily it wasn't that bad but i simply couldn't handle the constant harrassments. At one point i broke down. I was a little depressed, very shy.. so shy that it was rude if you know what i mean. It gets to a point when you can't answer someone back. I realized this when i was talking to a girl who i got teamed up with for an assignment (a group of 3), i just couldn't say anything more than yes, no, maybe. I look back on myself and i feel pitty towards the child i once was.

I still had feelings for her.. even though i haven't seen her much in 2 years. At first i didn't feel much when i was in school.. but when summer came and i went back to visit my home country i felt torn apart from something. I missed her so much.

Thankfully, my days start to brighten up in the next few years.
I get over this little (implying that i don't cut) depression and start to make more friends in grade 11. Everyone was more mature and i was never picked on. I have to admit i made lots of friends this year than all my years in highschool combined and had a good time. In the beginning of the year i quickly realise that i have a chance in being in one of her classes again so I change my courses and teachers to be with her. I still regret this decision today.. lets just say that i had all the horrible teachers that year and wasn't doing well acidemically. But thanks to my new found friends i survived. This year i also made an effort to know her, and it turned out she was not exactly the person i was thinking of.. close but not the one. This is when i lost interest of a relationship with this person.. but a friendship was still on its way. Our school gets a group of german exchange students this year, and one of them enters a relationship with her. Frankly, i was stunned... how did she expect to pull this one off? the relationship has no strong base and will inevidably become a long distance relationship. But in the end, it appears that she woke up from her fantasy and broke up with her boyfriend. Unfortunately, the boy didn't see this coming.

My feelings towards her were neutral after the breakup. I don't know how to explain it.. her kindness, spirit, and grace dulled after the breakup. She changed and was a little insecure. I thought she didn't need someone to talk to her at the time and left her alone.

The last year
I found her in one of my classes sitting by a close friend of mine. When i came over to sit by my buddy she didn't talk much. Afterall, my close friend is very bright and would barely speak to her because we had much more in common, a long history, and we were both getting really highmarks (so asking her questions regarding the topic) was irrelevent. With time we had our own chatty group in the class. It was full of good times and laughter! i would say that this was my favorite class (teacher played a big part in making the class so great). I can feel her trying to establish a mutual bond (aka friendship) but all the bad things that occured in the previous years would come back and haunt me.. we talked but no mutual bond was formed. I would say goodbye and only my friend would answer back... stuff like that, is she still insecure?
Well at the end of the year i hear her complain about history and how it is going to be so hard to study for the finals... so in an Act of kindness i asked her if she wanted to study together at any time during our spare block since i had one of the highest scores in my history class. She tells me she is going home (our spare block was the last block that day) and i clarify that i didn't mean now but at any time. was she nervous?

My attempt to pay back an act of kindness had failed but alteast i was willing to help her out in her time of need.

A few days back in the grad leaving ceremony. she found me greeted me and gave me a hug. I have to say i was a bit confused. I tried to interpret this event but im not sure what to make out of it.. i can ask any girl what this hug means and the answer could vary. It could have been anything, everyone was happy that we are graduating, everyone is going to miss his friends and classmates. This to me was a wakeup call, we are going away and will probably never see each other again. This is when i realize that i will truely miss this person.. but heck! i will miss everyone. I'm not sure what to do with these mixed feelings.. im not sure if i can even define them.

I'm not sure what to do now, should i ask her to keep in touch? ask for her number + msn? Should I tell her of the crush i had on her the past few years? I think i should not because a crush is simply meaningless. i find this hard to do because i've had many oppertunities to befriend her but i failed to do so.. and right now.. at the last moment, i want to be her friend.. i want to establish this mutual bond that only she attempted to establish in the past. But the problem i'm facing is that we are probably moving far away to different universities and it would be difficult to hold this friendship.. let alone start it.

I've rewritten these paragraphs 3 times!! But it was worth it.. i know what i really feel now and what should be done..
I've already made up my mind, i know what i will do and what i will say to her tomorrow. I would still love to hear your opinion on the matter.

Reply 1

1013

Tell her how you feel. It may be too late but better late than never.

Reply 2

Glory

The hug: Probabily friendly, maybe a goodbye. I hugged a fair few people on my last day of school, didnt mean i fancied them.

To be honest, if youve not told her how you feel for that many years, i dont think you can do it now. You dont have much to loose though, you probabily wont see her anymore, so loosing a friendship by telling her isnt a big worry. Id be more worried if she felt the same. How would you cope with being so far away? Would you be able to keep a relationship going?

With new university's you'll meet new people, make new friends and probabily fall in love, not crush over someone. Love and a crush are different things.

Reply 3

bobonix

I agree, however i don't think i'm even friends with her. So i have nothing to loose by trying to keep in touch. The crush is no longer there, but it feels bad to loose someone great (in terms of a friend).

Thankyou for your input!

Reply 4

bobonix

Oh and a wonderful strategy that you can use to clarify your feelings for someone is to write about it.. in your diary or in a word documents. I've written about this topic 3 times now and it is safe to say that i know where i stand now. Still would like any additional input