Ezra's Life in Song, Inaugural Post: Vanessa Carlton - "A Thousand Miles"

Youtube: the song (and music video).

I remember exactly where I was when I first heard this song, a full five years after its original release. I was sitting on a couch in Wendy's living room while largely not helping with post-party cleanup, on February 12, 2006.

That day, I'd raced home after church to get ready to attend her birthday party. It was a wet day, and I was driving a tad too fast down Hobson. I skidded into the guard rail at the intersection of Hobson and Washington, which smashed my right front lights and damaged the bumper. Luckily, the damage was not severe, but I knew I was going to be in deep shit with my dad. I made it the rest of the way home without incident.

Upon reaching home, I told my dad about hitting the guard rail, and of course, he forbade me to leave the house. But after a while, he magically changed his mind, with but a single condition-- he said I had to drive the marred car to the party. That was a whole lot better than nothing, so I took it. I wouldn't know until later why he'd let me go.

I arrived somewhat late, and the party had already begun. After a while, Tim Tsu came up to me with and asked an odd question, in an odd tone: "Hey, Ezra... wanna go with me to pick out a movie?" Another friend would be joining us. My logical side prompted me to immediately ask, "Does it take three people to pick out a movie?" "Oh, uhh... yeah, we need a variety of opinions. Let's go pick out a movie!"

We went to the nearest rental, browsed about for close to half an hour, and failed to reach a consensus on what movie we should watch. Tim received a phone call, then came over to inform us that "somebody else had actually brought a movie." That, or "they don't want to watch a movie anymore." We got back to Wendy's house, and I knew something was up the moment I got inside, because it was all dark. I seem to recall a crowd of peers crammed into the stairwell like sardines, giggling like the schoolgirls they largely consisted of. In the living room, Wendy stood in the dimness, wearing a white dress, within a large heart-shaped formation of lit candles.

I just kind of stood there and looked at her. She beckoned me over, into the center. "Will you go to Turnabout with me?" "Well, of course." Upon which, everybody cheered. Somebody put on music, I think, and she asked me to dance with her there, within the heart of lit candles. I dithered, objected on the grounds that I was a poor dancer. But, of course, I couldn't very well refuse her, in front of everybody there. So we danced awkwardly, within that heart of lit candles, in the dimness of her living room. After enough footage had been obtained of us, the pitiful spectacle was finally put to an end.

The lights were turned back on, and we started to clean up. That was when the song came on; it must have been playing from one of her mixes. I felt like a boss after getting asked to Turnabout, and we were quite a sappy pair, so this song was perfect for the moment. It was at that time that I found out that Wendy had managed to call my father, tell him about her plans, and thus spring me from house arrest. What a day. This was one of several high points in our (pseudo) relationship, and I shall cherish it forever, even though we didn't work out.

Why this song fits the "Ezra's Life in Song" project: recalls a significant emotional milestone; recalls a significant person; lyrics' writer also speaks of remembering.

Falling Without Style

During my senior year in high school, I met a girl through a mutual friend. For the sake of this story, let’s just call her “Mal.” She went to another high school in the same town, and we bonded primarily over the hardships of schoolwork, which at times included joint study sessions, and shared culture. Our conversations, both online and in person, were often playful. We teased and bantered-- flirted, almost. Independently from the old saying, we developed this farewell we used exclusively between us: “Good night, sleep tight, and don’t let the bedbugs bite!” That was part of our display of affection. We were more just confidantes than ever truly interested in each other, but we were real-- or so I thought.

I had been a proponent of honesty, during my younger years. Even when responding to such trivial questions as, “How are you?” I had often answered with, “tired,” “depressed,” or “shitty.” It was this foundation, an honesty which demanded intent when presenting such basic queries, upon which our friendship stood. I had no idea, then, that this foundation was set upon sand.

I enrolled at Washington University in St. Louis as a biomedical engineering major, my freshman year of college. In those days, WashU was among the top 10 universities in the nation, as ranked by U.S. News. As an Asian-American student that had totally bought into the Model Minority stereotype, to be there was absolutely wonderful. However, I was unprepared for the independence of life far from home and the responsibility of learning in that type of environment. Before long, I was shell-shocked by a string of personal disappointments and academic failures. The mounting pressure that resulted from the growing incongruity between my expectations and reality caused me eventually to drop out during my second semester. My community witnessed me return home in defeat.

My basis for self-worth was yanked like a rug from under me; I stumbled and had my nose bloodied before a watching world.

Less than a year later, I gained acceptance to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, in spite of my unresolved psychological issues. I’d gotten in touch with Mal again, who’d been there for a year, by then. She’d offered to walk me around campus a bit, answer any questions I had-- serve as a welcoming party, of sorts. I accepted. We met for lunch one day, and she greeted me with, “How are you?” I don’t even remember what I said, only that it was something along the lines of, “I’m alright.” My answer would have been fine, except that I had not yet perfected my mask, my façade of strength.

I still sported a splotch of crimson, spreading from my nose. I had not yet learned to lie with my face, thus make the lie complete.

She asked again, for confirmation, and my repeated reply gave it. Upon seeing the incongruity between my words and my face, her own face fell. The light in her eyes dimmed in response to the darkness in my own. The rest of our lunch and subsequent time together could not be saved.

I had needed understanding. I realize now that Mal would have tried to give it, and that effort would have been enough for me. It would have been better for both of us if I had said something-- anything-- but I did not even know to ask. I would rather have sweat and cried inside of my mask than let her attempt to help me breathe by taking it off. My next breath would have been the one needed for our friendship to live. When I think of her, I am confronted by a nagging sense of loss that consists of unrealized possibilities and un-lived futures.

Mal is not alone in the place to which I exiled her. Within the hollowness behind my mask, whispers escape my lips and echo with the names of a dozen lost friends.

A Link to My (More) Conventional Blog

More accessible/less cryptic updates on my life here: http://aboutcbt.blogspot.com/. Get some!

Bigger, Truer Love

I love her more than ever before. After all this time, I find myself praying for her, not about her. Freed of the shackles of romance, I now love her more truly.

Fragments: Rejection

Rejection isn't limited to somebody refusing to choose you. It is also when any one person in the world chooses any other person. When a person chooses another, he or she prefers that one over all the others in the world. Over you. That person is deemed to be of more worth to the chooser than you. The chooser may not even know you. But already, you have been written off. It just doesn't mean much to you, because you don't care about that person either, in return. But rejection is painful when you do care.

What makes rejection painful is not only that your worth isn't recognized by the other person, but that you have misjudged that person's judgment. You don't know this person as well as you thought you did, because you believed she saw you in a certain way. And that certain way you thought she saw you was the same way you saw her. Thus, the relationship is not one of intimacy, but its opposite, alienation. She doesn't know you, and you don't know her.