ghost town by kanye west. a reflection at 18.

As an 18 year old, my understanding of love, relationships and life as a whole is based on experiences where people have little to no experience. I don't know what to do. They don't know what to do. This is exciting; exploring new emotions with someone you care about allows you to better understand them (both the emotions and the person). 

Through my process of loving and learning, I've found comfort in listening to the experiences of artists I hold close to my identity, searching and exploring similarities of our emotions. Most recently, I've found this comfort while listening to Kanye West's Ghost Town as I hear a story of both joy and regret: wishing things could last longer but glad they lasted as long as they did. And although prehaps Kanye's intention of this song was to express his sentiments towards himself, there were two lyrics in the song that I felt related especially to my most recent relationship that recently ended. 

We're still the kids we used to be

This line makes me feel more bitter than sweet but bittersweet nonetheless. In my most recent relationship, I think I've grown more than in almost every other relationship or friendship I've been in considering the duration I was in it. When I was with her, I read more, paid more attention to sunsets and song lyrics, was more grateful the time I spent with people. She made me understand that everything has value and that everything is special. The things I did with her, like go out of my way to look at the sunset or reflect on difficult subjects that I read about in books, are things that I continue to do and plan on continuing for the rest of my life. I'm really grateful for that and I'm really grateful for her. I was embracing myself more, I was appreciating everything more, I was more patient. And I know that every time I see her I will be reminded of everything that she did for me. I'll remember the pictures of sunset we shared with eachother, everytime she smiled or laughed, everytime I held her hand. I mean this all in the most innocent way possible, but we had fun together. And I both hope and fear that when I see her that when these memories come rushing back, so will my emotions. And when these emotions come back, I will wish that things didn't end. I will wish that we are still the same kids who liked eachother and that we could be together again. That we will think back to when we are together and go back to it. A forgotten love and affection for eachother, an appreciation that will never not exist. I miss her, I miss when I was with her, and I miss who I was with her. I wish we could go back and be those kids. 

I've been trying to make you love me. But everything I try just takes you further from me. 

This line makes me think back to when I was in lower and middle school and how the only way I knew to get the attention of a girl I liked was by being mean to them: teasing them, pulling their hair, kicking them. Granted, I was young and naive and had no idea how to explicitly confess that I liked her to her face. That's okay. I just think it is funny because no girl deserves to feel bad about herself and hopefully wouldn't go out with someone who made her feel that way. But that is what I was essentially doing by being mean to them which probably drove them away from me, like the lyric says. To be clear, I no longer do that. 

But, even as I've matured, I've noticed that this idea of being mean to someone to gain their attention is still present in young relationships, especially the early stages of one. More specifically, the idea of playing hard to get. I think this idea is most commonly thought of as ignoring or taking a long time responding to text messages or sending short and basic messages when you do respond but I think it is essentially presenting yourself in a manner that shows you have no interest or are indifferent about building a relationship with someone else. You make them feel disposible and make yourself look superior. Why would you want someone to feel this way? I don't know. The only time I've thought of these ideas is when friends suggest them as a solution for solving my insecurity about the strength of a relationship. I'm strongly opposed to it just because I feel like showing how interested you are in someone isn't a bad thing. People like to feel appreciated, loved, important, so why wouldn't you want to make someone that you care about feel that way? I don't know. I'm also opposed to the idea because I have been on the receiving end and it made me feel shitty. I became insecure about who I was, how I portrayed myself, how I behaved around other people and that is not how I want to feel in a relationship, or at least that isn't how I want to start one: have to constantly worry and wonder if I'm good enough. That makes me want to distance myself from you, even if I like you.

I also think this idea is also present when two people aren't on the same page. Gestures that demonstrate affection may feel alienating or commitments of time may feel clingy, and I think this stems primarily from not talking about your emotions in an honest and open way. Just talking about the way that I was feeling is one of the things that I regret not doing in my most recent relationship. I wish I didn't worry about being vulnerable, I wish that I was more open, was more honest (these are things that I put on myself because I wanted to give the impression that I was secure and strong to one of the only people that would accept me for being unstable and weak). It is okay if you like someone a lot and care for them a lot. And althought I think timing of confessing emotion is a completely different thing, not being afraid is another. And I wish I was less afraid. Because when you don't talk, you don't have build up to something big and when you don't have build up to something big, it makes something big seem even bigger, which may make the receiving party feel overwhelmed. Those are very broad terms I know. I just regret not saying more than "I like you". I wish I told her how I felt about her, how she made me feel, how I was excited about us. I can't say that now. It is too late. Life is unfair.

Ghost Town

When I reminisce about my time with her, I feel empty because I no longer have her with me. A ghost town is physically empty too. But a ghost town also has everything that it once was. And that is when I stop feeling sad and smile instead, because I realize that even though I can't stop or go back in time, at least I spent it with someone who made me feel.