A Schurr Thing

by Julie Robinson

  Seeing that I’m older AND wiser AND still single, it has become abundantly apparent that deciding not to break-up with my high school boyfriend before jetting away to college a thousand miles from him was probably not one of my more stellar plans.  The fact that I was sleeping with a new guy who lived down the hall from me about a week into the first semester of my freshman year didn’t sway me from my I’m-going-to-marry-my-high-school-sweetheart-even-though-he’s-not-that-great agenda.  I was a sweet young thing with a mission, damn it, and I was determined.

Looking back on those years, I don’t have any idea how my whole scheme ultimately ended.  All I know is that I’m not married to that tall, thin, pot smoking kid from high school who had waaaaay more potential than was ever going to be realized.  Unfortunately, I’m also not married to the hot guy down the hall who swept me off my feet and into his bed pretty much the minute I landed on that fertile Iowa soil. 

Coming from Southern California to Iowa at eighteen for college amounted to some serious culture shock.  I had never walked beans, tipped cows, or detassled corn before.  Luckily for me, half of the kids on campus came from Chicago and had never done those things before either.  I was an odd one, Charlie Brown, coming from Thousand Oaks, California to attend college in the middle of a corn field, but I liked it that way. 

Being different has its perks.  I was known as the “girl from California” right away and would hear that pretty regularly when I introduced myself.  It was kind of like being a minor celebrity without having to sign autographs.  My clothes were a little different.  I had smoked pot for years.  I had surfed (badly—but no one had to know that).  And, I could easily keep the boys at bay with my little, “I have a boyfriend back home.”

All except one.

Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda

by Julie Robinson

   The afternoon was one of those perfect June Colorado days.  We met at his place, packed the car, picked up a snack at Mc Donald’s and headed out to the mountains.  The plan was perfect: His friend had an ancient cabin nestled in Mount Princeton just outside of Buena Vista.  We had been dating for about six weeks, this was our first vacation together, and I felt the buzz of excitement swirling around my brain.

In my vivid day dream memories we had rocking sex at night, strolled hand in hand through a charming festival by day, sipped wine by the roaring fire in the evening, and hiked in the hush of morning with the dogs.  In reality, the sex was decidedly vanilla, he smoked tons of pot, walked ahead of me clearly annoyed all day, avidly avoided all alcohol, and slept in so I explored the scenery with the dogs alone.  At the time I tried to ignore his inconsistent behavior—didn’t he lean over a small café table littered with our dessert to tell me he was smitten with me only a few days prior?—and hoped his asshole-ness would go away.  It never did and we broke-up over the phone the following week.

I wish I could say that that ended it.  Breaking up rarely ends a relationship, however, and I still pine for this man—the man he could have been—to this day.  Where did the charming bastard go?  The one who wooed all of my friends and left me giddy with delight?  Even he couldn’t explain it.  When he finally got up the nerve to officially break up with me his reason was “Je ne sais quoi.”  Loosely translated it means:  I have no fucking idea.