your phone is off the hook

thursday i had dinner with the person i like and then i took him to some meeting on campus or something. it was 8 pm and i'd only been with him since 5, and i didn't feel like going home, so instead i went to a bar.

it was nice to see my old friends again. two people i know started dating while i was away. i knew they were talking, whatever the fuck that means, so i wasn't surprised, but i hate when people i know start dating each other because then i have to hear about it all the time. i'm happy for them, but distantly. also i saw a girl who i like a lot and very much want to be friends with, but she has this obnoxious boyfriend. he's one of those outwardly pleasant people who casually says awful things and doesn't understand why people get upset about it. to him, topics like racism or sexual assault are theoretical things he never has to deal with, so he feels free to say hurtful things and then laugh about it because it's not personal for him. he once told me he likes arguing with me. i feel that way about, like, harry potter. but i don't want to be mean to him because his girlfriend is legitimately one of the coolest people i've ever met.

later in the evening we were outside and she was telling me and a friend how sometimes she just really hates her boyfriend. he takes karaoke very seriously and makes her practice songs with him at home before they go out. then at the bar when he sings he likes for her to sit and watch him the whole time, and afterward when he asks, "how did i do, babe?" he likes her to tell him that he sang well and that the audience was really into it and some people were singing along. the girlfriend said, "i love him, but sometimes i just want to beat his face in until he stops talking, you know?" same.

since my car broke down a couple weeks ago, the person i like mentioned to me at dinner thursday that he wanted to buy me some jumper cables in case something happened to my car again. i said, "thanks dad," because i'm a jerk. he suggested that he could get them for me as a birthday present and i told him no because that's a lousy gift and i can buy my own cables. he said he would buy me both jumper cables and a birthday present unless i bought them for myself and made me promise to get a set.
i told this to my friends who just started dating and they both told me that this means this person has a crush on me because he wants to take care of me and he worries about my safety. one of these people is untrustworthy in these matters because she thinks people should admit to their feelings for other people as soon as they have them, no matter what, and will say basically anything if she thinks it will lead to that happening, so i mostly disregarded her opinion. her boyfriend though said that the jumper cables thing is exactly the kind of thing he'd do for his girlfriend, and i believe it.

i think it's possible that they're right but also i find this whole thing b o r i n g. i usually enjoy this stuff but when i was rereading my last few entries to try to remember when my car broke, i realized that i've been talking a lot about this same thing and it's kind of frustrating because in the end i know i'm just guessing and i have no way of knowing if i'm right. maybe i am very slowly growing up, because increasingly my feeling is that i should either say something to him or stop worrying about it. i spend a lot of my life thinking about this sort of thing and i kind of wish i didn't.