Dreadful Reunions

All I want out of life is a warm bed, a kind heart and unlimited power—the kind that comes with the Apple employee discount. Or the advanced knowledge that I’m about to run into someone I know so I can act/appear accordingly. My landlord, so I can turn up my earbuds and look right as he passes left on the street; the newest flavor of the week, so I can do 75 crunches after only having a salad that day; my best friend so I don’t wear the shirt she lent me six months ago that I swear I don’t have; or my ex, so I can do 75 crunches after only having a salad that day. That kind of power is really something, even when it comes to miniscule daily tasks. Sometime ago, I found myself on the awkward end of a conversation that I typically try to avoid. I found myself talking with an ex, where the questions being asked were those of a cliché nature—the conversation in which you swore you’d never take part. You know, the ones where you initiate with an, “Ohmygosh! How are you?” followed by some variation of what’s new, how are things… you get the gist. The smorgasbord of questions to ask an ex is endless, although they’re essentially the same. The worst part about this particular conversation is that I was on the asking end. I found myself not particularly interested in what I was asking, but it just kept coming up—like word vomit. I asked, “What are you up to?” but what it really sounded like was, “Think. Think of any reason to leave. Any.reason.will do.” I guess I brought all these cookie-cutter responses on myself. “I’m great,” “Not much,” and “Things are going really well,” which is always exaggerated. But no one is going to let an ex think they aren’t fabulous, and haven’t been every minute of every day since you had that not-so-amicable breakup six years earlier. Let’s face it; no one really needs to be friends with an ex. They’re called that for a reason; X ‘em on out. Can’t we just say help, knowing we have a mutual understanding where each of us think the other sucks at something we couldn’t get over and call it a day? It isn’t that I don’t care what you have to say; it’s just that, I had the same conversation at my appointment with my gynecologist last week and it was less awkward.