Little Bustamove, a high school freshman, was a hopeless romantic who had grown fond of a girl. I was a pitcher in a recreational baseball league and I had one hell of an arm. I could only throw well, however, when I was thinking about this girl. I was unstoppable if I was thinking about a story or joke she told me; I realized how I felt about her while playing ball. Anyway, little freshman me was walking up the stairs at school one day when I saw my lady... kiss some sophomore. "It's okay," I told myself, "So many girls look like her from behind and I don't really think she kissed him." She promptly kissed him once more, turned around, and shouted, "Hi Bustamove!" I was crushed. I felt my heart drop. I finally knew why they called it a broken heart.
I soldiered on through that Thursday, not really talking to anyone. I was never much of a crier, I tend to mope around instead. The only thing I wanted to do was flop on my bed and lay there for a while. My brother was home for some sort of college break and we made it a family trip to drop him off at his school. My family and my brother's friend who lived down the street and attended this college drove down on that Saturday. My football teams lost that day. I spent the whole weekend listening to sad music and feeling sorry for myself. It was obvious I was depressed; my mom kept asking me if I was okay and I kept lying "yes." That weekend lasted an eternity, but I got through it. Then, I didn't think about those days for a couple of months.
In the winter, news broke that a student who graduated my high school the year before accidently committed suicide. He was drunk and playing with a gun at a party. I felt terrible for him and his family. I felt terrible for the people who saw it. I'm still shocked by it and this was years ago. What surprised me the most was when my mom told me that the guy who shot himself was my brother's friend who sat behind me when we went to my brother's college. I thought I had it rough because of a girl when the nice person behind me had just a few months to live. Life is so fragile and unfair but I was wasting it feeling sorry for myself. How am I going to be upset about some frivolous, stupid, teenage relationship that I never had when tragedies happen all the time? I always told myself to put things in perspective but I could never really relate Darfur or the wars. Now I could see the hurt. There are so many real problems and struggles that I realized teenage love does not suck, it is I that suck.