The Boomerang Effect

I remember when I first learned about boomerangs. No matter how hard the angular instrument is thrown away from it’s origin it always came back. Amazing! In such a world as ours there are few things that can be relied on. Yet, because of things like physics and maybe same laws in nature (I really don’t know) you can always count on a boomerang’s eventual return. Just like you can expect an object to reappear in a good disappearing act. Or a bruised glutton for punishment to come home once again for another beating. Or even no good rotten people to enter your life at the exact moment you decided you were over it…

Boomerangs always find their way.

This weekend I spent some time catching up with an ole friend who was once again in the midst of some man drama spelled T-R-O-U-B-L-E. It seemed that a man she met at her job, we’ll just call him Work Boy (WB), decided that he was just too busy to spend time with her after spending five months on her like a skin. They had spent their time together going to movies and different restaurants. They even attended sporting events and made an impromptu trip to the mountains just because she causally mentioned that she liked seeing the trees in a forest. She was a single girl impressed both by WB’s intellect and his spontaneity. And let’s just be real for a moment, she was excited to just be dating…finally!

But it really threw my Homegirl for a loop when WB started to fall back at the exact moment that she was allowing herself to like him. Even imagine a future together, when the folks are met and a house is purchased. She explained her confusion when text messages and phone calls went unanswered and his response was that he wasn’t aware that he had to check in with her for everything he did. Nearly tearing up, my Homegirl explained how their demise was a sudden as their startup. To think that their connection could end because he was just too busy. A lame excuse, especially when she believed that even the busiest person would make time for a person they wanted to see. But she took the hint, respected his wishes, was cordial when necessary and didn’t press the issue of “them” any further.

And then one day he called her out the blue, ready to converse. Asking how she was doing. How had her life changed now that Obama was president…all that jazz. Subjects that all turned into a giant segue for him to ask if there was still a chance for them. Especially, since it turned out that he wasn’t as busy now as he originally thought. He explained how much he regretted his decision and thought about her often. As she went on I could hear in her voice her forgetting about how easy it had been for him to cast her to the side because there was no room on his schedule. I could hear her forgetting how worried she was when her calls went unanswered. I could hear in her voice her actually welcoming his return into her life with a “maybe this time will be different.” To which I could only say “Yeah girl, maybe.”

See You in Seven

Postscript: Have a happy and blessed Thanksgiving!