Picture This!

I've crumbled a few times and gone against some of the cardinal rules of the Post Break-Up Rule Book. I doubt that anyone has the strength to actually be cleared of all rules; everyone slips up on a couple.

I'm guilty of some of the classics:

• drunk texting
• sending mix cds
• listening to music that brought me back.

But I've been able to be pretty good about some and damn proud of myself:

• I packed her photos away and haven't looked at them once.
  
• I never drove out to her house in the middle of a rainstorm, dropped to my knees and yelled "STELLA!"
  
• I never once MySpace/Facebook stalked her, for fears of coming across the dreaded "couple picture" set as a default.

-elbow nudge- Eh, Blondey??

So when I say I haven't seen her in a year, I mean that literally. That streak broke today.

My friend Jack is a new addition to my cluster of Los Angeles chums. He never was around during my girlfriend era and never saw her. During an online conversation today, he asked to see a picture. A reasonable request.

I pulled up an album I created on Facebook called "College Favorites" and searched for the one picture of her I kept on there. It was one that I'd always loved, but she hated. I think she took it when she was bored and laying on the carpet, waiting for something (me to finish up getting the whistle on Super Mario Bros. 3 sounds about right). She's making the face that most girlfriends make when they are waiting for their boyfriends to finish their video game. It's really an insignificant photo, but I thought it was funny and she was very pretty in it.

I never told her that. I never told her that I loved that photo. If you knew me, I'm not the type to voice these kinds of things. It's embarrassing and it makes me feel vulnerable to spew these types of romantic cliche's. But in hindsight, it's terrible that I didn't. 6 years? What was I afraid of? I'm not sure where that phobia originated from.

Good news, I didn't get that wave of nausea I've become used to. I smiled and sent the picture off to Jack.

So@24: Cutie, eh?
Jack: Yeah dude. Definitely.

It's so much easier to admit these things when I can hide behind my computer screen.