Last night was the first time a Glee episode had me on the verge of tears. It was filled with sadness as each of the main characters and their relationships were being tested and torn apart. The song choices were spot on and the lyrics mimicked the tone of the story lines perfectly. Each of the characters are really maturing and overall it was actually nice to consider the direction the show might be going in concerning more adult subject matter – despite the destiny of our beloved “Gleek” couples.
Emotionally, I think it touched me so much because I remember that feeling of being young and in love, being so wrapped up in someone and experiencing the pains of the heart when you either can’t have them or they no longer want you.
It’s so new and exciting at first. They are all you think about. Spending time with them makes you so happy inside. It’s the best feeling in the world really.
But when you really love someone, and I mean REALLY love them, it hurts so much inside when you hear them say they no longer want to be with you.
I had two “small” break-ups before that really big one. I label them as “small” because it didn’t hurt so much. Maybe they were just flings and I wasn’t as emotionally invested. Few, if any, tears were shed either time.
But then there was the one.
We’d only been together maybe six months, but God I loved that man. I probably smothered him, because it pained him so much to pull away from me. I didn’t want to let him go. I’d gone out of town that weekend to visit my family. He’d been distant and didn’t want to go with me. I knew why. And I was right. The night I got back into town we went for a walk in a park and he broke up with me.
The pain ate me up inside. I cried. I didn’t eat. I couldn’t sleep. I wrote bad poetry. I wanted to die. After a few days, he came around to check on me. He wanted us to be friends. I had trouble with that notion at first, but I soon opened myself up to it. I needed a friend.
I’m not going to lie – we mutually agreed to have casual sex with each other until either of us started seeing someone else. It wasn’t supposed to mean anything. I wanted it more than he probably did, and in the back of my head it did mean something and I thought I could change his mind. It didn’t work. And we eventually stopped having sex with each other. But we never stopped being friends. Good friends too.
Time and distance are the only things that have separated us now, but I still consider him a friend to this day. I think about him often, especially when the music plays that played in the background of a memory we shared. Music has that effect on us, doesn’t it?
It’s often the soundtrack to our lives when we want it to be. And the music on the show last night certainly struck a chord with me. They were never my songs before, but maybe they are now.
I’m older now. I know more. And the lessons I’ve learned of love are all memories, knowledge, and science, and progress as the song says. But the music still touches me and helps me to remember both how easy and how difficult it was. And still is.
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The Lone Writer: Shannon Yarbrough 
What a powerful, personal post. Loved it, and couldn’t agree more.