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I guess I’ve been deemed qualified to write
this, since I have successfully (or unsuccessfully) dated in both
situations before, as well as observed both situations many times.
When you’re a student at a large high
school, you are little more than a number.
You, your history, your friends, none of that is important
to anyone else. You
could go to the same school for years and still manage to not know
who even half the people are
It’s great!
No one knows or really cares who’s dating
who. What’s even
better though is when you break up, you never have to see the guy
again (unless of course you have a class with him; but you could
always get your schedule changed if you really wanted).
That is not at all the case at smaller
schools, and actually the smaller the school, the harder it is to
keep your personal life in fact personal.
Meet Marianne and Ivan.
The moment Ivan became interested in Marianne, there was
about 20 people going up to them asking, “What’s up with you
two?” Gossip started flying immediately and by the end of the week,
they had been married with six kids and divorced – all that
before they even had each other’s numbers.
It got worse after they actually started
dating. All of a
sudden, everyone and their pet monkeys were asking the two about
what they do, if they’ve met each other’s parents, if
they’ve had sex yet, if they knew any dirt on each other, etc.
I could go on for pages about all the personal stuff
that somehow became everyone’s business, or so they assumed.
If you got nervous reading what happened
before and during the relationship, watch your blood pressure.
The break up is ten times worse.
When the two broke up – which is almost inevitable
considering all the pressure they were under since before they
even got together – the pressure almost crushed them.
The mutual friends were no longer mutual and split
themselves up between the two.
Most of the time one of the exes will get the majority of
the friends, making the other one feel like a huge loser.
In Ivan and Marianne’s case, Ivan was left with no one.
They all took Marianne’s side.
The people that were begging for dirt returned, this time
more persistent, hoping that one of them would be either
bitter or pissed AND willing to spill.
In Ivan and Marianne’s case, they both had no problem
spilling just a little bit of dirt on each other.
There is no way to avoid each other in the
small school, so if it’s a messy break up, the time right after
the break up will be a living hell.
Even if it’s a “nice” break up, the tension is so
thick it would take a chain saw to even start cutting through it.
Unpleasant? That’s
an understatement if I ever heard one.
Believe it or not, it gets worse. And that happens when one moves on before the other. Man
does that suck, and I don’t mean a little sucky-ness for the ex.
I’m talking a massive suck-fesst.
But not just for the poor sap still pining for the ex, but
also for the one that has moved on.
How do you know when is an appropriate time to move on?
How do you face the heartbroken look of your ex when he
finds out? And the
poor, pining soul Ivan – how does he deal with the fact that his
ex has found someone new before him?
Now I’m not saying that these messy
situations don’t happen in larger schools.
But it’s a lot easier to have a personal life and hide
from exes at larger schools compared to the small ones, a whole
lot easier.
In Ivan and Marianne’s case they couldn’t
hide from each other. They
were confronted daily with each other and the problems they had.
To this day, the tension between them is still as thick as
it was the first time they saw each other after they broke up.
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