‘So just how many HAVE you been with? Be honest!’
‘22’
‘Really?? That seems a bit high…I don't believe it!’
‘Well, it's not so high for a man of my advanced years.. ’
She wondered whether I could actually remember them all. As 22 isn’t exactly what I would call a lofty number, I scoffed…
‘What are you talking about? I remember them all very well! I can even give you the list and describe the nature of each relationship.’
So I began the recounting, but mysteriously I could only recall 18. I searched deep into my brain-al recesses and double backed a few times, but I couldn’t come up with the other 4. After a while I wondered whether or not I had ‘padded’ my number. Perhaps I had actually only been with 18.
It was all a bit disconcerting.
Later that night I sat down at the computer to come up with a list, maybe writing it down would jog my memory.
Shaniqua
Danielle
Tina
Holly
Boshra
Adina
Nicole
Melissa
Colleen
Laura
Jen
Lilli
Julie S
Priya
Cristi
Amy
Lyssa
current live-in banger
Jesus… How would I remember Adina, and not remember the other 4? I only slept with her once, and I barely dated her. It was completely an inconsequential relationship. Albeit, over the years I must say I’ve always made a specific POINT of remembering her as I didn’t want to forget her if ever I was to come up with a list such as this.
I gave up the search and went to bed.
The next day the other 4 popped into my head! One was a ‘certain ex-blog-a-logger’, another was the girl that told me she’d rather stick a knife in her eye than ever speak to me again, some other was this girl that I’d recently gotten an e-mail from stating that she’d married some extremely rich Nordic God, and the final one was this chick who possibly was the most irritating person I’ve ever met.
Half of me was relieved that I hadn’t made that number up in my head, and the other half was a bit disappointed. For a couple of days, I had felt a tad purer.
After remembering these ‘lost women’, it didn’t really surprise me that I had subconsciously erased them from my thoughts. A couple of them were just very brief and meaningless flings, and the others were highly contentious. It’s funny how the mind works sometimes. To tell the truth, all of these women are phantoms in some sense. I mean think about it, over the years you meet people, hang out, perform excruciatingly intimate acts on each other, and in the end separate and become the most estranged of strangers.
Phantoms.
It’s almost as if none of them even exist anymore… Well they don’t really, at least not in my reality.
Of course, there may be an exception or 2 in there, the ones I still receive an e-mail from once in a blue moon, but generally I’m as connected to them as I am to a random body on the street.
It’s strange when you think about it.