Jealous Again

I’ve got the Black Crowes in my head. “Jealous. Jealous again.” Because I am. Of you. I have exactly 44 days until I can go homehome. 44 days to deal with being landlocked and loser. I always think of you when I hear the Black Crowes but this time it’s more than that. You were there. You could have bragged about it. You didn’t. Instead, you let me down easy. Talking more about the weather than what I was missing. I got weather here, too. I wanted to crawl through the phone and smell the salt in your hair. You were just there. What made me ask? Torturing myself with the wanting. How was the pizza? Where did you hike? Was it crowded? I stopped short of asking how the sea smelled, how the surf sounded on the shore, what was in bloom. Stopped short of being pitiful, but wanting all the same.

I reminded myself of someone I knew once. She would flip through fashion magazines and Victoria’s Secret catalogs and ask her boyfriend, “Do you think she’s pretty? Do you like her legs?” as she shoved the glossy near naked women in his face. “Well? Well?” What was she looking for? A lie? Could she handle the truth? What made her force the admission?

Funny thing about jealousy. It changes everything once it flares up and rages out of control. Like a fire, things get out of hand if not handled properly. People say stupid things when they are bit by the ugly green eye. Jealousy. Things become infected by jealousy. You lose things to jealousy. Things burn up in jealousy. Friends. Relationships. Things. Life as we knew it. Life period. I sort through the rubble, bits of charred emotions still smoking. Make my way through what I want to salvage, deciding what is worth keeping. Nothing. I decide nothing is worth salvaging. Let it burn I say. I’ll be home in 44 days.