All the Boys - More on Cognac

I had all these plans to go home last night and do some serious writing. I was going to work on my NaNovel, and I was going to compose my Tuesday post, where I would tell you a little more about Cognac. The thing is, my memory really sucks. It always has, I have a really hard time with dates, and time frames. I remember the most minute details and occurences, but I don't remember specific times and dates, I think I have a hard time because there's always so much going on in my mind that things get jumbled in there. But I'm digressing. Because of my sucky memory, I couldn't figure out exactly when it was that Cognac and I first started dating, so I came home to look for a picture of him I have, knowing that I'd written the dates of our relationship on the back of it (I told you, I remember minute details, and I remembered where this photo was, and that the dates were on the back of it, even though I haven't seen the photo in probably 4 years). What I didn't remember, however, was that in that box where the photo was, where I keep things like birthday cards from special people, Christmas cards, photos of certain exes, emails from others, those sorts of things, that I just can't quite part with yet, well, in that box I also found my journals. I found at least 10 of them. From as far back as elementary school, all the way through 2002. And among those journals were the ones I kept during my relationship with Cognac. Starting, in fact, with the week after I met Cognac.

So, I plopped myself down on my couch and set to reading. Two hours later, and I'd read the entire contents of my relationship with Cognac, beginning to end. I laughed, I remembered things I'd forgotten, I'm happy to say I didn't cry, but there were bittersweet moments in it all. What I didn't do, however, was write. I haven't touched my NaNovel since Sunday night. I'm still WAY behind on word count, but I'm hitting a bit of writer's block with it. I stare at the screen and can't find words to fill it. So I decided to stop trying and get back to Cognac.

I first introduced you to Cognac in this post, where I told you all about how we met. I'll give you a moment to go back and read that story now if you haven't yet, if you're so inclined. Go a head...I'll wait...

Okay, done? Well then, let's continue then, shall we?

Just a little visual aid for you all. As I mentioned before, when I was dating Cognac, I would often be told he looked like Tyson Beckford...the model in the above photo. He sort of did. He might have actually been better looking than him, but then, I was biased.

When I met Cognac, I was in the midst of a self-discovery of sorts. I was fresh out of college, going to clubs on weekends with my girls, and had this on again off again thing with a guy who was away in the army. He was presently away on base, therefore, we were in the "off again" stage of things. When Cognac entered my life, I was pretty sure he wouldn't be around very long. After all, as I mentioned in my earlier post about him, he was gorgeous. Too gorgeous for little old me. I have always had self-esteem issues, and even when I was at the peak of my popularity with men, I was still unsure of my impact. Therefore, when this vision of a man showed an interest in me, I was pretty sure it wouldn't last. From my journal, word for word: "I'm having a hard time digesting this because he is BEAUTIFUL. Damn, I can't even begin to describe him. From those eyes, to that smile...he is FINE...(I'm afraid) he won't have a damn thing to do with me". And yet, he kept calling me. And the more we talked, the more I liked him, and the more I realized he was really into me. From the start Cognac made me feel beautiful, sexy, special. Cognac was cocky, secure in himself, and he was extremely mature for a 22 year old. While I was still living at home with my parents, and in fact, with them being as strict as they were, I still had a curfew at 22 (maybe we'll eloborate on that in a future post), he lived on his own, worked and went to school, and had serious plans for his future. He was intelligent, sweet, and the kind of man a young girl could totally fall for. And he wanted me. I fell fast, and I fell hard. But Cognac returned the love, he was very much in love with me as well, and he wasn't afraid to show it, to say it, to admit it.

Before Cognac, I thought I'd been in love once before, but that relationship was unhealthy, and hardly reciprocal. Again from my journal, when reflecting on the fact that I was falling in love with Cognac and comparing it to my prior relationship: "I don't know if what I felt with "Slick" really was love, but if it was, it was the wrong kind of love". when I started falling for Cognac, however, it was mutual, it was my first true love.

Cognac had the ability to make me feel like a million bucks. He could look at me with that look in his eyes, and I knew I was the most beautiful girl in the room to him. He was the first boyfriend I brought home to my family, the first to spend Thanksgiving with my family, the first man I ever dated that my mother trully liked. In fact, I used to joke that sometimes I thought she liked him more than me (not true). He was a charmer, everyone loved him, my family, my friends, my coworkers, complete strangers.

And yet, somewhere along the way, he stopped charming me.

As I mentioned above, Cognac was driven, determined to make something of himself. He used to tell me he'd be a millionaire by the time he was 30. In order to achieve this goal, he was always getting involved in money making schemes. The problem was he worked a bit to hard. He became a workaholic, and toward the end of our relationship, we'd go weeks without seeing each other. He just wouldn't make the time for me, and I was obviously not happy about it. But there was more.

There was something else, something that even to this day I can't fully explain. With Cognac, I lost a part of me. I was with a confident and gorgeous man, who thought I was beautiful and intelligent. But with him, I was a low resolution version of myself. I don't really know how else to explain it. He didn't do it on purpose, but it's as if his light shone so bright that by comparison, it dimmed mine. I've always been bubbly, talkative, confident, and sure of myself. But with him, I was insecure, quiet, and unhappy. Even my friends would later tell me that I'd disappeared a bit while I was with him. Again from the journal, later on, after our break-up, when reflecting back on a conversation with Cognac: "He's right, I'm never goofy or hyper around him, I'm too serious...I want to be carefree, fun...I'm self-conscious with Cognac...I can't do that anymore".

We broke up less than a year after we started dating. Cognac would continue to call me long after the break-up, and we would in fact re-connect and try again years later. But I'll tell you all about Take-Two another time.

From our first time around, however, I gained much. As much as I dimmed while with him, the fact that someone as confident (cocky) and good looking as him had been so much into me, boosted my confidence by leaps and bounds. When we broke up, I had gained so much confidence around men. I'd gotten his attention, I could do anything. I also learned how to be loved. As stated, I'd been in an unhealthy (at best) relationship prior to Cognac, and he provided me with something I'd never had before, a relationship that was reciprocal. At least for a while.

Once Cognac and I broke up, I went through a phase of short term, fun, and kind of surreal relationships. Oh, the stories I have. As I read through my journals, I laugh at the names and stories I'd completely forgotten. And yes, I'll share...another time.

Ya'll come back now you hear?