get over it

At some point after our breakup, my ex gave me a framed drawing of a skateboarder rolling on top of the words I DON’T UNDERSTAND ANYTHING ABOUT LIFE WHEEE. It looks like something a child might draw, and now it sits on a shelf in the bedroom I once shared for the better part of a decade with the ex who gave it to me. I understood the gift to be a tacit acknowledgement of the utter incompetence we shared when it came to human relationships in general, and ours more specifically (hence its slow, nearly imperceptible demise).

I have a habit of collecting exes, of finding ways to keep them in my life indefinitely. I once read that it takes most people, on average, three months to get over a long-term relationship. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten over a long-term relationship. I don’t think I even know what that means.