Date: Sat, 28 May 2005 23:01:25 UT From: T O Subject: Turning Point - Introduction and Chapter 1 PREFACE Have you ever to make a choice? I am sure most of you have had to make a choice at one time of your lives. How about a choice that no matter what you choose, everything is going to change in your life. No matter which option you choose, the outcome is going to change the very person that you are. Some of you may be thinking, hey this story is about choosing between two people, and he will choose the one who he is supposed to be with and it is a happy ending, but sadly, you would be mistaken. This is a story about my choice of whether or not I was going to be happy with me. It is funny how a fork in the road works. You have a choice of two directions you can go, one going left, and the other going right. Notice how you can never go in the same straight direction that you had before. No matter which way you decided to turn, the direction you are travelling is never the same as it was before. That is the turning point that I am talking about and this makes the perfect interlude into my story. It all started back in the fall of 2000. All summer I had been preparing for the most exciting, adventurous, newest thing in my life. The start of my University life. ... As I have just realised that I was lacking in my introduction, my name is Jared, I am 18 years of age from a small town in Atlantic Canada, where I have lived for the entire span of my young life. Throughout my high school life, I was one of those people that most hate. You know the one, the band guy with straight A+'s who is involved in everything from Varsity Sport teams, volunteering with youth in Scouts, participating in student government, the list goes on and on. I am 6 foot 3; brown hair, brown eyes, and average build for a busy guy. I had to stay busy, or it left I time to think, and idle thinking could get me into extreme trouble. For the most part, I had a great upbringing. I had five of the closest friends a guy could have. They may have been all girls, but that did not matter because they had my back better than any group of guys could ever could, however I always felt that part of me was incomplete. I never understood why, and I certainly didn't give me the time to find out, as I was probably too scared to understand the real reason, all I knew is that I was missing something. That is why, when the opportunity presented itself to me to go away to school, I jumped at the chance. With scholarship in tow, I went away to University in Ontario. A chance for me to learn more about myself, leave the strange comfortable yet uncomfortable bonds that I was accustomed to, and strike out into a new endeavour. CHAPTER ONE 20 hours in a car absolutely sucks! I mean as nice as it is to sit in a cramped Grand Am with a father worrying about the trailer hitched on back of the car with all my gear in it, it truly wasn't the most pleasant experience of my life. However, at last, I finally had made it to my destination. I was finally at the University of Ontario. I was sitting quite quietly in the back seat just admiring my surrounding as my parents are talking to me about so many things, I didn't even bother to pay attention. I had finally pulled to my residence and this feeling of "home" set in. I was a little confused by this, but I let that pass. I got all my stuff out of the car, and after several hours of moving stuff in, I sent my parents home. I needed to start my independence and its pretty hard to do with mommy and daddy around. I love them dearly but I knew that it was time for me. I just kept working on getting on my room organized. I am such a perfectionist. Everything must be in the proper place or it drives me crazy A couple hours into it, I heard a knock on my door. As I had kept my door wide open at the time, a guy just came right in and said "Hey I'm Matt." I responded, told him my name was Jared, and turned around to see him. I just stared at him, noticed him in a football jersey and kept back to what I was doing. Let me give you a visual of Matt. He was 6 foot 2, just a smidge shorter than I was, but his muscles were way more defined than I ever could get mine. It shows that he works out all the time. He has baby blue eyes, short brown hair, and had perfect teeth. I think that hopefully gives a visual. "You must be my bog mate?" I again looked at him like he was crazy. He then explained that even though we had single room, every two rooms had an adjoining bathroom between them, which was affectionately called a bog. I was a little surprised, but was excited that I only had to share a washroom/shower with one other. I know I must seem anti-social, but something about Matt made me nervous, however, it never seemed like it bothered him. He just keeps trying to engage me into a conversation. I knew it was useless to try to finish organizing my room, so I stop and had a conversation with him. We really introduced ourselves, and it turns out the person that picks room assignment sucks, as you could not have two very different people sharing one common area. Matt was a football playing rich guy who has had every opportunity that money could buy, he had no relationship with his family, as beside playing football, did nothing else but party. I was a curling playing poor guy that had to work for every opportunity that I had, and who hated to drink. However, in our difference, there was a bond, who knew where it came from, but it was there. I really can't explain it any better than that, except it was weird. The first couple of weeks of school had came by, and things were starting to fall into place somewhat. I made quite a few new friends in class and in rez, I would see Matt daily as we were in the business program together. The thing about this program is that, since I was going to a liberal arts school, the business school was quite small and for first year students, the first year mandatory (3 each semester) were with all of the students together in each class. We would exchange pleasantries, have the occasional meal together at the meal hall, nothing major, but whenever I was with him I felt that the bond was still there. I hardly knew the guy, but it felt like we were connected somehow. However, this would change once the sunset. The original bond I thought I had with Matt was starting to get strained as it seemed like every night, he would go drinking with his football buddies and would end up in my room, as I was trying to do homework, or hanging with some of my new college friends, or even sleeping, and would come into to "hang out". This would be the only time that he would ever want to hang out with me and it was starting to piss me off. However, as long as I made it seem like I didn't want him there, his visits would be only temporary and he would end up crashing on the floor, or his bed, or in the bog, what ever worked. Each time however, a sad look would come across his face, a look that would always puzzle me. However, As long as I didn't have to deal with his drunk ass. Some nights, as I was coming back from one place to another, I would see him go home with some cheap looking chick, who was probably as drunk as he was, and they would come into his room. Once, the chick went into the washroom in the middle of the night and went back to the wrong room and ended up in my bed. However, the chick was always different, and you would never see them together the day after. This kept up for a couple more weeks, until one night he came into my room (surprising sober mind you) with a purpose. I knew he wasn't going to leave quite as quickly the time and I was just waiting to hear what this guy had to say.