The Story of My Magikarp

At such a young age, I couldn’t help but feel like Ted Mosby: exhausted, drained and exasperated by this dating world that never seemed to work on my side. In this sea filled with pea-brained fishes, I thought I was lucky enough to have caught a smart little magikarp who could, at a first guess, answer my PolSci questions without having to go through my tedious readings. Just when I was starting to believe that all the stupidity in the world was slowly concentrating around me, he came along.

(When I say pea-brained, I mean every single bit of the cruelty in it. My sails have been most unfortunate: Imagine having to go out with someone who has absolutely no idea who Hitler is! Is it just me, or do these fishes have a great shortage of brain?)

I spotted this little magikarp during my first day as a college freshman. He was quite a stunner (although I’ve often received complaints, accusing me of having the most nauseating taste.) He fell into the pattern of my usual eye candy selection: pasty, white and Asian. Beautiful. It took a little effort and a whole lot of serendipity till he swam away from the friendzone and bit on my fishing rod’s hook. I was captured. I thought I was saved.

Everything was perfect. I was the mouth; he was the ear. I bantered; he listened. I spoke; he agreed. I was a bully; he let me have my way. He’d rain me with compliments and I pretended to be displeased. Everything made sense.

We shared a common passion for academics. He had his calculator and I had my readings. He excelled in Math. I excelled in language. Everyday we continued to mesmerize each other as we admired how the other greatly shone where we fell short.  What I loved the most was how we could go on and on about what we learned in class, or what our daily discernments were—and everything sounded gibberish, but everything sounded genius. I had great respect for anyone who knew his way around numbers, and he just continued to amaze me everyday.

But…

 Perfection and permanence will never co-exist.

The grandeur dulled out. The fondness faded. The novelty died. The admiration turned to aggravation. Soon enough the magikarp I once loved was just another regular fish: a plain old boring adherent of the sea that failed to catch my attention.

Everything he did started to tick me off.  Everything that came out of his mouth annoyed me. What bothered me the most was how he agreed to everything I said, no matter how little or absolutely no sense I made. Every conversation was one-sided, like Charlie and Mary Elizabeth. I want an argument. I need discourse. I need someone to prove me wrong when I am. I don’t want someone to tell me I sing like an Angel when I could hardly do any better than Rebecca Black. He made a constant effort to entertain me; I made a constant effort to be entertained. What once was pleasing became a chore, and treating my fish became a bore.

I want to throw this magikarp back into the ocean.

I should have known better than to take a fish that has never finished a single novel, or that proudly patronizes Nicki Minaj. Maybe I am too picky. Or maybe it was the time when he asked me “Have you watched a Nirvana Concert?” Dealbreaker.

Perhaps I’m just too difficult to get along with. I’m starting to think I am the problem. You might think I am too evil of a person to be posting these things—but he doesn’t even read. It’s not a problem.

I know it’s a cliché but…

It’s not you, it’s me.