What About Shawna?

In the year 1995 I was 23 years old and had absolutely no career perspectives in front of me, and I made the decision to go to Job Corps to learn a trade. Although I lived in the bay area in northern California they sent me to Imperial Beach, California because it was there that they had an Accounting program I could get into. On the surface this seems like a wise idea, but in retrospect I think it was a poor choice. You see, I had a serious girlfriend at the time and her name was Jaime. Not only did I leave her behind, but I made the foolish decision that we should see other people. This decision would turn out to be very painful. It was at Job Corps, San Diego Job Corps, as it was called because of its proximity to that city, that I met Shawna, who would turn out to be the great love of my twenties.

But alas, love is often complicated and this most certainly was. In early May my good friend Chester introduced me to Shawna. At Job corps you live on campus, so in effect it becomes a college like atmosphere although people are learning trades or getting their GED. The three of us had breakfast together at the cafeteria and instantly Shawna and I hit off. There was no tension, it was an easy friendship and soon we were just inseparable. We always ate together and hung out after classes and what I liked about her was that I always felt appreciated around her, I always felt important to her. There was no gamesmanship, no hard to get, no guessing as to where I stood and I appreciated that. At the time I was not dating anybody on campus, but I still kept in touch with Jaime. Although she and I were not exclusive there was still a very deep connection to her. I was by no means over her. Occasionally we would still see each other with me flying to see her or her doing the same.

Before Shawna got to Job Corps I had dated a girl named Lisa and that lasted about five weeks. One of the issues was that I was really pining over Jaime and I couldn't really give Lisa the sole focus she deserved because my heart was elsewhere. And, as I have a tendency to be honest, she knew completely about Jaime, so this was not going to work. About three weeks into my friendship with Shawna the possibility of us dating came to the forefront. I remember talking about girls on campus and I said that it was hard for me to find somebody to date because all of the girls that liked me were ugly.

Shawna was very offended and said, "Excuse me."

I had to clarify, "What I mean, is that the girls who like me romantically are ugly."

Later on Chester, who was there for this conversation talked about it. I mentioned that Shawna had gotten really offended and explained to him that I had assumed Shawna was not romantically interested in me.

Chester said, in a voice that indicated he knew something said, "You assumed."

I then turned the subject to Jaime and explained to him that I was going to see her on the weekend, which was a few days away at this point.

He then asked me, "What about Shawna? Do you like her?"

This was complicated. Yes, would be the short answer. I told him that I did like her, but I didn't want to start anything with her when I knew I was going to see Jaime on the weekend, especially knowing that I would sleep with her. I had learned my lesson from dating Lisa, and I didn't want to put myself or Jaime or Shawna through such complications.

When I look back at that conversation I wonder how other guys would have handled it. For me, I had no instinct to be anything but honest about the situation. My fallback position is to come from a place of honesty. Nobody is 100 percent honest, I am not claiming that. However, I don't choose dishonesty in every single instance where being honest is uncomfortable or inconvenient. Being dishonest is not something I take lightly or abuse, although it seems to make life easier for some people. Sometimes doing the right thing gets the wrong results and I can live with that. I wasn't going to hide what was going on with Jaime and the thought of starting something with Shawna, not telling Jaime, sleeping with her and then coming back to Job Corps and making up some bullshit about nothing happened, well, that is just not in my reality. The fact that some guys would have done that didn't even enter my brain until much, much later. So, as I said I would I went to see Jaime and I slept with her that weekend.