5.25.2013

A Tricycle Life.

You guys,
Yesterday, I realized, 
I've spent my whole life...
as a third wheel.

Maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration, but hear me out:
From birth, I was the mini third wheel to my parents. This wasn't too bad. I would usually just play with marbles on the tile floor or run around in my backyard. But sometimes, hints of thirdwheel-ness would creep up. For example, the time I had to spend what felt like the majority of my childhood in the Celine Dion giftshop at Caesar's Palace because my parents left me to gamble. I came out of the gift shop not the same person. To this day, I can't really listen to Celine Dion belt out those notes without a tinge of bitterness in my heart.

In high school, the third wheel life wasn't too bad either. The Third Wheel Syndrome would come and go at monthly increments. One month, everyone loves you. Your girlfriends think you're the coolest. The guys think you're chill. You're the favorite. Then the next month, the pendulum shifts - and then you're the hated one & people just whisper behind you. High School is practically an institution filled with third wheels all trying to find themselves in a cruel world of hormones and melodrama. So, I didn't feel all that alone.

OH, but in college. In college, my friends, is when you start to realize...that maybe my life is not so much like a normal bicycle - two wheels, working together to achieve something great. But instead, a tricycle - an oddly shaped device that has no real purpose. Why in the world was that third wheel installed? To make the wheel feel lonely? out of place? awkward? Why? Why? Why? 
You see, college, is when people start pairing off and you start having conversations similar to this: 
Oh you found your soulmate? Ok, that's cool, I guess. I'll just go eat this meal by myself. 
or
Oh, you're going to the movies? Cool. Can I come...oh wait nevermind...I guess I didn't want to see that blockbuster anyway.

Yet sometimes, you find yourself in the situation where your two friends start dating due to the work of that devil named Cupid. This is the worst kind of third wheel. The process of "grabbing lunch" is never the same again. Starting with seating arrangements, it's never random anymore (maybe it never was). It is no longer a "oh, grab a chair, any chair" type of deal. You start getting your own entire side of the table. You start getting that one empty chair next to you. You tell yourself "Oh, well this is actually NICE, because I get to put my PURSE here." But then sometimes, you don't want your purse to go there. You want someone to sit there. Someone - Anyone. Every meal becomes like a Jewish Passover meal & the chair next to you is forever Elijah's chair - never to be filled, always left empty. Then to twist the knife even further, the check comes. And while everyone used to pull out their plastic and toss it in a pile to be split three-ways, Suddenly, there's only two cards. Oh, you're paying for her? Ok, cool. I guess...I guess, I'll just do some math here to figure out what I need to pay... 
And there, after you've signed your receipt alone and driven home alone, you start to feel kind of lonely. It's the loneliness that Beyonce never dares to sing about in her Independent Women songs. But it's real.

And now, in graduate school, where the majority of my friends are engaged, married, or have kids. I don't even know what kind of third wheel I am anymore. It's almost like I've been promoted to the third wheel's third wheel. I'm just so out of place. & this is when joking about third wheeling is no longer quite as funny as it used to be. It becomes harder to laugh carelessly because deep down, I'm kind of afraid that I'm going to die a third wheel. That somehow, even at the gravesite, I'll be buried next to my best friend & her husband with an empty tomb to the right of me - never to be filled. 

And I think it's here, in pits of loneliness that I just have to trust the Lord. I need to trust that He knows what is best for me. He has continually proven this to me - in all things.  I've been given the most satisfying gift in the universe - a relationship with Christ. What else do I need? The Tricycle Life will only be a momentary affliction in comparison to the eternity of life. May I never miss an opportunity to allow the tricycle life to point me back to my Savior and His comforting promises.

2 comments:

  1. i really enjoyed this read!! thanks so much for sharing miranda! hahaha you're so funny~~~ :D imma share this.

    - sarah -
    www.xliciousgirl.com

    ReplyDelete
  2. If you come to PBC you will not be a third wheel. You will find a man. Men will hollar at you. Come to the retreat by the way it's June 21-23.

    ReplyDelete

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