Degrassi knows all.

This morning, after a slightly painful phone conversation with my mom, in which I just couldn’t bring myself to tell her Jill had thrown me out (and so had to answer questions about Jill, although I don’t know the answers anymore: “How’s Jill? Is she going to work the same amount when she starts back at school?”), I turned on my favorite television show (and probably yours), Degrassi. This show has, oddly, played a tiny but notable role in all of my somewhat-significant relationships, as far as I can remember: I used to watch it with Sarah and Eric, I’m pretty sure Emilie and I talked about it on occasion, and I think I tried to get Jill to watch it once or twice. It’s so emotionally overwrought and melodramatic but, I admit, I love it. Here’s a rundown of the scene I caught:

What’s his name, guitar-playing coke addict dude—okay, it’s Craig (I looked it up—it’s been too long since I’ve watched it). So Craig comes home and some hot older blond chick (I don’t know who she is—I’m really way too out of touch) is there and it’s Christmas time or something and he asks her for advice: he’s supposed to be spending the night with Ashley, but I guess he’s having doubts, and he says something like, “She’s a great girl, right? I should feel lucky that I have her?” And the blond woman tells him, “Love isn’t about luck. Love is about being with the right person.” This is, apparently, profoundly inspiring to Craig, and he runs out the door, without a word, as she calls after him, “Hope I helped!”

So he shows up at this ice-skating rink and runs out there with his shoes on and calls after this girl Manny, and he slides up to her and tells her, “It’s you, not Ashley—it’s you, it’s always been you.” And homegirl looks skeptical for a minute (and for good reason, from the sounds of things) but then slowly breaks into a smile and accepts and kind of shrieks, happily, and jumps up and wraps her legs around him, y’know, in that joyful I’m-so-crazy-and-romantic-that-I’ll-jump-up-on-you-and-wrap-my-legs-around-you-without-warning-and-you’ll-just-instinctively-be-ready-to-catch-me kind of way.

And I’m thinking, that kind of shit only happens on TV and in the movies, or it only works in TV and the movies, and when you try to make that kind of thing happen in real life—the way I did, on occasion, with Jill—you just end up feeling cheap, and fake, especially when you’re reminded that you probably got the idea to say things like that—”It’s you, it’s always been you”—from watching Degrassi in high school.

Then again, when Ashley gives him a new-old beautiful beat up guitar, he doesn’t seem so eager to drop her and leap into Manny’s arms, so maybe the show knows a little more about how romantic love actually works in the real world than it initially let on.

Incidentally, no word from Jill, so the status of my worldly belongings—all my clothes, my computer, my camera, etc.—is still in the hands of fate, except I don’t believe in fate, so it’s just in her hands, I guess, and I’m waiting for whenever she tells me she’s going to throw it all out on her lawn so I can go pick it up.

I made sure to warn Jaclyn last night at work that I might be wearing the same clothes for a few days, and that she shouldn’t worry, and that I’d try not to stink.

I’m thinking about taking up running, in other news, because I need to do something.