Member-only story
We’ve all had feelings of some sort which weren’t shared by the person on the other end. The crush on the cute classmate who never even knew we were there. The infatuation with a music, TV, or sports star we were never actually going to meet. Falling truly and deeply in love with someone who just didn’t feel the same way. We have all had experiences with unshared romantic interests, for some of us those have been our only experiences. It feels awful, sometimes to an intensely painful degree. The impulse to glibly shrug aside the sting of it, to get the last laugh on the situation, is understandable but the Friendzone concept doesn’t make light of the situation or satirize it. It reduces it, and all involved, to an object of mockery and ridicule.
Feelings of attraction can be difficult to unpack. Physical attraction mingles with emotional attraction and intellectual connection. Is the draw we are feeling simply a case of physical attraction or is there more to it? Are we merely growing closer and more bonded with a friend or are other types of feelings starting to develop? Where are the lines, how do we tell the difference between those things? And how do we do navigate a friendship after an ask for more has been rejected? These are all incredibly…