Who knew that adult hands could be supported by wrists that a five-year-old or baby duck could easily snap.
This may be part of why I spent my teenage years absolutely failing with women. In middle school, I would ask girls who I liked how much they weighed to see if I might weigh more. Numbers made me excited! I loved math! I used to think this meant everyone else loved math, too!
In high school, I became intimate -- with the friend zone. With one girl, I spent so many years in the friend zone I didn't even realize I was in it. She was from Sweden. so I guess it was literally Stockholm syndrome. I would come over to her house and help her with calculus and I would comfort her and tell her how she was beautiful or how her boyfriend was a dick or how integrals are related to derivatives. Eventually, I spent so much time in the friend zone that I grew to think of it as some kind of magical home away from home, some lush forest filled with unicorns and elves and puppies none of whom were getting laid.
I was on an adventure! Constantly uncovering new questions about this mystical place:
Are you in the friend zone if they're sleeping with other people and NOT telling you about it? Are you in the friend zone if they tell you they could totally see marrying you in fifteen years? Why would you marry me in fifteen years, if in fifteen years I'll still be a virgin because you never slept with me?
A few months after my first girlfriend and I broke up, I heard she lost her virginity to the next guy she dated. At the time, I thought of this as a betrayal, not her choice. As if she owed me something.
A newspaper column once defined the friend zone as follows: She discusses her love life with him and has the "audacity" to ask his advice on it. He performs favors for her. He does everything a boyfriend would do -- but without the benefits."
as if the only reason to be a good friend or a decent fucking human is if you get something in exchange.
You cannot kill a monster until you are willing to see it in the mirror. Until you recognize its shape in your own skin.
Embed
About
Genius Annotation1 contributor
Dylan Garity is the assistant director of Button Poetry. This piece was performed in the 3rd round of the Saint Paul Grand Slam Poetry Slam on May 6th, 2013.
It describes a young man’s journey through the friend zone – acquaintance with it, intimacy with it, and, eventually, the realization that the friend zone is bullshit – “as if the only reason to be a good friend or a decent fucking human is if you get something in exchange.”
Expand
Share
Q&A
Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning