The spoof boy band 2ge+her had a tune called “The Hardest Thing about Breaking up (Is Getting Back Your Stuff)”.
Ain’t it the truth!
I honestly don’t remember all the genuinely cool stuff that “went down the ex hole” after a relationship went south. Usually, I wouldn’t even realize it til sometime later when I’d be looking for, say, my Clash t-shirt from the Fox show and it hit me, Mara wore it that night we were on St. Simons and the <adjective> <noun> never gave it back!
After all these years, it still pisses me off.
So what stuff of yours is gone, gone, and nothing’s gonna bring it back?
One girl I dated borrowed my copy of The Nag Hammedi Library and neglected to ever return it. While not an irreplacable item, it was a $40 book and it would have been nice to see it again. Come to think on it, she has several of my books. :dubious:
This doesn’t really count since it was a gift, but I used to have a nice silver ring I made in a jewelry class that I gave to my girlfriend at the time. I didn’t make it for her, I had made it years before and it was one of the few pieces I made that turned out nicely and was really worth keeping (or giving). Had I known then what I know now, I’d have saved it for someone a bit more deserving.
I don’t really need it back, but boy did this remind me of a situation.
Back in college I was dating this guy, and we both fancied ourselves quite the budding intellectuals. I had lent him a copy of a book I hadn’t read yet, The Emperor’s New Mind. He had the s to lend this book to ANOTHER GIRL as an attempt to impress her with his deep thinking nature.
When we broke up, he’s like, “I’m (you’re) never getting that back because what’s her name totally blew me off.”
I’m going off topic, but Harriet’s story reminded me of a college story. There was a girl I’d seen around campus who I was completely infatuated with but I had never spoken to her much less knew her name, etc. One day, my roommate comes over with his girlfriend and her friend who was, you guessed it, the mystery woman (whose name happened to be Amy, by the way). For fifteen of the more glorious moments of my life, Amy and I chatted and she looked over my collection of CDs and cassettes. She found an album she hadn’t heard before and asked if she could borrow it. Naturally I agreed since (a) I had the mental facilities of a lemur at the time and (b) this meant I’d get a chance to talk to her again.
A week or so goes by and I remark to my roommate that I wouldn’t mind getting my hands back on that album. He talks to his girlfriend who refuses to divulge Amy’s last name, phone number, etc but says she’ll “let her know”. Needless to say, I never did see my album again. I think I next saw Amy about a month later on campus but by that time she’d been downgraded in my mind from “Object of Fantasy-Like Desire” to “Petty Cassette-Stealing Bitch” and I didn’t bother to try to speak to her.
I had an immediate answer during scroll-over, then read the last line of the OP!
Since my first answer was disallowed, the one thing I would really like to get back was a very nice rosewood-handled boot knife. I miss the knife more than I miss her.
Several original paintings and ceramic pieces I had made, a library of about 1,000 books, and a sizable vintage clothing collection (including handmade cotton and lace underthings my great-grandmother had made in the early 1900s), fell prey to a disastrous live-in relationship which I had to sneak away while he was at work to escape.
My first husband was a terrible pack rat and I decided it wasn’t worth going through all that crap to find my stuff before I left. Somewhere in there is my tacklebox and all my old school yearbooks.
An old boyfriend gave me a really expensive bamboo flyrod just before I broke up with him. Even though he tried to insist I keep it, I thought it only right to give it back to him. I should have listened to him and kept it.
Don’t want any stuff, but would really like to have the piece of mind wasted on those yon gone wastrels back.
Ok, so, then, to summon it up:Give me my particularly, eventually, and quite personally signed book by Stanley Booth—lost 5 years ago, and given in the spirit of lending, I so want it back NOW.
I hate to warp this thread to my own purposes, but what if you have something you’d like to give back to an ex-lover, but expect that it somehow would be totally inappropriate and unwanted? :dubious:
Many years ago I gave an engraved bronze science fair medal to a guy I was crazy about. I bet it doesn’t mean as much to him as it does to me. If he still has it, I’d sure like to get it back. There are few things as dear to the heart of an aging geekette as a science fair medal.
I’ve never lost anything to an ex but I do have something that one of my ex’s would probably love to get back. It’s revord player in the shape of a banana painted like the one on the cover of the first Velvet Underground album. It doesn’t really work very well but looks damn cool. I would be all for giving it back but if you never call me you will never get it back. HAHHAHAHAH!!!
I lost her number and don’t know where she’s living or anything right now. Last I heard she had a kid. Not my fault she won’t come get her stuff back
I lost all of my kids’ baby pictures in my divorce. I had to get out of that marriage, and I left some things that I thought I could get back later. I’ve been nagging him for years, because the hell? Those are mine, or at least half of them are. It feels like I’ve lost a part of my kids’ babyhoods with losing those pictures.
My Mom recently found some she could part with and gave them to me, but looking at them just reminds me of the ones I lost.
I left a bunch of other stuff, but that’s what I regret. Everything else is just stuff.
A vintage leather wallet that had belonged to my grandfather. I know I gave it as a gift and it would be rude to take it back, but he really didn’t deserve it.
Oh, and not something I gave away, but something that was given to me that I lost and want back: a moussaka recipe an ex-boyfriend had that was the best. I know where he is, but don’t want to re-contact him. Anybody here from Tucson?
And moi, it’s not inappropriate at all if it’s that bamboo flyrod you want me to have…
But I think his second ex-wife may have gotten them, in addition to everything else they owned. Kharma?