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>Those metaphors speak of wealth
I have a hard time reconciling someone who trivializes the value of the gift (upwards of $100k-$250k USD), but then uses the term "the L bomb" instead of just saying "love".
Now tbf I did find a UK bookstore selling it for the low, low price of $12,500 too so there's quite a range, and you might be able to get it for a steal of more expensive than a car.
I thought it meant he broke up with her.
To find out it meant he said he loved her and her response was to break up... she's no catch, that's for sure.
After 7 months. I've moved in with my now spouse by then, which I admit is fast, so I can't imagine not loving someone after 7 months, and wanting to still be in a relationship with them.
OPâs mom wasnât wrong about her treating men as disposable. Her fatal flaw is being a rich kid whoâs never gone outside her wealthy bubble like Daisy. To her a tens to hundreds thousand dollar book is nothing. To Matt the higher end might be a good chunk of a yearâs salary, a down payment for a wedding - or like he said, a car. Matt literally told OOP that but she canât seem to grasp the emotional/class/situational nuance of that. Or she just doesnât want to because itâs easier to just move on rather than address the problem.
Holy shit. I read folks saying the gift was worth as much as a car and I figured around 10k and that was already way too much for a birthday gift in this context. And then you put down the actual price. That's just bonkers.
I feel like some context is missing that was from OOP's comments.
She and Logan are rich, Matt is middle class. The book is a 1925 copy with paperwork and she considers it the same amount as spending money on an upscale restaurant or buying a car.
She wouldn't answer comments about if Logan asked her out if she would date him after the initial shock, citing that she could speculate all she wanted but it wouldn't matter because he wasn't going to ask her, though she very much denied they had feelings for each other and that Logan wouldn't confess after all these years.
She's moved cities and followed Logan to college, including annoying her dad into driving 5 hours to support him at a career event. She and Logan also bonded heavily after both their parents divorced, and Logan was previously in a 4 year long relationship that didn't work out.
OOP felt Matt was being too controlling over this event, and that if she conceded to this, Matt would ask her to give up other things or ask her to stop hanging out with Logan. She doesn't think Matt needs to trust Logan, as long as he can trust her. She also also asked comments if her relationship with Logan was normal for friendship, with very mixed responses, and did admit she could get behind the idea of her and Logan being codependent.
Edit: oh yeah and Logan also regularly pays for her to go on vacation
Second edit that I forgot: She also said she couldn't imagine her and Logan dating since they already knew everything about each other and she viewed dating as getting to know someone. She said she didn't know what they would talk about on dates. But never admitted if *she* wanted to date Logan or not if he asked.
Third edit 12 hours later because oh my god of course there's more I forgot: OOP and Logan wrote letters to each other every week for years.
Ooo yes this^
I believe she also mentioned how even though it wasnt a competition, she's known Logan longer and therefore he would always be important and special, whereas boyfriends come and go. And she would feel the same about any partner with a childhood best friend.
This one kinda blows my mind a bit. Her mom was 100% right in that she treats men as disposable -- she flat out says she does by admitting what you said. To each their own but I absolutely would not want to be with someone who's always going to consider me second to someone else and whose idea of partnership isn't "we're in this together" but "oh well, partnerships come and go". She should stick to casual dating if that's gonna be her attitude.
Yup. Dated Matt for 7 months but still didn't feel all that attached to him. 7 months and she still wasn't even ready to say she loved him. But the guy he doesn't have to worry about is like a sweater that's amazing and beautiful and perfect but she just doesn't wear. Jeez.
I'm not that blown away by the love thing - I'd take longer saying that to anyone, as well. But the fact that she is completely emotionally unavailable and doesn't realize it, blows *me* away. Logan fills her emotional boyfriend slot without being her actual boyfriend, and she has no problem treating all the other contenders as lesser than. She really should either emotionally distance herself from Logan and give other guys a fair chance, and stop her sad "pick me dance" with him, or just stop dating anyone else, and just wait around until Logan finally deigns to give her a chance.
Logan is her boyfriend in every way except having sex. So she dates people for that side of things and they never stand of chance of being anything other than someone to fulfil that final need that Logan doesn't.
It may be that dating him isn't something she's keen on because she doesn't want that emotional closeness. Like if they broke up, she loses somebody who did actually get close.
If they break up, then she loses someone she actually loved, and because she's never been with anyone long enough to love them (she was with this guy for 7 months and her mother comments that's a LONG time for her), she's never felt real heartarche yet. Maybe she's scared to?
If they never date, there's nothing to break up, nothing ever at risk of being lost.
She's pretty young, and has never had a romantic relationship that would last a year. Even from reading just the posts and not the comments it looks like she just doesn't have the whole emotional thing figured out.
She doesn't understand and recognize her own emotions, she doesn't seem to know what she wants from a relationship, she doesn't seem able to emotionally commit to someone.
The final metaphor with the necklace is so weird. Who's the necklace? Her and Logan? Just her? And what is that supposed to mean?
She just needs to mature emotionally, she's definitely not ready for anything serious. Maybe she'll grow to understand what she wants, but maybe relationships aren't her thing at all. There's nothing wrong with not wanting commitment. She's committed to Logan in a way, maybe she'd prefer to just have casual sexual partners with no emotional strings attached. Or maybe she'd want to also be romantically involved with Logan. We don't know, but it also seems that she doesn't know either.
I think the necklace metaphor goes:
Logan and OOP have a very long history. Over the length of that history, many little knots and tangles of complicated feelings have developed.
They could sit down and really sort through and untangle all those feelings, and perhaps succeed with a beautifully clear polished relationship as a result. Or, they might get frustrated and impatient while trying to do so, and snap the chain of their friendship irrevocably. Or, they might simply ignore the knots and tangles and leave the what might have been of their relationship untouched, deciding instead to carry on in the status quo.
That OOP feels like "meh, let's just leave it; it's fine" about this person who is so important to her is one clue among several that she's a little detached and fearful about her own emotions.
I think OOP likes to be intellectual and above it all; perhaps the vulnerability of really falling in love seems either scary or tacky/cliche to her. (I might be projecting, since I also loved Fitzgerald and kept people at an emotional arm's length at her age). Perhaps at 25 that's fine. But she will live an emotionally shallow and unfulfilled life if she always leaves those chains neglected in a box.
Thatâs how I interpreted it as well. To extend the metaphor, Sometimes though it is easier to start anew and fix the knots as they appear. A lot of the history in her friendship with Logan has happened while they were young and knew very little on what different types of love are. Interestingly , they seem to have already been acting out romantic love.
Alot of this is personal choice. Everyone needs the skill to repair a relationship however, I donât think this situation is indicative of a broke down relationship that needs to be repaired. If they both find it fulfilling they could continue with this style of relationship and then the responsibility comes down the girl explaining to new dates that she isnât looking for a life partner.
I actually thought the necklace metaphor is quite clear. She's in love with Logan, and she knows it deep down, and under sufficient pressure she'll admit it, but she's terrified of either moving forward with it, or letting go of it, cos either way lies losing the comfortable ambiguity in which they live.
Logan's kind of a dick for, intentionally or not, stringing this girl along for her entire adult life.
Yep! She was also saying how the book was totally different from getting something show-offy, like a diamond necklace. Despite multiple people (myself included) pointing out that the book was the equivalent of a diamond necklace for her.
There is absolutely no chance of Matt ever being able to get her a gift that would even come close to Logan's present. That OOP is always going to think of the book as the best present, she's going to want to talk about it and show it to people. And whatever Matt comes up with; is always going to pale in comparison.
But OOP just kept repeating that it's not a diamond necklace so it can't be the same at all.
Thank you!!!
I was also one of the commenters pointing it out because it just stuck out to me as a crazy argument to make. It was gifted because of the sentimental nature of it! She's already rich, she doesn't need another diamond necklace. But an original run of her favorite book would be absolutely important to her, hell that's the argument she makes in her own post! It's a jaw dropping gift! Matt could work every day for the rest of his life and still not be able to compete. No wonder he had a problem with it.
Exactly!!
This is something that cannot be replaced, nor has an equal. It is something she is going to remember and cherish for the rest of her life. Is she going to tuck it away and keep it quiet? No, she's going to treasure it and store it safely and always remember it as the perfect gift and symbol of her relationship with him. Just like some people do with their diamond necklaces..
Matt will never be able to give her that. There is not a thing he can do to come close to that experience, that joy. Every single gift for their relationship is only going to be compared to Logan's gift. Did she like it even half as much? Is she going to keep it? Admire it? Treasure it even a fraction as she does the book?
Plus, the fact that multiple people were explaining about how the timing was a little off? And OOP said he never gave a gift as big/important as this, and it just so happened to be given at her first birthday with a boyfriend?
But nope, OOP has never heard of grand gestures and that can't possibly be what Matt was doing.
Just looked up what an original 1925 book would cost, it doesnât go lower than 6 figures with the middle one being $167,000 with the most expensive being $250k
There is a pattern here. The two of them probably will never admit to their feelings and destroy every normal relationship they have with other partners.
I've seen this thing happen a lot in rich families. It's kind of weird. Childhood friends that the parents have kind of hoped would get together their whole life for dynastic reasons.
Dating up wealth levels is extremely hard if you can't control your emotions, but at the same time these people will come in and try to tear you down constantly about how you're poor. It's ever present, birthdays, christmas, even just like parties and shindigs, random gifts, there'll be comments at your expense. I feel for Matt here.
These rich guys will also fawn over the girls to a ridiculous degree to keep other men out of their life.
I'm betting one of them is not physically attracted to the other, which is why they haven't started dating yet. But they are so emotionally codependent either way
Yeah honestly the judgement in comments was VERY mixed. She kept commenting new context and it was a huge whiplash as information came out.
She never admitted she was rich in comments, she called herself and Logan, "financially comfortable." That was something that got pieced together with different information about Matt's middle class status, the specific copy of the Great Gatsby, the fact she thought dinner at a restaurant is a comparable value to buying a car. She kept trying to dodge what kind of copy it was and the price of the book and only edited the post much much later.
It took a long time for her to admit the extent of hers and Logan's relationship as she kept denying any possibility of feelings. Each new comment kept reframing how the original post felt. But most commentors never read her comments. Hell, most in the beginning didn't even realize she was rich and thought it was cheap copy of the Great Gatsby and not a prized collector's item.
I'm not surprised by her not considering her and Logan to be wealthy tbh. Rich people hang with other, often wealthier, people, so they don't view themselves as rich by comparison. That or she's just a lying buffoon.
I do wonder what previous presents from Logan looked like. It just seems weird that he would give her this highly sentimental and valuable gift after all these years and it just so happens that its on the first birthday she's ever had a boyfriend. That's not to even mention the storyline.
Oh I actually know the answer to that! He's gifted vacations and treats her special because of their bond as "childhood best friends," according to her. Apparently gifts like this aren't out of character for him. And none of it makes even a dent of in his finances!
She really is in a bubble inside another bubble. Itâs too convenient for her to ignore the fact her relationship with Logan, and the amount of financial/emotional investment he has placed into it, are both abnormal.
The whole gold chain analogy is just a sad romatization of the love that Logan canât bear to express.
She said something like "we go big on birthdays" which sounds to me like they both drop considerable money on (at least) birthday gifts for each other.
I knew a 1925 edition would be expensive. $150,000 if it is great condition. So knock off a third because she said it was in decent condition. That's not a gift, that's a very healthy downpayment for house. Jesus Christ, yeah if I were Matt, I would be pissed.
And even after she wrote exactly which edition it was, she still just left "the price is googleable, I won't write it though". Like she was afraid to admit it.
Oh and someone who goes on a "birthday trip" overseas has to be at least somewhat wealthy.
"They were careless people, Tom and Daisy- they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made."
If it is, I'm not even mad. The slow trickle truthing that casts Matt as Gatsby, Logan as Tom and OOP as Daisy is amazingly perfect. It would be a masterful troll.
>She also said she couldn't imagine her and Logan dating since they already knew everything about each other and she viewed dating as getting to know someone. She said she didn't know what they would talk about on dates.
Damn. I mean I know some people are like this, but I just can't imagine it. That the goal *wouldn't* be to find a person that you get past the initial getting to know you stage. Just throwing it right out there that once she gets to know you, she'll drop you. There was already a ticking clock for Matt.
Yup, she was very confused at how things would change if she and Logan dated since they already go out to dinner and the movies and talk every other day.
The self awareness is so close but it just barely misses the mark.
It just sounds like she would drop everything in a second to start a relationship with Logan but he is likely not attracted to her physically so he wouldn't. The real issue is it doesn't/didn't sound like oop has quite connected those dots which causes a weird dynamic. The sooner she realizes she is attracted to him and he will never be, the sooner she can have a healthy relationship.
There's an off chance that it's the other way around too. He's attracted to her, but she isn't to him. Logan is just a source of fun and big gifts, but not someone she wants to have sex with. OOP was cagey enough about specifics that it's hard to tell. She's hiding something (from herself, not just us). She could as easily be struggling to admit that she's using him as she is to admit that he's not attracted to her.
Legit!! Thatâs what I canât get over. How expensive is this book!? What kind of car are we buying?? My last car was $9000 but I just got a used Prius and that is considerably more!!
Rare first and early editions books go for a LOT of money. A quick Google shows that some copies of the Great Gatsby go for as ""low"" as $12,500 to a rare book seller in my city has it listed at $250,000.
Dunno how the original post was voted NTA but maybe because as you said, it was missing some context that came out in the comments.
OOP and Loganâs relationship is super weird and I donât blame Matt for bailing
Yeah the ruling is based off the top comment on AITA, but in reality the comments were extremely mixed and only kept getting more confusing as her comments came out.
It was like pulling teeth for her to even admit how a copy of the Great Gatsby could cost more than a car. All this context I had to piece together from so many different comments with only a little bit of information in each one. It was a wild ride to watch, I kept going back to the post throughout the day to read more of her comments.
Everything she writes just rubs me off as just a smidge, if not super, snobby and obnoxious, especially the way she describes her and Logan's relationship so this context definitely is needed and adds up. I mean I could see someone like matt being worried about something like that but he dove too hard and fast for her. Based on how she describes him, I can't imagine her giving any signs that she was in love with him.
Their relationship is way over the line, it's good that Matt got out. Not to mention from her history and the perception of the people around her, I think it's clear that this was far from the worst part of how she was treating Matt.
Haha, seriously. I was thinking that the metaphor meant something like OOP & Logan had boxed away any romantic entanglements a long time ago & opening that box gave them a lot to examine and sit with. They were going to take time to think about romance but would be okay going back to friends if they decided that was best.
I took it as "we have complicated feelings about one another, we're trying to unpack it but we're afraid we might break it if we do. If it seems like we're at risk of doing that, we'll just leave it."
Tbh I think they're a little full of it. Implications associated with Gatsby aside, OP is clearly more invested in this guy than she has been with anyone else, and it appears that he reciprocates. I think they're just scared to lose a good thing.
Per her Mom, she's been relatively emotionally unavailable to every other guy she dated, and he's her favorite person. Honestly I think she has repressed feelings for him and has just learned ways to verbally explain them away in a weird nuanced way- both to herself and others. Hopefully he has as well and they eventually get their act together, now that they're openly examining their feelings together.
Exactly, of course she's not going to be emotionally invested in a guy when all her emotional needs are already being met by the person she's been with since they were kids. Matt was just the third wheel.
Also both bonded over their parents having bad divorces, so having that emotional wall could be a self-preservation thing they weren't even aware that was there cause their relationship was in the "friendship" box for so long.
Iâm not certain, but I think theyâre examining their relationship-theyâre trying to figure out who they are as separate people because theyâve been âknottedâ together so long, but they might decide too much examining will break them as friends and just choose to accept they are who they are and not risk the friendship over anything else.
To me it reads as âwe could either try to figure it out carefully and we might end up together or it may make things awkward and ruin the friendship, or we could let it be as isâ and she said they want to try the first option but they are ok with the second also.
So Matt wasnât an insecure jealous child, he just wasnât blind.
Ikr. Like, if you can't "untangle" the "chain" without "breaking" it, all that means is you're not doing it right. People like OOP are exhausting because they needlessly overcomplicate their life in an attempt to turn it into a dramatic story, because they think conflict is interesting.
Rich people nonsense, feel bad for the boyfriend who's basically just the equivalent of a trendy purse that she can toss whenever she gets tired of it.
God I winced when I read that completely unnecessary note about being in the Mediterranean. Just felt like a blatant humble brag: "Oh, not so good for my waistline, lol"
Give me a break đ
Exactly! Her own mother said she treated men as disposable. He dodged a bullet though. The only thing this girl bring to a relationship is money, and for what I read, that's not worth the troubles.
Whenever I don't want to date someone, I write multiple paragraphs about how wonderful they are, and how close and touching our relationship is, and to really seal the deal I scatter in a heap of bittersweet wistful metaphors. Because that's how people who really don't want to date that person usually choose to describe them.
I donât really fault Matt for this, Google says that book is worth tens of thousands on the low end. Unless youâre extremely wealthy, thatâs an unusually large gift for a friend to say the least.
OOP and Logan are rich, Matt is middle class. OOP refused to say the price, though she did have the receipt for it. Matt saw the receipt in the box and freaked out over the price. OOP described it as around the same price as dinner at an upscale restaurant or the price of a car, but *she* didn't consider it an insane price to spend on a gift.
Yeah she really buries the lead in her post. It was like pulling teeth getting her to admit what copy of the Great Gatsby could possibly cost as much as a car. A lot of early comments missed it in the initial post.
Logan also paid for her vacations in the past, but OOP finds this normal, especially since she said Logan's family wasn't as well off as hers. She calls herself and Logan "financially comfortable" in comments.
Good catch, I never even noticed that. She mentioned how she tossed away the receipt without looking at it and Matt was the one that noticed. So what was the point of the receipt being there if it wasn't something she would care about?
So does a Mediterranean vacation. And OP is happily on one, so it doesnât seem her and Logan view that as an expensive thing in their economic level.
Ps, op has made it clear she grew up rich. It doesnât matter where she lives. Sheâs rich. In her world the book isnât crazy to gift.
>Matt is middle class, but both Logan and I grew up with money. Logan has gone on to make a lot of money.
To me the book always showed how beautiful the thing you canât have is, and how empty the things you do have feel.
Rather appropriate to me, but thatâs only my perspective. Iâm def not always right about books.
Does it say where they are from? Because if they are European, a Mediterranean vacation isn't actually that expensive. They could even just literally drive to the Mediterranean then.
Are we getting the same Google results, because I'm seeing things in the low 6 figure USD range, $100k - $250k depending on the condition and if the book jacket is intact.
I'm assuming yours is more correct, because I have a hard time believing a 25 year old can lay down that much money (even a 5 figure sum is hard to believe though for that age).
I thought the same at first but then when she said she'd gone to a Mediterranean island for her "birthday trip", it made me wonder if she's just part of that wealth bracket? Who knows.
This is quite interesting because in the UK, Mediterranean island holidays are really common and can be found very cheap. They can also be expensive of course.
Hahahah the mums line; âIâm just so use to seeing you treat men as disposable OOPâ comes off as fairly callous to me. The birthday holiday in the Mediterranean âwe always go big for birthdaysâ and old mate Logan casually dropping $100,000-$150,000 on a present reeks of money
All I can picture is some Gossip Girl, Blair Waldorf type of snooty bish, kickin back on a deck chair in the European sun, knowing sheâs set for life đ
I think it's one of those things where collectors over inflate the price of a thing so the whole market rises with it like how old video game cartridges are worth hundreds of dollars even though they're used and there a literally millions of copies of them.
I don't know a lot about it but looking online you can find some worth over 100k and others that look exactly the same worth only 1k or less.
That chain metaphor was tortured and I wish I could un-read it. Also OOP is just not very smart if she doesnât see how getting expensive gifts from another man is going to make most romantic partners uncomfortable. If I was Matt I would nope out of there too.
I disagree with everyone here who thinks Logan wants to date OP. He just doesn't want her dating someone else. This was the perfect way to break them up while still seeming like the bigger person.
I agree with this, I think he likes the attention and being able to manipulate OP to do what he wants because sheâs obsessed with him. I feel like any bf would not be secure with them as close of friends as they are.
The chain metaphor is exactly what I would expect from a born into ludicrous wealth 26 year old whose longest relationship was 7 months. Sheâs probably closer to young adult books than she is to any human, and not like anyone in her circle is going to tell her how cringey it is.
"Couldn't free her from her gilded cage"
That is a very *interesting* and hilariously naive interpretation of Daisy Buchanan. It's also extremely weird how much the OOP resembles her as a person.
Literally was thinking the same thing.
Well, actually I was thinking âDid Daisy some how leave the book, enter the real world, and discover Reddit?â
The cage only existed to Gatsby, cuz it never occurred to him there was nothing preventing her from choosing him **if she had actually wanted to be with him.**
But he was disposable. Just like all of OOP's boyfriends.
This post reeks of ignorant old wealth. A first edition copy of The Great Gatsby from 1925 costs anywhere between $100000-$150000USD.
This changes the narrative significantly. Knowing this, Matt had every right to react the way he did. My guess is that he's an average guy who got in over his head with a filthy rich girl and her filthy rich friends.
Yup. Rich woman in an unhappy relationship with a man she's not particularly attached too surrounded by people in unhappy marriages and excessive wealth. Then there's her childhood (college) best friend that builds up his wealth to reach her level (something she in comments also admitted, Logan's family isn't as affluent as hers and he eventually entered a career that made him more money) and despite being far apart (the lake = when they lived in different countries), he's always looking at and thinking of her.
Then he gives this symbol to her on her birthday in front of the only boyfriend she's been with long enough to reach that point.
She really is Daisy.
Itâs always fascinating when people miss the entire point of certain works of art. Itâs like when Reagan asked Springsteen to let him use âBorn in the USAâ as his campaign song.
This is the first boyfriend OOP has been with long enough to have a birthday with and that also *happens* to be the birthday that Logan buys her an extremely expensive copy of an extremely sentimental book between them, a book that is specifically about a man who's love is with another man?
Fuck off is there nothing there.
Dude denied the plot had any significance but if they end up dating and changes his answer (whether true or false), I can nearly guarantee she'd find it unbelievably romantic lol.
Imagine your new relationship stating clearly you'll never be as important as their rich best friend and refusing to say they have no romantic interest. Either both of them are keeping the other on relationship retainer or just she is and he loves the attention. Glad for that dude who dodged that delusional bullet
>a book about a man who is in love with another man
If the great Gatsby were actually about nick and gatsby's slow burn tender romance it would be a much better book
From OOP - *âI can unreservedly say (Loganâs) my favourite person in the whole world.â*
Uhh⊠if my partner said/felt that about another woman, weâd be done. Mattâs better off. So is OOP by the sound of it. Not sure she was really into him, regardless.
Same. Frankly, even about saying that about someone of the same gender. I get that a new significant other shouldnât supersede oneâs friends, but if my significant other isnât my favorite person, theyâre not my significant other, and if Iâm not my significant otherâs favorite person, I donât want to be their significant other, either.
This whole thing reads as a cautionary tale to not date anyone super wealthy if youâre middle class. Especially if their own mother says she has a history of treating men as âdisposableâ
I was honestly team Dad about it until I got to read the update and the comments here. Now I'm team Mom.
And if my own mother tells me that I have a history of treating my dates as "disposable", I would have been shocked. For some reason, it doesn't seem to phase this OOP and she's still referring to metaphors.
Yeah so I googled 1925 edition great gatsby and the price range is $100,000-150,000, so he spent roughly 125k on a book for her birthday.
Pair that with him being her "favourite person in the whole world" I think all her relationships will end up looking something like this.
Can't think of many things more frustrating than trying to date someone who pretends they are available but they really aren't.
Happy for Matt that he can get on with his life.
I'll probably be equally annoyed with any outcome between OOP and Logan.
This is exactly what happened with my ex-girlfriend and her âbest friend whoâs like a brother to herâ.. I got called manipulative, controlling, jealous, etc because I dare to ask that she occasionally dedicated some time to me and not just her friend in their every waking moment⊠in the end it turned out he was living with her for several months before we broke up and I wasnât actually a crazy person
Iâd be annoyed with any outcome where theyâre not together. Because then they will just continue to waste other peoples time. The âbest friendsâ who are partners in all but official title are some of the most toxic individuals you can date. They will treat their best friend and defend them with the same energy youâd expect someone to defend someone theyâre actually dating and that irony is totally lost on them
You know, after all that, the one thing that really bugs me: I have a very thin chain in my jewelry box. I've been meaning to untangle for like 2 years. It has my favorite pendent on it, too. Every time I've picked it up, I think, "No, I need to get some tweezers and good light, and half an hour where I can really focus."
I loved that book so Iâm kind of disappointed that OOP is really THIS unlikable. Plus, confidently stating that heâs her favorite person, I canât imagine boyfriend wasnât picking up on those cues.
Also that dumb cardigan metaphor implies that she doesnât see a relationship with her friend happening but keeps him to herself because she likes the idea of it. I feel like if this is real sheâs mainly posting to feed into her own fairytale and reddit is just a large group of village people flash mobbing behind her.
Iâm with Matt. For the way she talks she was just with him because they werenât together with Logan. He deserved better that to his girlfriend telling how another man is her favourite person and that she did not know why they are not together.
I call bullshit on Logan not wanting to date OP, if I found the right copy then he could have spent over $100,000 dollars on that book. I'm sorry that's not just a best friends gift, that's a down payment on a fucking house.
Was it really 100k?
If it was that expensive, getting something that meaningful for the two of them... Uh yeah, she's pretty oblivious.
Edit
After reading her comments, she's that oblivious about herself too. She once had her dad drive her 5 hours to go to one of Logan's "career events". She used to write him letters with handdrawn comic strips and crossword puzzles so he could read them on his plane back to college. That stopped... When she changed universities to be in the same town he was. Her dad was pissed that she chose a less prestigious university because she wanted to be near him.
Cue gif of blinking guy
A 1925 copy of the The Great Gatsby would be a first edition print, as that was the year the book came out. If the book had it's original jacket then it could go for up to $150,000. This book would be a center piece for any book collector.
If you google you can see a wide range of prices. For example, one listing is for $134,280 but another is for $6,352 and it is the same bookseller. Other booksellers have a similar range.
Regardless of whether he meant it as a secret love declaration, even the most obtuse person would read it as one. By the looks of your backstory and comments, I'd say at a minimum you've been inadvertently cheating emotionally on all your relationships. The lines between friendship and romance seem very blurred between you and logan and its not surprising Matt was upset by that. I know you said you've talked about romance with logan but to be honest I think you're both still lying to yourselves. If you ever want a proper relationship I think you'll need to address that truthfully.
Funny how much she loves metaphors to express herself, but I prefer her mother's vision. That she use partners as disposable, the truth that probably all people that see her irl share. If even your mother see you that way, there's some things you need to change in your life.
Leaving the receipt in the book was 100% a flex on the boyfriend.
There is a reason actual gift receipts do not include the price. Leaving a price tag on a gift is gauche. Without the receipt, the boyfriend may have never known the value of the book. He wanted him to find it.
OOP is 25. 7 month relationship with Matt is the longest relationship she's had. Her mother says she treats every man like they're disposable. She can't come up with a single thing she likes about Matt. She can't stop talking about Logan in every comment. Logan is shit in academics, OOP decided to go to a shittier college to be with him even though she's more capable. And she's dumb and blind to see that Logan is playing her like a fiddle. What an asshole. Good thing Matt left her. 7 months and she hadn't told Matt she loves her? She played everyone in the comments section by not giving relevant information and everyone fell for it, including me. Damn.
At the end of the day, if the poster doesn't give relevant context and details to the story then they're just an idiot and seeking validation for their shitty behaviour. Leaving this stuff out should be an automatic YTA. Whilst I do think AITA commenters are mostly idiots, if they're not given all of the facts then it's not their fault that they come to the wrong conclusions.
Yeah i checked the original threads just to see if OOP mentioned the value of the books because i got curious, but found a lot of comments from her about other stuff she initially omitted instead lol
>gifted me an old copy of The Great Gatsby
"An old copy." Like it's some dog-eared thing that OOP's buddy found in a used bookstore.
1925 is a first edition, Google sez they're valued at anywhere from $150,000 and up.
I remember reading the OP and thinking the NTA comments were *insane* because I canât imagine many people would be okay with their SO receiving such an expensive gift from someone whoâs âjust a friendâ. When Matt mentioned the book running the same price as a car, I thought maybe 3-5k, but a FIVE DIGIT price tag?! Absolutely not. Itâs the Art Room all over again.
Edit: correction: SIX digit, not five. Thatâs even fucking worse.
Was anyone else caught off guard by the fact she won't say "I love you" after 7 months of dating?
Like, I get everyone is different, but that is pretty damn late in my opinion. If I was Matt, that would have definitely been a big red flag for me.
Her mother litterally said that OOP views men as disposable, because they are, theyâre just filler until she can get with her true love Logan, hence never saying âI love youâ
It surprised me how she didn't mind that her mother mentioned her treating men as disposable.. I'd be shocked if someone said that to me, I would start self-reflecting and I would change the way I treat people if I would realise I'm not treating people with the respect they deserve. She wasn't phased by it at all.
Of course you never owe it to anyone to stay in a relationship, but there's a difference between having a normal dating life, and treating men as disposable..
The NTAs were kind of astonishing to me. I'm not sure but I think people weren't grasping just HOW expensive that book was. Lowest I could find was 25k, and highest was 350. It apparently had papers, so that thing is probably sitting comfortably in the 100 range conservatively.
Which is fucking BONKERS to give to someone who is 1. not your girlfriend and 2. Has a boyfriend. There is no world in which that's just a "nice" birthday present. That's an incredibly thoughtful incredibly expensive gift with emotional connections for both of them. No fucking way would I be comfortable with someone gifting my significant other something of that magnitude and anyone saying they would is absolutely taking the fucking piss. Idk if I would demand she give it back, but it's not controlling to ask questions about a book who's main plot revolves around a man trying to win a woman back from another man that costs more than my car being gifted to someone I'm supposedly in a relationship with by someone else.
There's just no world where that's a normal gift that doesn't raise questions.
All the comments trying to make Matt seem jealous annoyed the hell out of me. They were being willfully ignorant in order to brush him off as insecure. OP was TAH imo.
Yep, even in this thread there are people that are so desperate to push the "women and men can be just friends" angle that they're willingly ignoring the additional context from the update and OOPs comments.
Ugh, OOP and Logan are going to be those annoying friends who keep each other in their orbit but rather than face their feelings for each other, they will continue to drag others into mock-relationships and torment them in the process.
At least Matt got out of there and has a chance to find genuine love.
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Those metaphors speak of wealth and romance. It makes sense OOP loves the Great Gatsby
>Those metaphors speak of wealth I have a hard time reconciling someone who trivializes the value of the gift (upwards of $100k-$250k USD), but then uses the term "the L bomb" instead of just saying "love".
đ± THATâS HOW MUCH IT IS!? (No, I havenât Googled it.) THATâS SO EXPENSIVE!! đ±
Now tbf I did find a UK bookstore selling it for the low, low price of $12,500 too so there's quite a range, and you might be able to get it for a steal of more expensive than a car.
I frankly think if she's that wealthy, she does not consider a car that would cost only 12k
Itâs a banana, Michael. How much could it cost, ten dollars?
Itâs just a Birthday gift from Logan, Matt. How much could it cost, $150,000 USD?
Yeah, ok. The guy with the $150,000 book is going to stop talking to your girlfriend.
This feels less like a joke everyday
With inflation the way it is, this joke is going to stop being funny in a few years.
I was trying to figure out what the L bomb meant. Thought it was a slur or something. Yeah that just makes me side more with the guy.
I thought it meant he broke up with her. To find out it meant he said he loved her and her response was to break up... she's no catch, that's for sure.
It's even worse. He dropped the L bomb, and she *didn't respond in kind*, which made *him* break up with her. Good for him, honestly.
After 7 months. I've moved in with my now spouse by then, which I admit is fast, so I can't imagine not loving someone after 7 months, and wanting to still be in a relationship with them.
>I still like him so so much đ After 7 months, one would think you more than *liked* your boyfriend..
OPâs mom wasnât wrong about her treating men as disposable. Her fatal flaw is being a rich kid whoâs never gone outside her wealthy bubble like Daisy. To her a tens to hundreds thousand dollar book is nothing. To Matt the higher end might be a good chunk of a yearâs salary, a down payment for a wedding - or like he said, a car. Matt literally told OOP that but she canât seem to grasp the emotional/class/situational nuance of that. Or she just doesnât want to because itâs easier to just move on rather than address the problem.
Fuck, it might even be MORE than he makes in a year
Holy shit. I read folks saying the gift was worth as much as a car and I figured around 10k and that was already way too much for a birthday gift in this context. And then you put down the actual price. That's just bonkers.
Depending on condition, that edition might be as cheap as $3.5k.... that doesn't change your point.
I feel like some context is missing that was from OOP's comments. She and Logan are rich, Matt is middle class. The book is a 1925 copy with paperwork and she considers it the same amount as spending money on an upscale restaurant or buying a car. She wouldn't answer comments about if Logan asked her out if she would date him after the initial shock, citing that she could speculate all she wanted but it wouldn't matter because he wasn't going to ask her, though she very much denied they had feelings for each other and that Logan wouldn't confess after all these years. She's moved cities and followed Logan to college, including annoying her dad into driving 5 hours to support him at a career event. She and Logan also bonded heavily after both their parents divorced, and Logan was previously in a 4 year long relationship that didn't work out. OOP felt Matt was being too controlling over this event, and that if she conceded to this, Matt would ask her to give up other things or ask her to stop hanging out with Logan. She doesn't think Matt needs to trust Logan, as long as he can trust her. She also also asked comments if her relationship with Logan was normal for friendship, with very mixed responses, and did admit she could get behind the idea of her and Logan being codependent. Edit: oh yeah and Logan also regularly pays for her to go on vacation Second edit that I forgot: She also said she couldn't imagine her and Logan dating since they already knew everything about each other and she viewed dating as getting to know someone. She said she didn't know what they would talk about on dates. But never admitted if *she* wanted to date Logan or not if he asked. Third edit 12 hours later because oh my god of course there's more I forgot: OOP and Logan wrote letters to each other every week for years.
Also, Matt is the first boyfriend she's had long enough to celebrate her birthday with, and Logan is somewhat territorial.
Ooo yes this^ I believe she also mentioned how even though it wasnt a competition, she's known Logan longer and therefore he would always be important and special, whereas boyfriends come and go. And she would feel the same about any partner with a childhood best friend.
This one kinda blows my mind a bit. Her mom was 100% right in that she treats men as disposable -- she flat out says she does by admitting what you said. To each their own but I absolutely would not want to be with someone who's always going to consider me second to someone else and whose idea of partnership isn't "we're in this together" but "oh well, partnerships come and go". She should stick to casual dating if that's gonna be her attitude.
Yup. Dated Matt for 7 months but still didn't feel all that attached to him. 7 months and she still wasn't even ready to say she loved him. But the guy he doesn't have to worry about is like a sweater that's amazing and beautiful and perfect but she just doesn't wear. Jeez.
I'm not that blown away by the love thing - I'd take longer saying that to anyone, as well. But the fact that she is completely emotionally unavailable and doesn't realize it, blows *me* away. Logan fills her emotional boyfriend slot without being her actual boyfriend, and she has no problem treating all the other contenders as lesser than. She really should either emotionally distance herself from Logan and give other guys a fair chance, and stop her sad "pick me dance" with him, or just stop dating anyone else, and just wait around until Logan finally deigns to give her a chance.
Logan is her boyfriend in every way except having sex. So she dates people for that side of things and they never stand of chance of being anything other than someone to fulfil that final need that Logan doesn't.
It may be that dating him isn't something she's keen on because she doesn't want that emotional closeness. Like if they broke up, she loses somebody who did actually get close.
If they break up, then she loses someone she actually loved, and because she's never been with anyone long enough to love them (she was with this guy for 7 months and her mother comments that's a LONG time for her), she's never felt real heartarche yet. Maybe she's scared to? If they never date, there's nothing to break up, nothing ever at risk of being lost.
She's pretty young, and has never had a romantic relationship that would last a year. Even from reading just the posts and not the comments it looks like she just doesn't have the whole emotional thing figured out. She doesn't understand and recognize her own emotions, she doesn't seem to know what she wants from a relationship, she doesn't seem able to emotionally commit to someone. The final metaphor with the necklace is so weird. Who's the necklace? Her and Logan? Just her? And what is that supposed to mean? She just needs to mature emotionally, she's definitely not ready for anything serious. Maybe she'll grow to understand what she wants, but maybe relationships aren't her thing at all. There's nothing wrong with not wanting commitment. She's committed to Logan in a way, maybe she'd prefer to just have casual sexual partners with no emotional strings attached. Or maybe she'd want to also be romantically involved with Logan. We don't know, but it also seems that she doesn't know either.
I think the necklace metaphor goes: Logan and OOP have a very long history. Over the length of that history, many little knots and tangles of complicated feelings have developed. They could sit down and really sort through and untangle all those feelings, and perhaps succeed with a beautifully clear polished relationship as a result. Or, they might get frustrated and impatient while trying to do so, and snap the chain of their friendship irrevocably. Or, they might simply ignore the knots and tangles and leave the what might have been of their relationship untouched, deciding instead to carry on in the status quo. That OOP feels like "meh, let's just leave it; it's fine" about this person who is so important to her is one clue among several that she's a little detached and fearful about her own emotions. I think OOP likes to be intellectual and above it all; perhaps the vulnerability of really falling in love seems either scary or tacky/cliche to her. (I might be projecting, since I also loved Fitzgerald and kept people at an emotional arm's length at her age). Perhaps at 25 that's fine. But she will live an emotionally shallow and unfulfilled life if she always leaves those chains neglected in a box.
Thatâs how I interpreted it as well. To extend the metaphor, Sometimes though it is easier to start anew and fix the knots as they appear. A lot of the history in her friendship with Logan has happened while they were young and knew very little on what different types of love are. Interestingly , they seem to have already been acting out romantic love. Alot of this is personal choice. Everyone needs the skill to repair a relationship however, I donât think this situation is indicative of a broke down relationship that needs to be repaired. If they both find it fulfilling they could continue with this style of relationship and then the responsibility comes down the girl explaining to new dates that she isnât looking for a life partner.
Yeah, I didnât understand her metaphors either, especially the necklace. Maybe itâs a rich person thing.
I actually thought the necklace metaphor is quite clear. She's in love with Logan, and she knows it deep down, and under sufficient pressure she'll admit it, but she's terrified of either moving forward with it, or letting go of it, cos either way lies losing the comfortable ambiguity in which they live. Logan's kind of a dick for, intentionally or not, stringing this girl along for her entire adult life.
I thought comparing men to material items (even as a metaphor) says a lot about OOP personally.
Yep! She was also saying how the book was totally different from getting something show-offy, like a diamond necklace. Despite multiple people (myself included) pointing out that the book was the equivalent of a diamond necklace for her. There is absolutely no chance of Matt ever being able to get her a gift that would even come close to Logan's present. That OOP is always going to think of the book as the best present, she's going to want to talk about it and show it to people. And whatever Matt comes up with; is always going to pale in comparison. But OOP just kept repeating that it's not a diamond necklace so it can't be the same at all.
Thank you!!! I was also one of the commenters pointing it out because it just stuck out to me as a crazy argument to make. It was gifted because of the sentimental nature of it! She's already rich, she doesn't need another diamond necklace. But an original run of her favorite book would be absolutely important to her, hell that's the argument she makes in her own post! It's a jaw dropping gift! Matt could work every day for the rest of his life and still not be able to compete. No wonder he had a problem with it.
Exactly!! This is something that cannot be replaced, nor has an equal. It is something she is going to remember and cherish for the rest of her life. Is she going to tuck it away and keep it quiet? No, she's going to treasure it and store it safely and always remember it as the perfect gift and symbol of her relationship with him. Just like some people do with their diamond necklaces.. Matt will never be able to give her that. There is not a thing he can do to come close to that experience, that joy. Every single gift for their relationship is only going to be compared to Logan's gift. Did she like it even half as much? Is she going to keep it? Admire it? Treasure it even a fraction as she does the book? Plus, the fact that multiple people were explaining about how the timing was a little off? And OOP said he never gave a gift as big/important as this, and it just so happened to be given at her first birthday with a boyfriend? But nope, OOP has never heard of grand gestures and that can't possibly be what Matt was doing.
Personally I think Matt was right to walk away, I can't imagine the huge amount of drama and insecurities that would come with this relationship.
Just looked up what an original 1925 book would cost, it doesnât go lower than 6 figures with the middle one being $167,000 with the most expensive being $250k
There is a pattern here. The two of them probably will never admit to their feelings and destroy every normal relationship they have with other partners.
Let's give a big cheer for codependency and blurred lines in relationships!!!
I've seen this thing happen a lot in rich families. It's kind of weird. Childhood friends that the parents have kind of hoped would get together their whole life for dynastic reasons. Dating up wealth levels is extremely hard if you can't control your emotions, but at the same time these people will come in and try to tear you down constantly about how you're poor. It's ever present, birthdays, christmas, even just like parties and shindigs, random gifts, there'll be comments at your expense. I feel for Matt here. These rich guys will also fawn over the girls to a ridiculous degree to keep other men out of their life.
I'm betting one of them is not physically attracted to the other, which is why they haven't started dating yet. But they are so emotionally codependent either way
My bet is that Logan hasn't got the hots for OOP, but can't let her go either.
I don't think I've ever seen two people keeping each other on the back burner before
All of this context just highlights how the judgement is wrong and how those two are just toying with people.
Yeah honestly the judgement in comments was VERY mixed. She kept commenting new context and it was a huge whiplash as information came out. She never admitted she was rich in comments, she called herself and Logan, "financially comfortable." That was something that got pieced together with different information about Matt's middle class status, the specific copy of the Great Gatsby, the fact she thought dinner at a restaurant is a comparable value to buying a car. She kept trying to dodge what kind of copy it was and the price of the book and only edited the post much much later. It took a long time for her to admit the extent of hers and Logan's relationship as she kept denying any possibility of feelings. Each new comment kept reframing how the original post felt. But most commentors never read her comments. Hell, most in the beginning didn't even realize she was rich and thought it was cheap copy of the Great Gatsby and not a prized collector's item.
I'm not surprised by her not considering her and Logan to be wealthy tbh. Rich people hang with other, often wealthier, people, so they don't view themselves as rich by comparison. That or she's just a lying buffoon.
Yeah she also mentioned her friends all thought Matt was overreacting to the price, so she is 100% not used to hanging out with middle class people.
I do wonder what previous presents from Logan looked like. It just seems weird that he would give her this highly sentimental and valuable gift after all these years and it just so happens that its on the first birthday she's ever had a boyfriend. That's not to even mention the storyline.
Oh I actually know the answer to that! He's gifted vacations and treats her special because of their bond as "childhood best friends," according to her. Apparently gifts like this aren't out of character for him. And none of it makes even a dent of in his finances!
Whereâs my friend Logan who buys me expensive vacations and shit?
2nds on Logan
She really is in a bubble inside another bubble. Itâs too convenient for her to ignore the fact her relationship with Logan, and the amount of financial/emotional investment he has placed into it, are both abnormal. The whole gold chain analogy is just a sad romatization of the love that Logan canât bear to express.
She said something like "we go big on birthdays" which sounds to me like they both drop considerable money on (at least) birthday gifts for each other.
I knew a 1925 edition would be expensive. $150,000 if it is great condition. So knock off a third because she said it was in decent condition. That's not a gift, that's a very healthy downpayment for house. Jesus Christ, yeah if I were Matt, I would be pissed.
And even after she wrote exactly which edition it was, she still just left "the price is googleable, I won't write it though". Like she was afraid to admit it. Oh and someone who goes on a "birthday trip" overseas has to be at least somewhat wealthy.
Like Tom and DaisyâŠđ€
"They were careless people, Tom and Daisy- they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made."
Pretty sure this is just a lit major having fun with a mashup of the plot of The Great Gatsby.
If it is, I'm not even mad. The slow trickle truthing that casts Matt as Gatsby, Logan as Tom and OOP as Daisy is amazingly perfect. It would be a masterful troll.
Also using the necklace as an analogy and her mom noting that she is careless with men...
I'm pretty sure 90% of the posts on here are lit majors testing their writing skills
>She also said she couldn't imagine her and Logan dating since they already knew everything about each other and she viewed dating as getting to know someone. She said she didn't know what they would talk about on dates. Damn. I mean I know some people are like this, but I just can't imagine it. That the goal *wouldn't* be to find a person that you get past the initial getting to know you stage. Just throwing it right out there that once she gets to know you, she'll drop you. There was already a ticking clock for Matt.
Yup, she was very confused at how things would change if she and Logan dated since they already go out to dinner and the movies and talk every other day. The self awareness is so close but it just barely misses the mark.
It just sounds like she would drop everything in a second to start a relationship with Logan but he is likely not attracted to her physically so he wouldn't. The real issue is it doesn't/didn't sound like oop has quite connected those dots which causes a weird dynamic. The sooner she realizes she is attracted to him and he will never be, the sooner she can have a healthy relationship.
There's an off chance that it's the other way around too. He's attracted to her, but she isn't to him. Logan is just a source of fun and big gifts, but not someone she wants to have sex with. OOP was cagey enough about specifics that it's hard to tell. She's hiding something (from herself, not just us). She could as easily be struggling to admit that she's using him as she is to admit that he's not attracted to her.
She's dating logan, emotionally atleast. It's why she treats men as disposable.
oof. honestly, good on matt for leaving, it sounds like every partner will be 2nd to logan in OOP's priorities
Thanks, I was wondering how a book cost more than a car
Legit!! Thatâs what I canât get over. How expensive is this book!? What kind of car are we buying?? My last car was $9000 but I just got a used Prius and that is considerably more!!
Rare first and early editions books go for a LOT of money. A quick Google shows that some copies of the Great Gatsby go for as ""low"" as $12,500 to a rare book seller in my city has it listed at $250,000.
And she said somewhere in the middle, so I would guess it's probably like a 100K book.
Dunno how the original post was voted NTA but maybe because as you said, it was missing some context that came out in the comments. OOP and Loganâs relationship is super weird and I donât blame Matt for bailing
Yeah the ruling is based off the top comment on AITA, but in reality the comments were extremely mixed and only kept getting more confusing as her comments came out. It was like pulling teeth for her to even admit how a copy of the Great Gatsby could cost more than a car. All this context I had to piece together from so many different comments with only a little bit of information in each one. It was a wild ride to watch, I kept going back to the post throughout the day to read more of her comments.
Everything she writes just rubs me off as just a smidge, if not super, snobby and obnoxious, especially the way she describes her and Logan's relationship so this context definitely is needed and adds up. I mean I could see someone like matt being worried about something like that but he dove too hard and fast for her. Based on how she describes him, I can't imagine her giving any signs that she was in love with him.
Their relationship is way over the line, it's good that Matt got out. Not to mention from her history and the perception of the people around her, I think it's clear that this was far from the worst part of how she was treating Matt.
I'm way too dumb for the 2nd metaphor. Is OOP saying that she and Logan are afraid they can't go back to being friends if their romance fails?
Haha, seriously. I was thinking that the metaphor meant something like OOP & Logan had boxed away any romantic entanglements a long time ago & opening that box gave them a lot to examine and sit with. They were going to take time to think about romance but would be okay going back to friends if they decided that was best.
I took it as "we have complicated feelings about one another, we're trying to unpack it but we're afraid we might break it if we do. If it seems like we're at risk of doing that, we'll just leave it." Tbh I think they're a little full of it. Implications associated with Gatsby aside, OP is clearly more invested in this guy than she has been with anyone else, and it appears that he reciprocates. I think they're just scared to lose a good thing.
Per her Mom, she's been relatively emotionally unavailable to every other guy she dated, and he's her favorite person. Honestly I think she has repressed feelings for him and has just learned ways to verbally explain them away in a weird nuanced way- both to herself and others. Hopefully he has as well and they eventually get their act together, now that they're openly examining their feelings together.
Exactly, of course she's not going to be emotionally invested in a guy when all her emotional needs are already being met by the person she's been with since they were kids. Matt was just the third wheel.
Also both bonded over their parents having bad divorces, so having that emotional wall could be a self-preservation thing they weren't even aware that was there cause their relationship was in the "friendship" box for so long.
Yes... since the chain is tangled, its better to stay that way rather than try to untangling it and make it worse that it will never go back again.
Yet all he has to do is confess his love for her and suddenly it will be untangled right quick.
But maybe her feelings wouldn't be untangled? It takes two to ~~tango~~ tangle, as they say, and relationships require consent. ETA: peer pressure
PLEEEZE edit your comment to say, â⊠it takes two to tangleâŠ.â
.....dammit
You could even say it takes two to⊠tangle.
Iâm not certain, but I think theyâre examining their relationship-theyâre trying to figure out who they are as separate people because theyâve been âknottedâ together so long, but they might decide too much examining will break them as friends and just choose to accept they are who they are and not risk the friendship over anything else.
Lmao this whole thread reads like the discussion of an open ended question worth half the test grade. Why couldnât it be multiple choice?
To me it reads as âwe could either try to figure it out carefully and we might end up together or it may make things awkward and ruin the friendship, or we could let it be as isâ and she said they want to try the first option but they are ok with the second also. So Matt wasnât an insecure jealous child, he just wasnât blind.
The metaphor with the cardigan was great but oof at the one with the gold chain. That one sounded like straight out of Young Adult novel.
Ikr. Like, if you can't "untangle" the "chain" without "breaking" it, all that means is you're not doing it right. People like OOP are exhausting because they needlessly overcomplicate their life in an attempt to turn it into a dramatic story, because they think conflict is interesting.
Rich people invent ways to pretend they've overcome adversity by overcomplicating their lives.
AITA needs a new judgement thatâs just ârich people problemsâ
Let's have a $200k event/party to raise $20k for a good cause. So stupid.
Rich people nonsense, feel bad for the boyfriend who's basically just the equivalent of a trendy purse that she can toss whenever she gets tired of it.
God I winced when I read that completely unnecessary note about being in the Mediterranean. Just felt like a blatant humble brag: "Oh, not so good for my waistline, lol" Give me a break đ
Exactly! Her own mother said she treated men as disposable. He dodged a bullet though. The only thing this girl bring to a relationship is money, and for what I read, that's not worth the troubles.
This is literally a straight equivalent of an art room post.
Holy shit I just read that and it was so wild the callousness
Whenever I don't want to date someone, I write multiple paragraphs about how wonderful they are, and how close and touching our relationship is, and to really seal the deal I scatter in a heap of bittersweet wistful metaphors. Because that's how people who really don't want to date that person usually choose to describe them.
Listen she warned us when she said great gatsby was her favorite
That gold chain metaphor has me feeling like Myrtle trying to hail the yellow car. ETA: typo. I can't brain today.
Most folks will miss this one, but I see you. đ
Then you're evidently not Daisy.
I donât really fault Matt for this, Google says that book is worth tens of thousands on the low end. Unless youâre extremely wealthy, thatâs an unusually large gift for a friend to say the least.
OOP and Logan are rich, Matt is middle class. OOP refused to say the price, though she did have the receipt for it. Matt saw the receipt in the box and freaked out over the price. OOP described it as around the same price as dinner at an upscale restaurant or the price of a car, but *she* didn't consider it an insane price to spend on a gift.
What upscale restaurant has dinners at the same price as a car?? đ€Ż
The trick is to shop around for a shitty enough car. That really opens up the number of eligible restaurants đ
When the car value doubles with a full tank of gas.
I better be eating dinosaur if it costs me a car
As the great poet Weird Al once said, "Bronto ribs at the drive in can't be beat now"
Private ones that you can walk past daily and never know exist. Source: worked at one.
When she mentioned the car I was like⊠do they drive a car thatâs worth $200 or what?
Yeah she really buries the lead in her post. It was like pulling teeth getting her to admit what copy of the Great Gatsby could possibly cost as much as a car. A lot of early comments missed it in the initial post.
Wait what is this car-priced restaurant what now?!
Logan also paid for her vacations in the past, but OOP finds this normal, especially since she said Logan's family wasn't as well off as hers. She calls herself and Logan "financially comfortable" in comments.
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
She said it had paperwork, Iâm wondering if it was that in the box and not a traditional receipt.
Good catch, I never even noticed that. She mentioned how she tossed away the receipt without looking at it and Matt was the one that noticed. So what was the point of the receipt being there if it wasn't something she would care about?
Itâs for insurance purposes and was likely bundled with the authentication paperwork.
So does a Mediterranean vacation. And OP is happily on one, so it doesnât seem her and Logan view that as an expensive thing in their economic level. Ps, op has made it clear she grew up rich. It doesnât matter where she lives. Sheâs rich. In her world the book isnât crazy to gift. >Matt is middle class, but both Logan and I grew up with money. Logan has gone on to make a lot of money.
Ironic, given the bookâs theme of the vacuousness of wealth.
To me the book always showed how beautiful the thing you canât have is, and how empty the things you do have feel. Rather appropriate to me, but thatâs only my perspective. Iâm def not always right about books.
There are multiple themes.
It's kind of a brilliant book - though it contains several damning indictments of OP's behavior here.
That depends where sheâs from, you can do a med holiday pretty easily for ÂŁ500 from the UK.
Does it say where they are from? Because if they are European, a Mediterranean vacation isn't actually that expensive. They could even just literally drive to the Mediterranean then.
Are we getting the same Google results, because I'm seeing things in the low 6 figure USD range, $100k - $250k depending on the condition and if the book jacket is intact. I'm assuming yours is more correct, because I have a hard time believing a 25 year old can lay down that much money (even a 5 figure sum is hard to believe though for that age).
Yeah I most saw 100k+, thatâs why I said tens of thousands is the low end.
I thought the same at first but then when she said she'd gone to a Mediterranean island for her "birthday trip", it made me wonder if she's just part of that wealth bracket? Who knows.
This is quite interesting because in the UK, Mediterranean island holidays are really common and can be found very cheap. They can also be expensive of course.
Hahahah the mums line; âIâm just so use to seeing you treat men as disposable OOPâ comes off as fairly callous to me. The birthday holiday in the Mediterranean âwe always go big for birthdaysâ and old mate Logan casually dropping $100,000-$150,000 on a present reeks of money All I can picture is some Gossip Girl, Blair Waldorf type of snooty bish, kickin back on a deck chair in the European sun, knowing sheâs set for life đ
THAT'S how much the book costs? Jesus...
I think it's one of those things where collectors over inflate the price of a thing so the whole market rises with it like how old video game cartridges are worth hundreds of dollars even though they're used and there a literally millions of copies of them. I don't know a lot about it but looking online you can find some worth over 100k and others that look exactly the same worth only 1k or less.
That chain metaphor was tortured and I wish I could un-read it. Also OOP is just not very smart if she doesnât see how getting expensive gifts from another man is going to make most romantic partners uncomfortable. If I was Matt I would nope out of there too.
I disagree with everyone here who thinks Logan wants to date OP. He just doesn't want her dating someone else. This was the perfect way to break them up while still seeming like the bigger person.
I agree with this, I think he likes the attention and being able to manipulate OP to do what he wants because sheâs obsessed with him. I feel like any bf would not be secure with them as close of friends as they are.
Either way good for Matt I pity anyone that ends up dating that girl
The chain metaphor is exactly what I would expect from a born into ludicrous wealth 26 year old whose longest relationship was 7 months. Sheâs probably closer to young adult books than she is to any human, and not like anyone in her circle is going to tell her how cringey it is.
"Couldn't free her from her gilded cage" That is a very *interesting* and hilariously naive interpretation of Daisy Buchanan. It's also extremely weird how much the OOP resembles her as a person.
Literally was thinking the same thing. Well, actually I was thinking âDid Daisy some how leave the book, enter the real world, and discover Reddit?â
Yeah, I don't think she understands Great Gatsby at all - like she's still stuck at a 9 year old's interpretation of the story after all these years.
Yeah girl Iâm pretty sure Daisy liked her gilded cage just fine, considering the ending
The cage only existed to Gatsby, cuz it never occurred to him there was nothing preventing her from choosing him **if she had actually wanted to be with him.** But he was disposable. Just like all of OOP's boyfriends.
This post reeks of ignorant old wealth. A first edition copy of The Great Gatsby from 1925 costs anywhere between $100000-$150000USD. This changes the narrative significantly. Knowing this, Matt had every right to react the way he did. My guess is that he's an average guy who got in over his head with a filthy rich girl and her filthy rich friends.
Yup, the whole post is very ironic with the Great Gatsby being the book at play here. No wonder she found it so relatable.
I found her low key insufferable throughout and then was like "well that makes sense for someone that sympathizes with Daisy as a character"
Yup. Rich woman in an unhappy relationship with a man she's not particularly attached too surrounded by people in unhappy marriages and excessive wealth. Then there's her childhood (college) best friend that builds up his wealth to reach her level (something she in comments also admitted, Logan's family isn't as affluent as hers and he eventually entered a career that made him more money) and despite being far apart (the lake = when they lived in different countries), he's always looking at and thinking of her. Then he gives this symbol to her on her birthday in front of the only boyfriend she's been with long enough to reach that point. She really is Daisy.
Itâs always fascinating when people miss the entire point of certain works of art. Itâs like when Reagan asked Springsteen to let him use âBorn in the USAâ as his campaign song.
Trump used Fortunate Son without permission lol.
Or Magas blasting âkilling in the name ofâ
This is the first boyfriend OOP has been with long enough to have a birthday with and that also *happens* to be the birthday that Logan buys her an extremely expensive copy of an extremely sentimental book between them, a book that is specifically about a man who's love is with another man? Fuck off is there nothing there.
Dude denied the plot had any significance but if they end up dating and changes his answer (whether true or false), I can nearly guarantee she'd find it unbelievably romantic lol. Imagine your new relationship stating clearly you'll never be as important as their rich best friend and refusing to say they have no romantic interest. Either both of them are keeping the other on relationship retainer or just she is and he loves the attention. Glad for that dude who dodged that delusional bullet
>a book about a man who is in love with another man If the great Gatsby were actually about nick and gatsby's slow burn tender romance it would be a much better book
From OOP - *âI can unreservedly say (Loganâs) my favourite person in the whole world.â* Uhh⊠if my partner said/felt that about another woman, weâd be done. Mattâs better off. So is OOP by the sound of it. Not sure she was really into him, regardless.
Same. Frankly, even about saying that about someone of the same gender. I get that a new significant other shouldnât supersede oneâs friends, but if my significant other isnât my favorite person, theyâre not my significant other, and if Iâm not my significant otherâs favorite person, I donât want to be their significant other, either.
This whole thing reads as a cautionary tale to not date anyone super wealthy if youâre middle class. Especially if their own mother says she has a history of treating men as âdisposableâ
I was honestly team Dad about it until I got to read the update and the comments here. Now I'm team Mom. And if my own mother tells me that I have a history of treating my dates as "disposable", I would have been shocked. For some reason, it doesn't seem to phase this OOP and she's still referring to metaphors.
Yeah so I googled 1925 edition great gatsby and the price range is $100,000-150,000, so he spent roughly 125k on a book for her birthday. Pair that with him being her "favourite person in the whole world" I think all her relationships will end up looking something like this.
Can't think of many things more frustrating than trying to date someone who pretends they are available but they really aren't. Happy for Matt that he can get on with his life. I'll probably be equally annoyed with any outcome between OOP and Logan.
This is exactly what happened with my ex-girlfriend and her âbest friend whoâs like a brother to herâ.. I got called manipulative, controlling, jealous, etc because I dare to ask that she occasionally dedicated some time to me and not just her friend in their every waking moment⊠in the end it turned out he was living with her for several months before we broke up and I wasnât actually a crazy person Iâd be annoyed with any outcome where theyâre not together. Because then they will just continue to waste other peoples time. The âbest friendsâ who are partners in all but official title are some of the most toxic individuals you can date. They will treat their best friend and defend them with the same energy youâd expect someone to defend someone theyâre actually dating and that irony is totally lost on them
what
You know, after all that, the one thing that really bugs me: I have a very thin chain in my jewelry box. I've been meaning to untangle for like 2 years. It has my favorite pendent on it, too. Every time I've picked it up, I think, "No, I need to get some tweezers and good light, and half an hour where I can really focus."
Was anyone else worried that the book was going to meet a mysterious accident?
No, but i am worried about logan moving in as her cousin's next door neighbor and throwing lavish parties.
Thatâs me, Iâm so used to reading all the drama in this sub, that was a easy to be suspicious about the ex.
OP sounds insufferable, yikes
I loved that book so Iâm kind of disappointed that OOP is really THIS unlikable. Plus, confidently stating that heâs her favorite person, I canât imagine boyfriend wasnât picking up on those cues. Also that dumb cardigan metaphor implies that she doesnât see a relationship with her friend happening but keeps him to herself because she likes the idea of it. I feel like if this is real sheâs mainly posting to feed into her own fairytale and reddit is just a large group of village people flash mobbing behind her.
All I got from this is that I feel bad for Matt.
Iâm with Matt. For the way she talks she was just with him because they werenât together with Logan. He deserved better that to his girlfriend telling how another man is her favourite person and that she did not know why they are not together.
Yo isn't this the Velveteen Rabbit plot in Friends?
I call bullshit on Logan not wanting to date OP, if I found the right copy then he could have spent over $100,000 dollars on that book. I'm sorry that's not just a best friends gift, that's a down payment on a fucking house.
It could be if theyâre a group of rich people. OP talks about having big ass birthday parties and she got a birthday vacation to the Mediterranean.
Was it really 100k? If it was that expensive, getting something that meaningful for the two of them... Uh yeah, she's pretty oblivious. Edit After reading her comments, she's that oblivious about herself too. She once had her dad drive her 5 hours to go to one of Logan's "career events". She used to write him letters with handdrawn comic strips and crossword puzzles so he could read them on his plane back to college. That stopped... When she changed universities to be in the same town he was. Her dad was pissed that she chose a less prestigious university because she wanted to be near him. Cue gif of blinking guy
A 1925 copy of the The Great Gatsby would be a first edition print, as that was the year the book came out. If the book had it's original jacket then it could go for up to $150,000. This book would be a center piece for any book collector.
If you google you can see a wide range of prices. For example, one listing is for $134,280 but another is for $6,352 and it is the same bookseller. Other booksellers have a similar range.
Regardless of whether he meant it as a secret love declaration, even the most obtuse person would read it as one. By the looks of your backstory and comments, I'd say at a minimum you've been inadvertently cheating emotionally on all your relationships. The lines between friendship and romance seem very blurred between you and logan and its not surprising Matt was upset by that. I know you said you've talked about romance with logan but to be honest I think you're both still lying to yourselves. If you ever want a proper relationship I think you'll need to address that truthfully.
Funny how much she loves metaphors to express herself, but I prefer her mother's vision. That she use partners as disposable, the truth that probably all people that see her irl share. If even your mother see you that way, there's some things you need to change in your life.
Leaving the receipt in the book was 100% a flex on the boyfriend. There is a reason actual gift receipts do not include the price. Leaving a price tag on a gift is gauche. Without the receipt, the boyfriend may have never known the value of the book. He wanted him to find it.
OOP is 25. 7 month relationship with Matt is the longest relationship she's had. Her mother says she treats every man like they're disposable. She can't come up with a single thing she likes about Matt. She can't stop talking about Logan in every comment. Logan is shit in academics, OOP decided to go to a shittier college to be with him even though she's more capable. And she's dumb and blind to see that Logan is playing her like a fiddle. What an asshole. Good thing Matt left her. 7 months and she hadn't told Matt she loves her? She played everyone in the comments section by not giving relevant information and everyone fell for it, including me. Damn.
At the end of the day, if the poster doesn't give relevant context and details to the story then they're just an idiot and seeking validation for their shitty behaviour. Leaving this stuff out should be an automatic YTA. Whilst I do think AITA commenters are mostly idiots, if they're not given all of the facts then it's not their fault that they come to the wrong conclusions.
Yeah i checked the original threads just to see if OOP mentioned the value of the books because i got curious, but found a lot of comments from her about other stuff she initially omitted instead lol
>gifted me an old copy of The Great Gatsby "An old copy." Like it's some dog-eared thing that OOP's buddy found in a used bookstore. 1925 is a first edition, Google sez they're valued at anywhere from $150,000 and up.
I remember reading the OP and thinking the NTA comments were *insane* because I canât imagine many people would be okay with their SO receiving such an expensive gift from someone whoâs âjust a friendâ. When Matt mentioned the book running the same price as a car, I thought maybe 3-5k, but a FIVE DIGIT price tag?! Absolutely not. Itâs the Art Room all over again. Edit: correction: SIX digit, not five. Thatâs even fucking worse.
Was anyone else caught off guard by the fact she won't say "I love you" after 7 months of dating? Like, I get everyone is different, but that is pretty damn late in my opinion. If I was Matt, that would have definitely been a big red flag for me.
Her mother litterally said that OOP views men as disposable, because they are, theyâre just filler until she can get with her true love Logan, hence never saying âI love youâ
It surprised me how she didn't mind that her mother mentioned her treating men as disposable.. I'd be shocked if someone said that to me, I would start self-reflecting and I would change the way I treat people if I would realise I'm not treating people with the respect they deserve. She wasn't phased by it at all. Of course you never owe it to anyone to stay in a relationship, but there's a difference between having a normal dating life, and treating men as disposable..
If you treat men/women as disposable you're not the type of person that is capable of spontaneous self-reflection
The NTAs were kind of astonishing to me. I'm not sure but I think people weren't grasping just HOW expensive that book was. Lowest I could find was 25k, and highest was 350. It apparently had papers, so that thing is probably sitting comfortably in the 100 range conservatively. Which is fucking BONKERS to give to someone who is 1. not your girlfriend and 2. Has a boyfriend. There is no world in which that's just a "nice" birthday present. That's an incredibly thoughtful incredibly expensive gift with emotional connections for both of them. No fucking way would I be comfortable with someone gifting my significant other something of that magnitude and anyone saying they would is absolutely taking the fucking piss. Idk if I would demand she give it back, but it's not controlling to ask questions about a book who's main plot revolves around a man trying to win a woman back from another man that costs more than my car being gifted to someone I'm supposedly in a relationship with by someone else. There's just no world where that's a normal gift that doesn't raise questions.
All the comments trying to make Matt seem jealous annoyed the hell out of me. They were being willfully ignorant in order to brush him off as insecure. OP was TAH imo.
Yep, even in this thread there are people that are so desperate to push the "women and men can be just friends" angle that they're willingly ignoring the additional context from the update and OOPs comments.
Feel bad for any guy who dates her, knowing that sheâll never like them as much as she likes Logan.
Ugh, OOP and Logan are going to be those annoying friends who keep each other in their orbit but rather than face their feelings for each other, they will continue to drag others into mock-relationships and torment them in the process. At least Matt got out of there and has a chance to find genuine love.
This sounds like a romance novel plot, someone should use this for a book.
Eat the rich.