Posts tagged with "letters"

Making A Difference

Over the last while, I’ve been receiv­ing some very nice let­ters and com­ments.

Two, in par­tic­u­lar, touched me. This one:

I stum­bled upon your blog a few days ago. I’m read­ing all your archives right now.

One of your entries moved me so much I had to pass it to my best, most initi­mate, most sensitive/sensual girl­friends. It was­n’t a big group, but a group I felt could hear what you were say­ing in your entry. It was about find­ing the spot on a woman that should be kissed.

I read your blog every day because I can’t believe there is a man out in the uni­verse who is this intu­itive, in tune, so aware of him­self emo­tion­al­ly and phys­i­cal­ly. I wish you had gone to my col­lege — you would have been so loved and admired.

So this entry dis­tress­es me, and I don’t even know you. I under­stand lon­li­ness — I’ve nev­er had inti­ma­cy, or rather, I’m very afraid of it. I don’t even know why I’m telling you all this because you don’t know me either and you won’t care, but this entry hurts. You must know by now that some­one thinks of you every­day. Maybe it is your mom, maybe an ex-lover or girl­friend or male friend or co work­er.

I think I’m more in shock that you can write so hon­est­ly and open­ly. I’m jeal­ous of that.

well, I just want­ed to let you know that. And that I have a crush on your blog. Can a per­son crush on a blog?

Please take care,
Zaira

And this from a few months ago:

Hi Jeff,

you don’t know me and we will prob­a­bly nev­er meet. It’s sort of inter­est­ing the way the inter­net has changed the way we can know some­one.

Allow me to intro­duce myself, since you have already bore your soul in a very real way that has moved me to write to a com­plete stranger-some­thing i have nev­er done.

I am a 30 yr old inte­ri­or design­er, a born and bred new york­er cur­rent­ly liv­ing in brook­lyn. It’s been slow at work late­ly, so to pass the time I have tak­en to read­ing blogs most­ly design relat­ed, but some­how i read a com­ment that you had made on a ran­dom blog, look­ing back i can’t remem­ber which one unfor­tu­nate­ly, and it led me back to your per­son­al blog some­how.

you see I am not like you at all. I feel sim­i­lar feel­ings, and even have sim­i­lar beliefs, but I don’t have the guts to put myself out there in that way. I dont even have a blog, and i can bare­ly talk to my friends about the way im feel­ing. so for me your blog is very ther­a­peu­tic and refresh­ing.

like most peo­ple who blog, im sure, you won­der if any­one out there is read­ing. Well just want­ed to let you know that I real­ly like your blog and will con­tin­ue to read it.

I have added you as a flickr con­tact and i see that you have reciprocated-*armadilliz* I am not a stalk­er / crazy per­son, or any­thing like that, just a fan, so rest easy.

Take care,

-Liz

And while peo­ple tell me how much they appre­ci­ate me being open and shar­ing myself, it’s noth­ing com­pared to what they share of them­selves in these let­ters. I don’t know what com­pels some­one to write to a total stranger, but it’s a warm­ing ges­ture, some­thing that inspires me when I’m feel­ing closed and self-con­scious.

So I want to say thank you.

Thank you to the peo­ple who’ve writ­ten me. Thank you to the peo­ple who share their own prob­lems and issues and lives. Thank you to the peo­ple who let me know that I’ve inspired them to start their own jour­nals. Thank you for sup­port­ing me when we’ve nev­er even spo­ken.

It’s your words that make me feel like I’m not so alone when I’m sit­ting in my house, won­der­ing what to do with myself. It’s your kind­ness that gives me strength when the world is falling down around me. It’s know­ing that I’ve been able to make a dif­fer­ence that keeps me going.

Thank you.

Letter From An Ex-Girlfriend

Jeff

Where do I start? I can’t even begin to recount the last six weeks of my life, and real­ly if I were able…Im [sic] not sure you’d want to hear it. I won’t say the “let’s be friends” email was a sur­prize [sic]…I sup­pose I just need­ed to hear it.

I find a let­ter in my mail­box, wrapped in a gold foil enve­lope, teal let­ters on a white page.

The let­ters are blocky, square, with no regard for case. She used to write me notes with her Es as three par­al­lel lines, count­ing on the eye to draw an illu­sion of a ver­ti­cal bar, and her Os dot­ted in the cen­tre. It was one of her things, one of the details she used to be unique.

Now she’s aban­doned all that.

I’m already skep­ti­cal, on my guard.

It’s hard though…I had my chance…I sup­pose you had yours through our relationship…you could­n’t be what I need­ed then and now look at you — the sub­ject of my fantasies…watching from afar…wishing I’d have saw [sic] these things then — won­der­ing if maybe I had looked through less skep­ti­cal eyes, I could have saw [sic] who you are today.

I’m remind­ed of why it end­ed. Of how hard I tried to make it work, of all the things she did to hurt me.

Now she points out her faults. The mis­takes she made. She flat­ters me. She lets her guard down. I’ve nev­er felt her so vul­ner­a­ble, and this is how I know she’s changed.

You lead the struc­tured life I always want­ed, I don’t know if you have a coun­ter­part in your life…I don’t know if you’re con­tent now to struc­ture your own world and not yet some­one else’s…there are few things I do know about you…but what I do see…Im [sic] sor­ry I did­n’t before.

Truth be told…Ive [sic] dri­ven all the way to the east end on a few occa­sions and turned back. My inten­tion was to fall at your feet…to kiss them as I had in the past but with a renewed respect for you and a bet­ter under­stand­ing of myself. But I was affraid [sic].

I’m remind­ed now of what drove me to achieve what I have now. To cast off that part of my life, to buy a house, to live on my own, to move on. I may nev­er have had any of this if it was­n’t for her.

I’m sure you’re shak­ing your head now…maybe laughing…maybe not even read­ing this any­more. You’re done with me it seems. i’m [sic] okay with that…afterall [sic] it’s my own fault. I had that chance and I could­n’t take it.

i’ll [sic] get to the point: on the next page is a short fan­ta­sy I had pass through my mind yes­ter­day and so I wrote it down in my jour­nal because late­ly some­thing has changed in me — I nev­er assign a name or face or…person to my fantisies…lately you’ve been front and cen­tre.

I’m remind­ed of how intense­ly sex­u­al she was. The nights we stayed up, alive in flame, con­sumed by our con­cu­pis­cence, push­ing the lim­its of our bod­ies. There were times when I nev­er felt so alive.

Before you read this next page…know that if you had want­ed me at your feet—Id [sic] be there in a heartbeat—even still—what an hon­nor [sic] it would be to curl up at your feet while you read this—

Okay now Im [sic] stalling—because Im ner­vous at the thought of you open­ing your eyes to my want…for you.

Her words aren’t enough. Not enough to change my mind or what’s past.

Too lit­tle, too late.

Note: The sec­ond page, the fan­ta­sy, was­n’t includ­ed, for fear that it would give away the iden­ti­ty of writer. It reads like some­thing from l’Histoire d’O; noth­ing vul­gar, but flat, dry, and devoid of lit­er­ary devices.

Letter To An Ex-Girlfriend: Bronwen

I love you too much baby
For you to be with me
I love you too much baby
I got­ta set you free

—Shea Seger, I Love You Too Much

You were the clos­est I’ve ever come to per­fect in a girl­friend. In fact, you raised the bar. Now I know there are girls out there who are fun­ny, intel­li­gent, open-mind­ed, car­ing, sane, and I’ll always be look­ing for the same now.

Making love to you was fun because you’re so damn cute. I loved to look into your eyes, though I wish you’d be able to keep yours open.

In so many ways, we worked. My love of dark choco­late and your love of milk choco­late meant that we’d nev­er have a prob­lem fin­ish­ing off an assort­ed box. You’re so easy-going, while I’m so uptight. All the lit­tle things, like puz­zle pieces made of clay.

Even though it’s been months since we’ve bro­ken up, our video is still by far the most played item on my iTunes playlist. It’s such a beat­i­ful mem­o­ry, and I’ll always cher­ish it.

I still miss those notes you used to leave me about what you did dur­ing the day and when you’d be back. Those times we’d take the bus, and you’d rest your head on my shoul­der. Those times we’d wres­tle and fall asleep in a pile, right there, from exhaus­tion.

I miss all these things, but the fact is that it did­n’t feel right, and it would­n’t be fair to either of us to keep going. You deserve to be with some­one bet­ter. Someone who will ful­ly appre­ci­ate you and the things you do.

I know I nev­er said it in our rela­tion­ship, but I loved you.

And I still do.

The Letter To An Ex-Girlfriend series

  1. Introduction
  2. Ashley
  3. Michele
  4. Christie
  5. Jackie
  6. Louise
  7. Bronwen

Letters From A Prisoner

I’m not going to deny it any­more. It’s always been you. But I under­stand, you don’t need to explain, I get it. Work, our lives, we’re busy. You’re about to go off on a grand adven­ture. And I can see why you think that a rela­tion­ship with me and that adven­ture are mutu­al­ly exclu­sive but I just want to say my piece. Getting lost with each oth­er could be the great­est adven­ture we’ve yet to embark on and I just want to say that if you want to get lost with me I’ll always be here per­pet­u­al­ly lost with­out you.

I read his let­ters, some dat­ed, some titled with expres­sions of for­lorn hope. Familiar words that cut me to the bone.

They’re beau­ti­ful. I nev­er knew he was capa­ble of such poignan­cy, such emo­tion. It fills me with envy.

Sometimes I just want to be noticed. Not often, but some­times late at night when I’m think­ing about the “what-ifs” of the day. Being too obvi­ous would be dan­ger­ous though and so I slink away, back to my cave to think, rather than do. Such a cow­ard, I loathe myself. You’d say no, every ratio­nal sce­nario I’ve played out ends with that.

He’s trapped, per­pet­u­al­ly lost in the thought of anoth­er. This time, I’m on the out­side, look­ing in. It’s all new for him, and I can hear in his voice how much he detests it.

His angst is unbe­com­ing. He’s not a writer, but he writes these let­ters, hop­ing the cathar­sis will save him. I’ve been here enough times to know that it’ll be alright, but that there’s also noth­ing I can do to help, so I resign myself to help­less­ness.

And now I’ll be pre-occu­pied and jeal­ous for the rest of the week­end. Me, jeal­ous and not trust­ing myself to speak, me. Not me, any­more. This love is like lep­rosy, pieces of myself are falling away. It’s abla­tive.

Yet his tone is so unfa­mil­iar, so unlike him. Me, he writes, Not me, any­more. He does­n’t even believe it him­self. The san­guine friend, reduced to an enfee­bled state he wants des­per­ate­ly to cast aside. Even with the wis­dom I’ve gained, it still sur­pris­es me how attrac­tion, infat­u­a­tion, love can make one so irra­tional.

In these let­ters he shares his feel­ings, whol­ly, as if to say, “Here is my heart. Please hold it gen­tly”. The words would strip him bare if he spoke them to her, so he writes them where no one but me will read.

A pris­on­er, he lives in this cage, caught between the will and the risk of express­ing to her how he feels.

Letter To An Ex-Girlfriend: Louise

The thrill is gone
The thrill is gone away
The thrill is gone baby
The thrill is gone away
You know you done me wrong baby
And you’ll be sor­ry some­day

—BB King, The Thrill Is Gone

Our rela­tion­ship was a night­mare of ups and downs.

You had the amaz­ing abil­i­ty to make me feel good about myself, by say­ing the right thing with intel­li­gence and elo­quence.

Yet every time I felt like I was mak­ing progress, progress that took tremen­dous effort and ener­gy, progress for you, you would put me down. Every time I took a leap of faith and put myself out there, you would hurt me. It was­n’t even a case of bru­tal, tact­less hon­esty; you would insult my pride for no rea­son.

I think it betrayed a sub­con­scious inse­cu­ri­ty. Something you would do to make your­self feel bet­ter. Like your con­stant need to prove that you’re busy and mov­ing on. It’s as if your life is emp­ty, void, and you’re des­per­ate to fill it with some­thing.

I had to end things when you went too far.

There were no regrets, because I did my absolute best to make things work. Even though I suf­fered, I ignored the pain, and tried work­ing through it. I only gave up when you proved too stub­born to change or under­stand.

The rela­tion­ship was­n’t a total loss. It was an inter­est­ing intro­duc­tion to the sub­cul­ture. It was pas­sion­ate­ly sex­u­al. It also made me more con­fi­dent, although I real­ize now that it was­n’t because of you. You bare­ly gave me any trust, and every step for­ward I made, you pulled me back two. It was me who fought through all the inse­cu­ri­ties and rose to the occa­sion.

When you came back in January, with­out a word of apol­o­gy or men­tion of the wrong you did, I had no inter­est in con­tin­u­ing the rela­tion­ship. After that, I thought of you when­ev­er I heard the song Buried Myself Alive by The Used.

Then, with all your let­ters and your apolo­gies and your tears, two years lat­er, you asked “nicer than that”.

Unfortunately, it was at an unsta­ble time in my life, so I asked you to back off and wait. Your idea of back­ing off and wait­ing is leav­ing me creepy com­ments and dat­ing to fill the time. I just can’t under­stand how you keep mak­ing these mis­takes. It’s almost like you pur­pose­ly sab­o­tage your­self.

I don’t want to be involved in the dra­ma any­more. Nothing is ever sim­ple with you. Even though you say you’ve changed, it’s not worth the risk to me. You had your chance, and it was a damn good one.

You’ve wronged me too many times. The last time you left my house, not know­ing when or if you’d come back, I felt noth­ing.

I knew then that the thrill was gone.

A few oth­er things:

  • On the phone, your voice could be so cute that it would make me weak and for­get every­thing you did.
  • Out of all my girl­friends, you were phys­i­cal­ly the least attrac­tive, yet you were the most con­ceit­ed about your looks.
  • It was very much appre­ci­at­ed when you brought me flow­ers at work, and the times you’ve dropped off food and oth­er good­ies at my door. No one else has done this for me.
  • The way you would remem­ber events was often com­plete­ly wrong. It would­n’t be so bad if you weren’t com­plete­ly con­vinced that your inter­pre­ta­tion was cor­rect. It made things rather scary, like dat­ing a schiz­o­phrenic. You could total­ly fab­ri­cate how things went, the way you want­ed to remem­ber them. The root of an argu­ment would turn into my fault, instead of yours.
  • You were a knock­out in bed.

The Letter To An Ex-Girlfriend series

  1. Introduction
  2. Ashley
  3. Michele
  4. Christie
  5. Jackie
  6. Louise
  7. Bronwen