FWD: part II

hello my lovely, your the sweetest kindest friend in the world. i love you so much. your at work, yeah, friday nights, i'm here, wouldn't be nice if we were in thailand, at the beach together instead of here and now. someday i'm gonna take you back, or somewhere take you on a holiday all this sounds like a grade schooler wrote it, it's that kinda of love, ***, the purest of all forms, the proudestof all knowing that i could attract i friend like you. with love all ***

BACKGROUND: When we returned to **** I didnt speak to him for a couple of months although I know it hurt him a great deal. I always knew our love was still strong and we would continue being best friends and later look back on this period and laugh at our/my stubborness but I wanted him to know how abandoned I felt in Thailand and for him to feel it for a bit. Two months after our return, he became extremely tired on a Monday, on Friday went to the doctor and the following Monday was told he had leukemia and left town to get treatment at one of the best cancer hospitals in the country, near his family in the Northwest. This email was sent form his hospital bed. He died three months later. The biggest regret of my life is not letting go of my ego and opening up my heart and telling him how much I loved him. But now I tell him every day. And he tells me right back.

FWD: part I

it was unhealthy to come running home. you were, right. but it feels to be home. i feel being home. i think about you a lot. thinking about what your doing, how you're getting along. i know that being alone doesn't really phase you. or your comfortable with it, but it feels like i turned my back on you, and went running the other direction, which i guess is what i did. the whole thing was so messy. messed up with all the confusion, we talked so much about. all of it felt unhealthy, but know that i'm home it feels with your help, and talking and crying with *** that my relationship will be balanced more with communication, and i'm committed to not get lost in this. i will, but i'm gonna try to continue finding myself as well, doing what i need to do. being so far away, not being able to funciton, was to hard to do those things. having the feelings i did have, i wanting, needing, loving so bad, were right. your friendship in my eyes blossomed that much more. you being there for me, and loving me the way you did was so something. i just hope that walking the streets you don't hold grudges, or more that when you do come home that all is repairble. blah.

really i care, but more importantly i just felt like telling you that i love you for letting me run with understanding. i found the place i need, to be, may suffer repercusions later, but you being there helping me discover, fight it, push me, forcing me to look at all i did, was life. life that helpped me to being more.

love you, travel with safety.
****

BACKGROUND: This email was sent to me by the best friend I've ever had and one of the most amazing, loving, compassionate people I ever met. We had gone to Thailand together for a one month vacation but he left after one week because he was despondent over being away from his girlfriend, his first love. I was furious that he left.

FWD: guilty toast and such

You said you wanted me to write you an email. Well, actually you said, "You could write me an email," which I will interpret to mean that you would like me to write you an email. I just can't promise that it will be cohesive or interesting. I am tired, too.

Here's the question of the month: Why do I walk around feeling guilty ALL THE TIME?! I just made myself a piece of sprouted grain toast with Earth Balance "buttery spread." I have this sense that somebody is watching me, following my movements approving or disapporoving - ready to hop out and scold me for putting on too much buttery spread or eating toast at 11pm when I am hungry. Then I realized, hey, I am a grown up. I paid for this bread. I paid for this butter. It's my time. I can eat however the fuck much toast I want to. In fact, I might even have a second piece! So, what's with the internal police officer?

Do you ever imagine that someone is watching you do the most mundane of things and approving or disapproving? flipping on a light switch? washing your hands? checking to see if the door is locked? getting dressed to go to the gym? Am I alone in doing this? (It's okay if I am, I just want to know if this is my own funny little behavior or if it's universal. By the way this is not a rhetorical question. Please write me back or talk to me about it.)

Random flashback to 4th grade PE: Mr. Jenkins said that we didn't own anything. Nothing was ours. Everything belonged to our parents. The toys we played with, the clothes on our back, everything. Nothing actually belonged to us. Not to mention that if we watched "The Simpsons" we might end up in jail later in life... Wierdo.

I am not well. I look in the mirror and I see dark circles under eyes, sad lines, blotchy patches of stress. I look and I see my mother. In every expression. In every pore. In every hair follicle. I want to exorcise her from my body, from my soul, my mind. I know that women patch things up with their moms sooner or later, but I just think: "What do I have to gain form it?" I don't like her. I am willing to accept that it is my duty to love her, but it's impossible to like someone if you just don't godamn like that someone. What am I supposed to do?! I am dreading Saturday. The last thing I want is for her to be closer to me in proximity, when I already feel her shadow invading my every day.

I do actually want to have serious conversation with her, but I can't do it with her husband here and I can't do it over the phone and it would be rude to spoil what she thinks of as a nice vacation - so what, when? You know that she's the only person that I have ever wanted to hurt? Like, physically and emotionally hurt. I had a dream about screaming at her the other night. (this is not a first) Screaming myself silly, saying everything in exactly the perfect way, in the perfect words, the perfect tenor to my voice. I am a very forgiving person - sometimes to my own detriment - but I can't force myself to forgive her. I guess just...more time...and timing...

I don't think you really like to hear about this stuff. I know I need to address it sooner or later and I am not afraid of doing that. It's just...timing. I am still too eager to hurt her to have a successful conversation - and what's worse is that I know exactly how to hurt her. I don't actually in good conscience want to do that - but I just might given the chance - so I just need more time. I need to feel ready. I reached that point of readiness with my dad and it has been delightful ever since. I am just not there yet with her, please forgive me.

Night is rarely my friend on this island. You wanted an email. That's all I got for now. I am tired. I want my kitty. I want my you. I just want to be at peace for a night. I hope I'll sleep after all the toast and wine.

Write me back in the morning please?

FWD: In a moment of weakness...

Well, obviously you didn't want it enough. Remember that moment we had in your parents' guest room? You looked at me with such intensity and said, "You have no idea...You have no idea..." What did you mean by that? That I had no idea how much you were going to end up hurting me? What was it that you were feeling for me at that moment, and how could everything have just collapsed in such a short time? Obviously there are a lot of unresolved issues here. I'm trying to make this break as clean and as bloodless as possible, but who am I kidding? I have been processing everything these past few weeks, and now all the rawness is coming to the surface. . . .

Deep inside, beneath the anger, beneath the resentment, there is love. Love and gratitude. Love and gratitude and sadness. You have fanned the fires of transformation in my life, as the yogis would say. And that is a real gift. Getting laid off was one thing; you have broken me completely, and now I'm truly wide open to the world.

I don't think I'll be in *** for much longer. I'm seriously considering moving out to the *** once my lease runs up in April. Gotta get crackin' on that driver's license! You know how I feel: My heart yearns for space, for community, for connection. For a brief moment--when you told me about wanting to explore *** with me and we searched for yoga studios in *** after looking at your school's Web site--I thought that that was something I could've had with you down the road. Guess that wasn't meant to be. But maybe we will help each other to get to where we have to go, as you pointed out. Maybe we already have. . . .
I can't lie to myself. Especially not about you. I am mourning the loss of what I thought we had, ***. Every day. I miss you more than you can imagine, and it breaks my heart to hear you say that you miss me too, but it also frustrates me to no end.

I don't know who I am to you, what I represent to you. Maybe one day it'll all make sense. Right now I feel powerless, mostly because what I feel for you is still so powerful.