LETTER SENDERS.
I was drawn to open my old cigar box full of old photos, love letters and keep sakes – after reaching out to an old friend. I was digging for a photo I had recently come across from 7th grade – and it was then that I found the letters.
Notepad sized remnants of longing. Letters full of words that I haven’t heard a person mumble in my direction, for what feels like an eternity. It’s easy to long for these letter senders. Their words are running water, as I walk between morning and night in the driest of concrete deserts. My lips are chapped, I am sunburned – and I crave the cool of northern plumbing and central air conditioning.
It has been a long time since I let myself feel the twang of “what if.” I let that longing sit with me for just a moment before I swat it away like a mosquito humming in my ear.
As I poured through the letters, simultaneously weeping and laughing over them each; not for the first, nor the last time – I couldn’t help but come to the realization that the reason I left each letter sender – was not because I didn’t love them anymore or less than I once had, but simply because I didn’t know how to love myself.
As I read their words, each ringing with admiration and desire to stay connected through all of the messy disconnect – I saw them as though they had just been jotted onto a crisp sheet of paper – no more creases, tears or signs of age. Their meaning no longer clouded by my own perception. A feeling, I wish I could have given to these letters and their senders long ago.
I spent
my
entire life trying
to be the cool girl
As much as I used to blame my letter senders for the demise of each relationship, the truth is – it was my fault, too. How could I have possibly maintained a relationship, while also maintaining the facade of the “cool girl?”
A girl with no boundaries, deep abandonment issues, a self-conscious mindset, and who was terribly afraid of rejection was not equipped to maintain much of anything except perfection. I was unable to be truly vulnerable. I was unable to truly be myself. So I ran.
To be fair, I think running away back then was okay. It wasn’t necessarily healthy, but at the same time – I don’t think any of my letter senders and I were meant to be. I don’t dwell on past relationships or my actions or their actions. I am grateful to be able to peer down at my past from a new vantage point, so the next time I experience love – I will be able to be all of the things I wasn’t before.
I have had the gift of becoming friends with each of my letter senders; watching them grow from young, naive adult man-children into thoughtful, courageous men; who have found themselves paired up with smart, strong, beautiful women… it is now very clear to me that they have each been a vital pitstop in my journey towards becoming my own secrete admirer.
It’s only been with time, solace, therapy and letting go – that I can embrace the fleeting moments of wishing I was a different version of myself somewhere in a parallel plane. I know I’m out there somewhere – living a very different version of this life. Maybe in each alternate reality I am happy with myself from the get-go. But luckily, I’m stuck in this dimension. I get to witness my own process of unlearning habits, and I have the chance to be the best and worst version of all the different me’s.
I don’t think I’m the one who got away. I don’t believe my letter senders were the ones who got away either. I am honored to have loved them so fully, and to be loved so fully in return.
