i was tempted to set this into the archive with the date/time stamp of it’s creation, october of 2006, and thus, hide it in plain sight. but i find that subterfuge unnecessary. so. instead. placing it as the small, black stone that it is and simply for archival purposes. which feels good… for it is good to be able to remember and nothing more.
hi there, me again. just wanted to send you an email and thank you for today. i’ve been pretty lost and alone lately, The Riders are keeping me sane, but home life is a wreck and honestly, i’ve been rather depressed since Heath.
i don’t think he ever really understood me and i seem to lack the words or ability to lend that understanding. it’s odd. i’ve never in my life been so misconstrued and judged by another, and for the longest time, i counted on my actions getting through to him. how could they not? or so i told myself.
for many months, i went without just so i could send him things to help him hang on. he never knew that, of course. i always played it as if it was extra cash and no worries. i made a point of writing or sending along some manner of something every day. i knew how frustrated and incapable he felt, and thought perhaps knowing there was someone who cared would mean something.
he forever cut at me. every good thing set to suspicion. every act accused of ulterior motivation. it hurt. he never knew how much he hurt me, and he knew he hurt me, just not how deeply.
the only thing i’ve ever had in my life that i could look at and know to be good was my absolute willingness to do for others and my aspiration to be kind to others. it is the thing that kept me alive, kept me sane. i gave every bit of myself to him. good, bad, all of it. trusted him to care enough for me to keep them safe.
even when he deliberately picked arguments, i remained. i know that pattern. ran it a number of years myself. be as awful as you can, so they run away, and you can stay safe in the knowledge that you’re impossible to truly love. he was wrong, of course. just as i was in those times i did it.
but eventually, you hit a point where something so hurtful, so malignant in accusation comes that you just rock on you heels and you know there is no way that person could ever really care for you and say such a thing to you.
that was what happened. he finally found the ace, the one card even i could not endure. knowing me caring and kind, knowing me dedicated to be so, he took the one thing that would most deeply call into question everything i have ever aspired to be and slapped me in the face with it.
and why? stars. i suppose there are a lot of reasons. but they all boil down to pride. he clings to pride and punished me for not having it in relation to him… even as he forever talked about how no one should have pride. perhaps i should have. perhaps i should have told him to go fuck himself the first time he ever cut me for being good to him. or for being honest. i boggle still at all the bruises i have from him for daring to be honest.
he never wanted to hear about becoming. especially not his own. i said it all anyway. and he punished me for it. and i let him. i thought maybe, if he felt like he could kick me and i wouldn’t run away, maybe then he’d find the way to not feel like he had to kick me anymore. stupid, i know. i forever make the mistake of assuming people want to be kinder. he said he did. i believed him. for a while. but his actions never quite matched his words. it took me a long time to really accept that.
bah. you know, for the last two months, i have struggled to just forget everything about him. and just when i get to a place where i can breathe without feeling like i’m going to fall apart… here it all is again. not your fault. please know that i know it is not your fault.
i’m lost, really. for the first time since i was a kid, i let myself love someone, really love them. i stopped doing that a long time ago because everyone i loved just abused me and left me… just … left.
i believed him when he said he would never do that to me. i believed. and now… well… other than feeling really, really stupid, i guess i’m just … done. i know the way i feel about him isn’t going to change. if it hasn’t after all of this, i can’t imagine it ever will. so i just try to get through each day, try to forget that i ever knew his name, try not to miss the emails, try not to miss chatting with him, try not to miss talking to him, try not to miss believing, try not to miss feeling like i was right to give him the only real gift i ever had worth giving anyone.
i try to tell myself i wasn’t wrong to care, to believe, to love. and the people of The Riders help to some degree. strong connections and to a one, they are such good people. i am often filled with wonder how many really good people i have met because of this.
but life doesn’t happen in a game, and even i don’t try to deny it. and in all honesty, a truly good part of my life, a part that has seen me through so much… is now in tatters. i don’t even know where to begin trying to restore it. all i know is that, as ever, i’ll be doing it alone.
i miss him. i miss all the good things of him, and oddly enough, i miss the bad things, too. i suppose that will sound strange. i always saw the best in him, even when he couldn’t see it, even when he was so insistent on only showing me his worst. he used to tell me that he wished i could see him at his best, i don’t think he ever knew it was that part of him that caused me to love him so.
i used to hope he could find the way to do the same. i know better now.
sorry. i didn’t mean this to be a dissertation on my sorrow. but i thank you for letting me share it. it helps.