I don't know which greeting to even use to start this email. Do I use "hello", "hi", or "greetings"? Are we that friendly? We haven't talked in a while so do I put myself out there and extend the olive branch "missed you", "sorry we haven't talked in a while", or "how have you been"? We still have a business relationship so do I adress you by one of your many titles, Mx., "Dear", or just your first name? I am writting you because I have a lot to say. I don't even know where to start.
I want to rebuild. No, I want to tear what we had down. Everyone keeps telling me it was\is toxic. That you are toxic. At first I didn't believe them, I was blinded by my love for you. Then a few to many heart aches later, I didn't want them to be right. We look at each other and I wonder if we actually see the other person? I didn't. I don't know if I can look at you without also me? I see so much of myself in you. So when they say you're poison, that means I'm poison too. I couldn't find a way to seprate you from myself. Then after you ran away from me a few more times, I was confused. How could I stand here, vulnerable, open, but standing my ground and you couldn't? I started to see all the "differences" between us. When you were scared I was brave. When I stood strong you ran because I saw you as weak. I the divide was very apparent when you were mad about black lives matter shutting down pride. I accepted my feelings and you tried to hide, down play, kill, and supress yours (unsuccessfully). You settled into suburban white picket fence gay hetero normative cis domesticated life. I started to listen to my friends, even through they don't know you. They don't understand you and they are very bais against you. I listened to them even through they didn't know me like you do. It got easier and easier to just blame you. To say you were the one at fault and I was the righteous one. It got so easy to be the loving martyr, the person who didn't know how to stop loving, the one who never ran out of forgiveness, and the one who saw redemption in you when everyone else just wrote you off as a lost cause. To everyone else I was hopelessly trying to save someone who would always take advantage of my kindness. You were the monster. We had enough history, and everyone could see you love me when you look at me. Everyone, even those closest to you believed me when I told them. I told every boyfriend I met, except the current one. They all sided with me. I told them its not your fault, you were really a great person, and that they were lucky to have you. You just couldn't love me back. What a fairy tale monster they began to see. Misinterpreting my therapist is what really did it though. She said I was better than you. I deserved better than you. I told my best friend and asked him who's better. "If I'm too good for them, than who's better? Gandhi? The Dali Lama? Obama? I think Michelle would be upset with me." He said "Break up with them and find out. Steer clear of Obama though, I've seen Diaries of a Mad Black Woman." That was the last straw. I flew to break up with you. I had to always be the one who was right, and one breaks up with people in person.
One thing I didn't think of until you ran away from after we broke up, was that I'm toxic too. You left your home, your responsibilities, and an event you loved, just to avoid seeing me for 5 days. I didn't see it at first, who bales on CC last minute? Why? Then I remembered, I'd already done that, Denver. I know what you're feeling. I've felt that. I have lied to you about my life, just in different ways. I still don't trust you after all these years. I don't communicate either. I stay angry for months, all you get is radio silence. Then I come back like I haven't just shut you out and everything is fine. I could just tell you I'm upset just like you could just tell me you love me. But we don't, we pull away, we run. We are broken and sometimes we hurt each other with our sharp edges. I was so caught up in being the winner, the good one, that I never thought about how I was hurting you. So wrapped up in my pian I didn't see that I have hurt you. I didn't even see the pain until now. I have never apologized for all that. Despite the pain, when I was done, you were the one to have faith.
We were making progress. The distance, whether we like it or not, was and still is probably the best part of our relationship. It allows us to heal and think. We both hate confrontation, but hate being shut out even more. If we lived closer to each other their would be a lot less confrontation and in the lot more avoidance. The distances gives us the ability to justify when we shut each other out. The distance meant I couldn't just come over and talk to you, not that I would have. It meant we had to sit down, compose our thoughts, and then write them out. We didn't really say things we didn't mean in our writing. We were slow about it. We were slow about everything, that is also a good thing, now that I look back. We built up trust, something neither of us give lightly. I felt like every time we trusted each other a little more, we were really giving each other more rope to hang ourselves with. Hang myself I did. We were in each others mind. We both know, walls can keep most out, but we are engineers. There are few feats we cannot conquer. Walls are child's play for us. We both though made fortresses in our minds. We thought we were impenetrable. Great minds think alike, but fools rarely differ. Where we so smart we came to the same conclusions or so complacent with our pain that we adhere to the same rules? Anywho, you already know how to get into something you've already built. We never pushed though. The understanding that we would come around in our own time was mutual. When we caught the other in a lie we just went along with it, like we didn't know it was a lie. We didn't always know the exact truth, or why the other lied but we never forced the issue. I loved having that faith. That even though you have a key, you will wait for me to invite you in. We also started saying more of what needed to be said. We stopped watching idely, we were always there for emotional support, waiting to be called on. We started saying the hard truths. We knew what action would be easy to take, but we also knew which one was right, no based on one's specific selfish gaols, but based on the others long term motivations. Even if it would not bring me closer to you, if you thought it severed my long plan, Amoriartii, you would tell me what I needed to do. I did the same for you, even when I know you didn't want me to. When we burn it all down, I want to salvage the good things.
If we can't salavage the good after its all been wiped clean, then I want to build better. We need to heal. We need to heal separately. I know second chances really don't exist. Life's not a video game, you can't just start over. We carry our history with us. But instead of a uhaul can we try only bringing a small carry on back to this. I'm not trying to minimise our history but I don't want to drown in it either. In a perfect world, our history is reformed as lessons "textbooks" we take with us and can look through when we are trying to find answers to current problems. I need to learn to trust, not lash out (or run away) when I'm hurt, to communicate, not to take out my pain on others, to forgive, let go, to see you for you, and to listen even when I don't like what's being said. I can't force my process or yours. I've been learning patience believe it or not. Though I'm not completely competent in it yet, I'll be here. I have no clue what life has in store for us. I don't know if you still want me in your life. Someone once said " We're like fusion and fission. Life keeps pulling us apart and putting us back togther..." At somepoint we have to stabilize right? I hope that we end up in one another's life somehow. I don't make promises I can't keep, you know how I feel about promises. I promise I won't give up faith unless you ask me to.
XOXOXOXO
J Skittles
I can't send this letter because Amoriartii asked for space. I have to honor that. Also this doesn't really address any of the messed up things they did like complaining to me, a Black person, that Black Lives Matter completely ended the pride parade in their city. A city where the Queer POC population is overwhelmingly the majority, yet the parade itself is 90% White. They have been complaining about another board member owing the money from 2016. The board member in debt is the poorest person on the board and lives below the poverty line. Amoriartii has 2 full time jobs and isn't hurtting for money at all. Finally, what brought me to break up with them, excluding all the external factors, they lied. I made one rule: don't lie to me I'd rather have you say nothing then lie. They lied about being in love with me. They said they weren't and they are. I don't lie either I evade or not answer but I didn't lie. So do we hate each other? Probably not. Do we love each other? I'm not sure. Is there pain here? Absolutely. Is there joy, bliss, happiness, and glee here. There use to be but it's been a long time! Does the joy out way the pain? I pray to God it does.
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