*I skipped #6 for a reason, and besides, I felt this one was fitting for you. Even though I got over you by the summertime, I held on to this letter for a while. Felt today was fitting though too, since it was an anniversary of the incident.

5.20.2019

To You,

I’ve barely known you, and already I’ve written you a letter to share with the world. I’m not sure if you deserve it. But it’s fine, you’ll never read this anyway— I don’t think you think about me much these days anyway. I just wanted to write this down and figure out why, out of all the other perfectly wholesome fish in the sea, I happened to be drawn to you.

      It’s not even like we had some magical first date that blew my mind or anything— it was so normal, and after that first meeting, I was sure that I’d never see you again.       

     We met on a particularly unremarkable rainy Tuesday night. You were 15 minutes early, and I was on time, but you said something that made me feel like I should’ve been there 20 minutes before you. We waited outside the restaurant for an hour anyway, watching the rain fall around us and making work jokes before we were seated inside. They put us right next to each other at the community table, which I took to mean as an omen. I’d always thought sitting side-by-side was a D.O.A  for a first date, especially on whatever we would’ve been. I was right.

      But, despite that, throughout the night I hung off every word you said. You talked about your hikes in the same excited way that I do, and I felt this instant kinship with you because of it. It’s a little thing, I know, but I hadn’t found that love for nature in anyone else I’d met yet. I felt lucky that we crossed paths, and that I’d finally met someone who loved road trips and adventures as much as I did. You talked about your friends like they were your family, in the same way that I do about mine, and you talked about your family with the same type of honesty as I do with my own. We both felt like we sometimes lived in a shadow of our siblings, but we loved them with our whole hearts anyway— and for a few minutes, I really thought we thought in the same frequency. Maybe I’m just romanticizing you, but for two very different people, I really liked the small nuances we had in common. The ‘bar’ for dating really was that low for me to like you too, which in hindsight is totally my bad—but still. I thought there was something different about you. I seem to always think there’s something different about everyone.

      You will go down as a love story I never got to have. One of a handful I’m embarrassed to carry in a life that’s barely even started, but perhaps my one of favorite stories to tell out of all of them. Besides, it’s great for parties, lol.

     I wish I told you how how gorgeous I think your eyes are, because I don’t think anyone’s told you enough. Or maybe they have, and you hear it all the time and I didn’t know that about you yet—who knows. Anyways, I wish I said it, because when you turned to look at me at the stoplight after our hike, the light hit your eyes in a way that made me completely forget what I wanted to say. I’d never seen a more beautiful combination of green. I have to go out into nature to find it, but your reminder of growth has been within you the entire time. Between seeing that and hearing how sad you felt about your place in the world, I just didn’t know how you couldn’t see what I saw in you.

     But you are more than just your gorgeous eyes. You are this incredibly imperfect combination of all the things I love about the world and all the things I fear about men. You would tell me about yourself, and on my drives home I would I simultaneously think about all the things you have in common with the men who’ve hurt me, and all the things that made me know that you and I were meant to meet. 

     But like most of the boys who’ve come in and out my life, you weren’t ready for me— and I get it. I’m just too much, too soon in your life, and too much of a burden that you don’t want to carry. I get it. I really do. I’ve heard it before. I know how much of a weight my baggage can be anyway. You didn’t need to remind me like the others did.

I’ve got three endings for how I want to complete your letter, but you’re not worth one of them, the second one was too mean for the world to see, so I had to land on this third one. I’ll start the end with the beginning of our end.

February 14th, 2019–

      We got dinner on Valentines Day, after you insisted, despite my fear of it being one of my favorite holidays. I was scared to put any pressure on whatever we were. But you insisted. So we did. And after work, you took me to sushi because it was your favorite— I skimmed the menu looking for something I could eat. I didn’t want to be too much, I could be quiet tonight, for you. And so, I ordered an avocado roll and hoped you wouldn’t say anything about the lack of meat in my diet.

       And I won’t lie, the dinner went really well! We were talking as comfortably as we normally did, and I gave you the little valentine I made you— a tiny shovel with a card that said “I dig you”, and I remember your laugh because you liked corny jokes as much as I do. Your ears perk when you laugh, I remember noticing that night and thinking it was adorable. And so, as far as I was concerned, the night was going really well. But joke’s on me— because I always think things are going well before they really aren’t.

      I’d like to believe that the best lesson I got from dating you, was the lesson I learned that night. After dinner, when we sat in my car and caught up on our plans for the week, and our next date— you changed the subject to talk about your ex. And then, you started crying. I was SO mad at myself, running through everything I’d said in the last few minutes, but then you started talking about how in the year it’d been since you last spoke to her, you were missing her more that day than any day. 

     In hindsight, I mean— the signs of the end were right there in my car clear as day. You clearly were not over your high school girlfriend, and I was dumb enough to begin to console you about it. I do NOT know what I was thinking. Here was a guy who I thought was so bright that it lit my life up, crying to me, in my own car, about his ex girlfriend, on Valentines Day. I mean, it could’ve been worse, for sure— but now I’m just mad at myself for thanking you for your vulnerability. I’m mad at the time I wasted letting us stretch on for a few weeks after that.

    Anyways, I think what made me lose respect for you the most, and what ultimately put you on the shitlist of people whose memory I wouldn’t want to carry with me anymore— was the way we ended. 

     On one evening, a few weeks after the crying-in-my-car-on-Valentines-Day thing, you texted me. We hadn’t been texting too much because you were traveling for work, and I’d almost fully convinced myself that phones just didn’t work in Texas. But yes, no, okay, back to the text— it was long, and it was direct, and in a few sentences you managed to not only tell me that I didn’t spark joy in your life, but you also cited your high blood pressure as a reason why you just couldn’t date anyone right now. Your high blood pressure. 

     And so, in my own true fashion, I sent you the longest message ever about how sorry I was that I wasn’t being bright or encouraging enough. I sent you another message about how I was sorry about your high blood pressure diagnosis, treating it like it was the most debilitating disease I’d ever heard of. My sister survived cancer, and I was out there trying to console you for your high blood pressure fears. I should’ve just told you to eat some garlic pills and get over it. UGH, WHY DID I TRY TO MAKE YOU FEEL BETTER IM SO STUPID!!!

     I don’t want to give you a letter longer than you deserve, because in the end, you were just like the rest of them. I will be fine, and you will be too, but I want you know that you suck for ruining the perfectly great Valentine’s Day I was having by telling me all about your ex and crying about her in my car. That was insensitive of me, I’m sorry. I suck too because you were just being vulnerable. But my guy, you were my first Valentine’s Day date in years, and the first guy I actually liked since Letter #2. Did you really have to do me like that?? You didn’t even know how much I loved celebrating love on that day. You didn’t really know anything about me yet. And now you won’t. And that’s okay. I’m just writing this to process what happened.

     Anyways, I hope you find your happiness. I hope you don’t Marie Kondo any other girls in your life like you did me, lol. And I hope that you find a love you deserve. I’m fine with being Marie Kondo’d by you, I really am. No one’s ever told me I didn’t spark joy in them before, so thank you for making my head shrink back down to its normal size. You gave me a good story out of it anyway.

Thank you, for more than you know. 

I’m thankful for the lesson that came out of meeting you.

From, 

Me