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theory unsent letter

help

dear Friend, I like that moment of our phone call when I ask you if you need anything, if there’s something I could do for you, any way I could help.  Seems more important, now that we’re talking only two days a week.

Then when you asked me the same, what I need and how you could help me, I was moved.  Love flooded my heart.  “We’re doing healthy relationship,” I thought, a tender triumph.

But I was overwhelmed with ideas, to answer your question, what help I’ve wanted and needed from you, over the past year we’ve known each other.  What I wanted six months ago, what I want now, what I’m allowed to ask for.

How strong is this ship, anyway?  I don’t need to test that, asking for something I don’t even want anymore.  But all that was swirled together inside me, in the moment I could answer the question.

what I used to want

I wanted you to love me how I love you.  To prioritize me, cherish me, make time for me, make plans with me, invite me into your life.  Partly you did that.  I guess that’s the hard part, the partliness.

Once on the phone, I said I wanted to go there and visit you, see the special plants and sea life.  You said, “All in good time.”  Pushing me away, but with the possibility I could visit in the future.  But I think there will never be a place for me there.  You’ll never kick out your abusive girlfriend, so she’s taking up that receptor.  You can never welcome me.

I longed for your body, to make love with you.  You’re very pretty, but there are a lot of pretty people in this world.  Something about the light shining out of you.  Even from the beginning–on zoom, I moved the chatbox to cover your picture.  I wanted to look at you so badly that I couldn’t look at you at all.  My eyes weren’t capable of ignoring you.

In a breakout room, we talked–you were seeing me in a way that seemed uncommonly curious.  I got the feeling you were looking at me and actually seeing me.  Maybe I was wrong.  But that was the way I wanted to be seen.  Everyone initially dismisses me as irrelevant.  You honored me, strangely–you honor everyone.

language

I make a big distinction between pain and damage.  I’ve definitely been hurt by you, but not sure about damage.  Your heart is gold–you are a good person who wants the best for everyone.  But sometimes I’ve found you harmful because of what you won’t talk about.

I decided you’re emotionally irresponsible to the point of abuse, a few times.  I was full on anguished, told my friends what you were doing, and they were angry at your dudely avoidance of difficult conversations.  Some questions are really not ok to ignore.  You would continue to enjoy the goodness I give, but not engage the difficult stuff I needed your help with.

I don’t want to be critical.  But I need to know what’s happening, so I can make good choices that will help me on my life path, best for me and everyone who wants to do life with me.

If you’re casual friends with someone, there’s a lot you can just not discuss.  But once people are close, some things might need clarifying.  How do you know when you’re close to someone?  There’s not a chime that dings.  We’re always adjusting.  I wish you acknowledged we had become close and decided to treat me that way.  Later, you kind of did.

ten percent

I love you more than just about anyone.  I was there for you, partly living for you.  Ten percent of my heart was over there.  I knew what time it was for you, and I would have a sense of the activities of your day.  I know how you like your coffee, what you smoke, how many cell phones you carry.  The names of your siblings.  The names of your favorite two cats.

I don’t think you were doing that for me.  Some days I felt close to you and considered.  But you get swept up in what’s in front of you.

One day you and I were co-working, and you were going to complete a draft of a project you shared with me.  But someone approached you for help with a resume, and something else like that came up–rather than saying no to the person in front of you, or asking them to wait, you said no what you were doing with me.  I noticed more how your living in the moment was often at the expense of longer term well-being, and at the expense of me.

language

Language is what I most want–you’ll say “I have a lot of love for you,” but not “I love you.”  I wish I didn’t need you to tell me that you love me, but I do.  Around my birthday, we were talking on the phone–I said I love you, at the end.  You said, “I love–much love.”  That moment you caught yourself and interrupted yourself, to not say what I needed to hear–I’m still crying.

Also, so many pics of me, I’ve sent to you–probably a hundred.  “Lookin’ good,” is the best I ever got.  Was I really never beautiful to you?  What would I have to do, to be beautiful for you?  Not even a little bit?

Wear a crown of diamonds, adorn myself with a thousand flowers, apply make up?  Wear a pink dress?  High heels?  I kinda wish you would tell me how to be beautiful for you, but sadly, I would probably attempt to do it.

I would spend the rest of my life worshiping your body, if given the chance.  My entire being is the admiration of your beauty.  You are so beautiful–you are beauty.  So beautiful to me, you overwhelm my eyes.  You teach me what beauty is.  But that sentence from you, I do not deserve.

So it’s really unbalanced.  That’s what most hurts.  But when I ask about me and you, feelings, plans for the future, my questions are ignored.  I would give you anything I have.  You would give me a cookie.

divest

So then I think I don’t really matter to you, and I should find greener pastures.  Sometimes I’ve tried, to disconnect and shift my attention to people who want me more, and who can talk about it like grownups.  Once I was hurt by something you did, and I announced to two friends, “That’s it.  I am divesting.  He is getting nothing from me, anymore.”

So yeah, I decide that, but how can I divest from the best?  I had decided not to do a phone call.  My life was feeling good without you–I had to feel none of the pain, when you didn’t follow through with me.  I was no longer ten percent with you, doing my inner life a little bit with you.

It felt great to no longer need you, and you couldn’t hurt me anymore, by failing to do what you said you’d do, or not answering my questions, or some sick decision you made pertaining to your abusive girlfriend, announced to me with zero consideration for my response.  I panicked in the middle of the night, knowing she attacks you, but you choose to keep violence in your life, while not fully inviting me in.

Oh yes, love is scary.  Better to be hit, shoved, grabbed, threatened with a knife, and terrorized by the known quantity than throw open the gates and make yourself available to true love.  Love is supposedly your path, but ironically, you choose violence, as less of a risk.

But we don’t talk about that.  You never ask me, and if I bring her up in our conversation, it’s just heartache, fruitlessness, tears.  Nothing I say matters to your deepest life problems.  The moment you live in means you can’t hold the past and future in your mind.  So everything is sacrificed to the moment.  Yep, good luck with that.

phone call

I was going to cancel our phone call that week, because I was overwhelmed, and my life felt good without you.  I didn’t see a reason to invite chaos in.  Felt done.

Then I had that dream about you.  With all those animals, the dream felt really important.  The three big dreams I’ve had about you tell me that you’re more to me than an addict artist gardener, class clown joker fourth born on the other side of the country.

I feel God is telling me to stay close to you, love you, learn with you, and build reality with you, somehow together, in an inner world.  That could be untrue.  But I don’t dream about other people like that.  Whether it’s really God pushing me to you, or it’s time for me to deal with my trauma of growing up in a domestic violence addict household.  Or the sparkle in your eye, or your beautiful hands I want to kiss–who knows.

Just for now, I will continue to engage the mystery miracle that is you.  I can find no better wordplay, and I love so much of what you do.  Thank you for your friendship.  I’ve never successfully pulled away from someone like this, after falling in love with them.  I think we’re doing great adjusting and trying this out, how to be friends in a way that does not hurt me.

I would like if you told me I’m beautiful and that you love me.  It’s weird to me, you won’t.  Otherwise, I don’t really know what to ask for–I love you for who you are.  I want to help you do what you truly want to do, and be who you want to be.

If you truly want to be a dude who won’t say you love me or I’m beautiful, or have difficult conversations, go for it.  I’ve offered to help you learn to communicate better, and you never said yes!  Let me know if you ever change your mind.

thank me

I guess the thing I would like from you, that I think you could actually supply, is for you to thank me.  A month or so ago, I donated money to the recovery meeting house you go to, for sobriety help.  Probably you never saw I did that.  Would you thank me?

It’s because I want you to be happy and sober and have a good life.  Your well-being is everything to me.  You are everything to me.

hugs, Nest

By Nest

Curious, disabled Earth Goddess, telling the truth.

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