It is Thursday; while I have not done this in a while, I have been reflecting upon my life a lot in the last year. Today, I have the time to write this; after having read through some of my old “letters,” I believe I know what I want to say and to whom.

To: You
From: Me

I know you probably do not know I am writing to you, and that is my fault. I accept it, and I apologize for having made it so. I do not know how you feel about me; and, at this point, I have done everything possible not to know and not to let you know how I feel. I apologize for that too.

I am in a good place in my life right now: not an easy place, but a good place. I have come to that place where dreams and reality converge and you can choose what you want to become real. The place where you can make any dream come true, if you believe that the reality can be as good as the fantasy. However, I am a realist; I leave dreaming for when I sleep, and fantasy for when I am reading. But I am also an optimist. I have two rules: “never quit” and “there is nothing you can’t do.”

There are many reasons I am writing a “letter that I’ll never send” to you, again. One, I am afraid. That seems self-explanatory, but there is more to it. I am not afraid of rejection, though the possibility exists. I am afraid of loss, pain, and getting more than I give. Might seem strange, but those are my biggest fears in the least possible words. Two, fear. Yes, the same as “one” and yet different. It’s more like terror. It is paralyzing and overwhelming, and it keeps me from saying what I truly want to say and how I truly feel; I seem to be at its mercy. This overwhelming emotion seems to force me to keep you away. It forces me to create distance that I don’t want.

At this point, I am taking back control over my life. For too long, control was in the hands of circumstance and the past. Now, I am slowly and steadily taking back what I had and moving forward with my life. It has been at a standstill for too long.

It has been an arduous journey; it is not over. It is not easy to acknowledge things that are painful, and sometimes traumatic. It is very hard to battle yourself everyday and constantly win. It is possible, however. I have been at the bottom of the deepest hole I could have ever imagined; I have dragged myself out of it and forced myself to stay away from it. It takes more than determination; it takes defiance and perseveration. Even when I don’t feel the need to push, I must because failure to do so means losing ground, and that is unforgivable.

Maybe one day I will tell you about my journey. I have alluded to it before, but never really told you about it. Even when we knew each other, I was going through its beginning and I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want it to change the way you saw me. There is the possibility that you knew; if that is the case, thank you – because you were then a good and understanding friend.

You have always been a good and understanding friend. I am truly grateful for that, to life and to you. I cherish my true friends. Unfortunately, even true friends grow apart, and some will come and go through our lives. I hope that is not the case with us. Truth is: I hope we will try to be more than friends, because you are more than a friend to me.

I am sorry I didn’t see it when the time was right. I am sorry I didn’t acknowledge it when it was all too clear to me but I didn’t want to see it. I am sorry I was not a better friend, a better person. I am sorry I didn’t give you what you asked for just because you didn’t say the exact words I needed. I am sorry I said all the wrong things, and made you at any time think that you were not as important to me as you are. I am sorry I made you think there was someone else, or that you were replaceable. I am sorry I have never once told you that I love you.

I do. At least, I did. Because, we are now the next closest thing to strangers. I don’t know you now any more than you know me, though we are likely intrinsically the same as we were. I’d like to meet you again, and get to know you again, and be friends again, and see if we can be more. Then again, as much as I don’t believe in wishing, I wish that I could just send you this letter, that I could just tell you all this.

Remember that place at which I currently stand? It’s a crossroads of sorts, a place where the past, the present, the future and dreams meet. It’s a place where you can embrace who you are and who you want to become and what you want from life, and just go for it. On the other hand, it is also a place where you can see every wrong step that you have ever taken and likely will take; where you can acknowledge that fantasy and reality are separate and distinct; that we all fall and fail at some point and that it is those falls and failures that give us our best attributes, if we let them. It is a place full of possibilities; it makes you want to jump while it terrifies you because you can end up a splatter on the asphalt.

I am working it. Working on embracing who I want to become and what I want and where I want to be. I know who I am; I might have forgotten for a short while, but I was blessed with knowing who I was when I was very young. I am Christina, just me – no more or less. That’s all I have ever wanted to be, just me.

I never imagined I’d want to be me with someone else. Not once before we met did I think that was something I would want in my life. I was me with you, all the time, from the beginning, without trying. I was awkward, argumentative, clueless and never got the punch line. That’s me. I am smart, confident, persistent, an avid reader, complex, multifaceted, frustrating, unyielding in my principles, non-conforming, easily bored and engaged, unquenchably thirsty for knowledge and I don’t understand people and have never claimed to do so. I also seem somewhat distant and aloof, though I am just watching and listening and trying to understand people, who make as much sense to me as quantum physics. I hope you too were yourself with me; you are not any less complex than I am. As far as I am concern, the facets of you I have seen are brilliant.

I don’t ever want to lose my friend, but I feel like in trying to keep you in my life I have lost my old friend. But, what is more, I have lost the opportunity to have my friend be more. We could have been more than this. Maybe we still can. It is up to you, though I know there is much for which I have to make up. I know it is not fair of me to say “it is up to you”; nor is it fair to not send you this.

I’ll get there, even if it seems too late. There is no “too late,” just as there is no “later.” It is always “now”. We all live with the consequences of our choices, good or bad.

Love,
Christina