For these 2012/2013 holidays, I went home for 2 weeks. I could've been drinking and partying like in my previous years. I did nothing like it. I just wasn't in any mood to do any of that. I spent a lot of time with my parents, a lot of time with P. and a lot of time with myself. Days have gone fast. I came across some of my old boxes because my parents need to be moving from one house to another and I had to go through a lot of my stuff to give away, bin or keep. I came across letters from an old boyfriend of mine, G. Evading his letters from when I was 15-17 was .... Heartbreaking, shocking and weird. I am finding myself in the same situations, the same thoughts and the same reactions as when I was 15. Instead, I am now 28... And I feel that I am going around in circles. I am badly trying to understand why and what's gone wrong and when.
Below, I have translated some of the stuff G. was writing to me, a 15-16-17 year old girl, living 400km away when he was 8 years older at 23-24-25. The difference was huge. I am not sure how much of what he was saying made any sense to my chicken brain back then. But emotionally, I don't seem to have grown up since then.
"Why are you saying that you would like to destroy all that you are, in one second, along with everyone around you? (...) you are strong A., stronger than you think. But this means nothing if you lose the faith in yourself. Take a look at yourself for a moment, beyond what you are every day. Look at yourself through my eyes and make them yours, always. (..) I hope this state of mind that you're in has already passed by now, by the time I am writing this letter but if it hasn't, you must search within yourself what is making you have these thoughts. Let me be part of your self discovery. Share with me whatever you find. (...) please love life just as much as you love me, feel what is around you and don't let anything get you down. (...) they say happiness is within your reach, you just have to reach out and grab it. Is this all the anger that you feel because you can't have me with you?
[...]
Beyond the prison of our love, a prison that I long for and in which I would spend not only one, but every life that I would have, is the life that we all love so much.
[...]
You must forgive the love of this fool that is too blind to see you in your greatness. I can feel you inside my soul. You are my dream. And I will hold you until the end. Because without you, I don't know how my life would be.
[...]
Oh my god, A., life is so beautiful mostly because you are in it, mostly because I love you, you feed my dreams and my soul.
[...]
Through you, I can see beyond the present time. Maybe you are more, maybe you are just a once in a lifetime miracle.
[...]
Sometimes. I can't believe what is happening, it all seems unreal. Yet everything is just as perfect as it should be.
[...]
I am finding myself in every word that you write. Your thoughts, your emotions, they are also one. I feel as if we are a whole, beyond any idea of having what is yours and what is mine. This is why it is strange. I am finding myself in the freedom of your love and there is no boundary to my soul.
[...]
Why are you saying that you're always watching out for people or things to prove you that life's a bitch? Would you feel much better if someone/something proved you right? Why can't you understand that everything is as we want it to be?
[...]
Someone was saying to me once, don't fight with life because it's an unfair fight. You throw everything you've got at it and all life does is it throws you back at yourself.
[...]
I don't know if I will ever be wise enough to love you as you deserve to be loved, to keep you with me despite all the challenges life throws at you. I can only smile and love you. Just the way I dreamed of. Just the way I've always wanted to.
[...]
I've been waiting for you all my life and I've always known that somehow I will find you.
[...]
We have never spoken about the things that might affect both of us. This thing with your dad has affected you so much and has changed something in your soul. (...) everything that your dad does, because he is your dad, affects you. I understand that you don't want to judge him, his reasons or lack of them. But whatever is happening with your parents I don't want it to affect us. I don't want to lose you for a mistake of your father. And please, even if you don't want to forgive him, then please don't let it cast a shadow over your soul. Because it's not worth it. You could say that I want to protect us, to protect myself. Partly. But you are the one who matters. For me. So don't let yourself carried away, not this time. You're saying that you lost everything that you started to believe in. Everything that you found in yourself since you met me.
[...]
And if you want a cigarette so bad, why don't you start smoking properly? Am I disappointed? You can't. Not for this much. There are very few things that you could do to disappoint me. But do you really care? Does it really matter? I still love you A., and you can't change that. The rest is up to you what you do. Remember in the park, you told me I can't make any demands or claims? I wish I could have more time with you. I wish.... But I have to settle for less. And I do. Nothing is really settling when it comes to you.
[...]
You said in your letter that you're praying to god to give us both strength. I now realise that you are,A., a reason I would ask God something for myself. I would ask for you.
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I believe that if there is a way to weight up someone's strength of character, one method is to measure the strength to say the truth, no matter how much it hurts. No matter the cost.
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I would like for you to have the power to see life as it is: uninvolved/detached, to know to enjoy it but also laugh at it. And don't forget that someone believes that you want to do something with your life.
[...]
I am, still and will be yours, in ways that you can't even think of yet."
Reading pages and pages, hundreds of pages of all the most beautiful love declarations in the world, the sort of soppy stuff that you only hear in the movies and think you will never have a man in your life to tell you these things, in such a perfect way. And yet, here I am ... Cynicism is the first observation that I can make. Then.... Is just misunderstanding of myself. Did I not read those words properly? Did I not understand what they meant? Did I never feel the true power of most of them, like I feel them now, burning through me? Was I too young? Was I un-able? Would I even know what to do with all that, even today, 13 years later?
Reading these letters I can see myself disintegrating, hating myself, feeling guilty because I started seeing other people, because I was trying things out and because I started self-destroying. It's the same pattern. How can I be following the same pattern, the same thoughts and the same behaviour like 12 years ago? Oh my god, I was a teenager, people grow out of it. And G's words, all of his words despite me talking to him about other guys and about how horrible I am, his words as just as beautiful and just as hurtful so many years later. I forgot how amazing and maybe so much better than me he was at writing. How he was taking his strength from all our things and how I was getting further and further away.
I am doing the same thing now. It's hurting me. Whatever I've got inside me, it's stopping me from being able to develop and be in a long term relationship with another partner. Reading those letters made me realise how deep and how far back my problems go. I don't know where to go from here. How do I address them?
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