I've written this post about a thousand times. Well, maybe ten.
In my head, this Dear John letter is pure poetry, but every time I try to put it to paper, it never sounds the way I want it to sound. It never says all the things I think it should. Plus, when it comes to quitting: I'm sort of notorious for changing my mind.
(It might be useful to play the video below... Go ahead: press play. I'll wait.)
My mind is made up now...
When this idea started, kicked off by the Kid, turned to reality by me, I never imagined anyone beyond he and maybe two friends would read it. In all honesty, I doubted even he would. Which he didn't, at least regularly: but that's okay.
Turns out, I loved the anonymity of type-type-typing into what I thought was an abyss. Turns out that abyss was ironically crammed with people like me. All of us, alone, waiting for the echo of our words and being surprised by the voices that bounced back -- voices which were not our own, but something different, someone different, someone...
This blog saved me in measurements only a small few will understand.
That small few might be large now, but for me... It meant a small circle of random women and men who collided at one time in one perfect space. Their stories, my stories: they became a mix that made for a perfect concoction in that one long, awesome moment. Their words, these people got me to go deeper inside my head and in equal parts, let me get outside of my head...
I am so grateful!
In May, I'll be featured in another one, Torn. (I hope you'll read it.)
My kids are becoming old enough to have experiences that aren't mine. I can't write about them in good faith anymore -- it seems uncouth and uncool. That being said, I am grateful for every inappropriate word I wrote here about them, and us, and our lives: I think I might like those words more than any of the pictures I took.
Right now, I want to write fiction and maybe, at last, the book I swore to the Kid and everyone else I would write. This does not mean that I'll stop telling my truth. I just want to start telling it differently.
I hope you keep telling your stories. I hope you keep speaking your truth...
Thank you for hearing mine. Thank you so, so much.
I've loved every bit of this.
Goodbye from PostPicketFence and the Three Short Drunk People and the Kid too....
"Pack the old love letters up...
We will read them when we forgot why we left here."
