The Last Email (Again)

My Dear Little Boy,

I am writing to you from the highs of Castle Village.

Yesterday was my last email with him, the BiPolar Bear.  (Again).

There will always be another last, another final, another complete and permanent Good-Bye.

The circumstances are as follows:
He was alone in his apartment all last week, and the week before.
I had gone to the party, thanked him and we began writing (again) with some regularity.

Him:

I immensely appreciate all of this, I really do.  I read your e-mails carefully and sympathetically.  I guess I sometimes just don't understand what you want from me.  I don't know that I have any great insights or whatever to impart during any discussions.  The past year for me has been the worst in my life.  I have largely avoided people, even some who are very close to me.  I'm slowly recovering, but very slowly.  Mom's passing was a hit of the most imaginable sort and I've been concerned with getting my OWN head together.  I have had no energy to devote to other people.  Please understand that.  If you had met me first a few years ago, you wouldn't recognize me now.

I subscribe to your views about humans' being social and all that.

The next party?  No idea.  That one last week took a huge amount of preparation and effort, which is probably a big part of the reason that it rolled so well.  And it DID roll well.

Now that's a pretty long e-mail from [last name}, no?  : )

Me:

That IS a long email, THANKS!!!!

I guess all I want from you is  . . . this.  Words.  Conversation in person, when you are up to it.

No offense, but I don't expect that you are really especially brilliant or have any great insights.  And that's fine.  I expect you to be  . . . human.

He responded:
It will happen. I PROMISE.  In good time, it will.

Twice a week.  And then he wrote on Thursday.  And then on Friday.

I wrote him a note, asking to see him in person.  How, after all these emails, it would be better.  (More "normal", although I know he hates that word.  Maybe I was provoking him.)  Regardless, he did not answer.  He also did not tell me he was going out (which he usually DOES when we are in the middle of an email conversation).  He simply did not respond.  He writes back the next morning (happy cheerful) that he was out all night, left at 6am and was just returning.  And that he needed some sleep before going to the opera with his piano teacher.

As always, I am glad you are going out and socializing.  But you must see my side of things.

You tell me to be patient for our friendship; however, I simply don't believe you anymore.  Nor have I any reason to trust you.

This email thing is not normal or healthy; I must exist as something to bolster your male ego or something.  And the idea of that hurts me tremendously.

In fact, here's a challenge, a DARE. 

If you are sincere in your efforts, then *call* or *invite* me somewhere. In person.  Like normal people.  Invest some of this marvelous social energy in our friendship.

Otherwise, let's please stop this charade.  I have no interest in being friends with a computer.  Or an uptight robot (which you appear to be)   ;P

Last night, I came to the realization (again) about what a stupid game this is.

Very Sincerely,

Me

Then he wrote:
Oh, stop it.  I've really grown cold to these neurotic things.  This pisses me off.  Stop this, OK?

And I, fed up from the night before, decide I've had enough.  That the emails are not what I want.  Either a normal relationship or nothing.  And I choose nothing.  Because he is making me crazy.  And I have no room for that.  

It sounds like he intends for us to be in-person friends, no?  Granted, I'm a girl, but I've done everything I can to strip away sexuality from the equation.  

Humans are complex.  Conversations are as well.  I am recording this as much for my sake as for yours.  

PS Last year, something similar happened.  I walked away, almost relieve to have him gone.  And he wrote to me a few months later.  And invited me over (!!!) for two hours.  We listened to music.

And we had a normal conversation.  (And we have rarely had one since.)

PPS  I do count the relationship in HOURS.  As of this moment, maybe 15 hours total conversation (all the talking in the street-he ALWAYS shakes my hand and greets me with a warm smile) and easily 3000 emails.

PPPS If you are questioning me, don't worry, I question my own judgment.  What if he just does not want to be friends with me?  What if he is normal and I am "crazy"?  Yet, is it crazy to want to talk to someone in person?  I cannot use him as my point of reference.

Magic Elixir

(Sometime at the end of February)

My Dear Little Boy,

I gave it to him.  The Magic Elixir.  I had worked for it, I had been watching it for months in the tower of Castle Village.

My friend who plays Viola, the one who conjures teardrops from our eyes with her overgrown fiddle; the one who is damned to never hear how beautiful her notes are.  She had been rewarded with the FINEST oil by her master.  (He gave everyone in the orchestra the most expensive Olive Oil for Christmas, a beautiful bottle.  Named Lancaster?  Maybe?)

I watched as she poured it over her salads and could not taste it mixed in with all the other wonderful tastes.  Lost glory.

Prince Charming had told me repeated how much he and his Mother, The Little Queen, had adored the finest Olive Oil in the land.

I only hope it can help him.  And that it is all not too late for him.  (I am very slowly pulling away, it may be too late for me)

==
And now, two weeks later, he has told me, precisely:

Things here are pretty good.  Plenty of work and music and reading.  I've become obsessed with studying Anglo-Saxon/Old English and it's going easily (thanks to my German and Icelandic).


So perhaps he IS getting better.

I hope it is due to the Magic Elixir.

Or his own potions.  I thought to tell you fully, about the association between the spell he is under and how it is like the one that has seized your own mother.  I hope she is well.  We will see her in a few days; you will spend a week with her.

If I see her, I shall cry.  (I cry at the very thought.  I miss her terribly.  As you must)  

Snowy Orange Hat in the Park

Dear Prince and Snow,

I ran into you guys today in the park.  Just as if we were people living in the same neighborhood!

Dr. Charming, I noticed your orange hat with the wide brim first.  I noticed it had fallen and there was some snow on it.  When we were talking, I kept wanting to brush it off.

You both looked a bit dazed, but maybe it was just a matter of having cabin fever.  There was the Big Snowstorm yesterday, and we were caught in the communal sense of bewilderment that comes when you wander the first streets covered in white.  The trees were still slighted frosted, especially the large ones along where the garden usually bursts with color.  There was a huge brushstroke/eraser all over the park and it was fun to guess what things were taken from our sight temporarily.

I was out with my friend who breaks down walls with her viola.  Did I mention her trip and performance in South Korea?  You seemed a bit starstruck, which was sweet.  She's not used to fans. She's also slightly not used to me introducing my friends.  I wish she was more careful to try with people I like.  (I think you guys need a little tenderness lately).  The conversation fizzled out sooner than it should have, and I was sorry.

But I have decided not to struggle with your (plural) silence anymore.

I was glad to run into you both in the grocery store again.  Funny, like in April.  We talked; you both seemed to be shopping in reverse, putting things back on the shelves.  Complaining that the prices were too expensive.  Which they are.  I mentioned how spoiled I was by Fairway.  You mentioned leaving your car at your dad's.  (Right).   And you talked about going to get some fish from the fish place.  I got into my routine about complaining about not cooking because of my roommate-which I am trying to stop.  Both the complaining and not cooking.  I bragged about making soup.  Snow mentioned her tomato soup, seemingly asking for a compliment, but you were oblivious.  (Most of the time, I love how you two interact.  Comfortable and jokey with each other.  A good vibe, mutual and full of positive energy.  Good to be around, very good.)

==
Valentine's Day is coming up.  They are playing all manner of love songs on the radio.  Some of which I remember from when I was 14, knowing that I had love waiting for when I'd be grown up.  ("And I love you so" by Don McClean)

And although you made me feel so lonely, so lonely, when you said you wouldn't be in this city if you didn't have your wife, I disagree.  I disagree that the perfect love ideal should be modeled on just one person.  I do not have now (but perhaps I have waiting in the future) a singular romantic love like that.  I'm not saying it doesn't exist.

I just believe that Love is bigger than that.  I've loved music and The Boys since I was young.  Love had always existed in my life.  I hear it in my singing. I carry it with me and am careful to select people, art, memories that remind me of its existence.  It did not die with my Father.  And if and when I meet a single person that fits, when that person leaves, Love will not leave with them.

When I saw you two walking today, I didn't recognize you guys until you were close enough to see faces.  You seemed so sad, so quiet, so melancholy.  Even in the store, we talked, you smiled, you even made a joke.  (About me surviving on my prison food, which I got-but Snow was careful to make sure I didn't take it as an insult.) You talked about getting fish.  (You have a habit of already being on the run, I feel like I'm always stopping you as you are ready to pull away, but you always seem eager to turn back around)

I wish we were the kind of neighbors that --
I could go over to your apartment and knock on the door.
I could invite myself over for dinner.
I could understand what your home-cooking tastes like.
That I knew the sound of your laughter.
That I knew when you were in a bad mood and I should leave you alone, and when you are fully approachable and I could come up with an idea that you guys might actually be interested in.
I wish I weren't so shy-or hesitant-or wishing for things that you guys are not even thinking about giving to me.

You mentioned you were going to buy fish.  We were joking about how I survive on prison food.  Pita chips and water.  But I couldn't mention dinner.  Either you guys cooking or us just going out, casually.  I have consciously decided to stop trying with you guys.

Snow mentioned feeling like an orphan. During that other storm.

I have lots of love-simple, gentle, non-intrusive LOVE to offer.  I believe in being kind, even when you don't have to be.  I believe in listening to everything.  The big stuff and the little stuff.  And if you do that with enough people, when it is easy, you can have support when things are rougher.  That it is better to be sociable, when it is at all possible.  Better to be generous than cheap, better to help than not.  Better to talk, to struggle to put things into words, to COMMUNICATE.  Because this world is pretty fucking confusing anyway.

And there's lots going on under the surface.  (Especially with you, that I can never begin to guess at.  I want to talk about those messages you sent me that night.  Or if this is the type of friendship I can expect from you.  But I don't want to ask any Meta questions.  Nor do I want to bring up anything negative.  Which makes me feel less than honest.  Which gets me grumpy at you.  Then mad.)

I'm amazed at how Simple it was to talk to the both of you in person.  How little effort it actually involves, once we get going.  How YOU tend to take yourself so seriously (me too) and how all that stress dissipates so quickly. What a relief.

I liked so much when I thought you were self aware, and felt free enough to communicate to me.  That's a very important quality in a human to me. But you have been so silent for the past few months (since November?)

Tell you what.  My only goal when i talk to either of you, is simply to make you smile.  Or better yet, to have you get to a point where you smile or tell a joke on your own.  Is that not something to actively pursue?

==

Snow White reminds me of the lead singer of Innocence Mission. Which is a good, simple and lovely thing.  (Some similar qualities I see in myself).

Peace to both of you.  And please be happy.

Sincerely,
The Girl down the Hall