Internet Friends

My (almost) friend,

It feels different to write you a letter even though (as of yet) our communication still stems solely from our fingertips.

But there is something wonderful about communicating here, inside the wide umbrella of Internet. I always imagine it like Santa's workshop within a large clockwork factory-- as soon as I hear that satisfying click, my words are off! Speeding through the frantic underworld at megabytes per second, narrowly missing tiny elves and eluding the occasional gremlin in the works.

You are so far removed from everything around me, it's easy to imagine a labyrinthine complex between us. And so each time I receive more from you it means our words have found a way to exist and to survive our combative worlds. Basically it means you haven't forgotten me for the spoils and triumphs of the dreaded 'IRL'.

And more than that, it is glorious. We sit atop computer chairs of gold and memory foam and declare ourselves. Our size is whatever we imagine, we are entities solely made up of words.

I will choose to be a microcosm.

A sub-genre of obscurity on the fringe of your cognizance.

And I will choose to be no size at all.

So that I may infiltrate you at any level and no physical boundary may preclude me.

And I will choose to be all-encompassing.

Bigger than your whole imagination, so I can swallow you whole and fill you up until my own words trickle out of your indents.

Until your spacebar is my heartbeat.

I like the idea that a turn of phrase can be a turn of hip, or cheek, or some abstract polygon of anti-flesh. That I can build myself into a sea of letters that still somehow carries what, and (if it can be answered) who I am in essence.

When I cease to be this virtual claim, and regain my status as a flesh-and-blood girl again, I hope that you still like it. Still like me.

Are we the same? Which will my screenname evoke?

Names are a different kind of word.

When people say "who are you?" you say it, instinctively.

And maybe it represents all you are, but maybe it's simply a collection of letters with a vaguely pleasing sound that someone thought up once while drunk on life and high on the power of word creation...

Mine means more than words to me, is more than even they are capable of. And the only way to make you see that same inherent worth is to use all of my words (all the silent ones too), until you know who I am.

Until you know the most important word in my life.

I know that there can never be just one-- words only flow when they collide.

And that is part of the wonderfulness, that something can exist with so much potential but realize none of it without another. It's gorgeous and cheesy and speaks to my insides.

For now I am glad to know the you made of words, and fascinated by the process of learning more. I will continue to revisit the common clichés of meme, and link you to weather.com until something real falls through the cracks of this crazy-beautiful phenomenon--

Internet friends indeed.

Yours, Truly.

And Now For Something Completely Different

"To Scale"

My littleness is not one-sided.

It pervades my every dimension, it colours my movement, it informs my mannerisms.

I live a little life.

But the slow pull of melancholia is double the gravity,

And the hole in my stomach echoes more times than a can in a canyon.

My raging pulse is an mad drum reaching a wild crescendo and that damn trickling fear

just sits in wait like an icicle

over my fragile spine.

It makes me wonder... Are my feelings immense?

Or do they only overwhelm me because I am... small.

Am I the only one?

I have compared myself to a moody ocean.

Sinking ships in the bay,

I beckon with the lulls and dips between waves,

Before the storm hits, and the sky admits--

it's just for show.

Pathetic fallacy calls for stormy skies, despair prefers straight pain.

My friends, you take your thunder-- I'll bring the hurricane.

Other times, I have cited a star--
A cosmic release, a bug in a jar.

Up and away from these notions
The motion of the ocean, and the commotion of
emotional turmoil.
There is a fire, making it's home in my bones, burning the marrow till tomorrow,

running on midnight oil.

You're too distant to see how it burns in me,

and the colours bleed;

There's a disconnect in my constellation.

My littleness is not one-sided.
But neither is my greatness.

The Scientist

Dear Sir,
The evidence is as follows:

I have never been normal. The days of wanting to change that are long gone, but you make me feel like I could be... stable. Like everything is just a little bit easier than I thought it was. I've been struggling at things that can just... be.

You make me feel real, like a real person. And for years I’ve been living like that’s not me: like rules don’t apply to me, like other people aren’t speaking the same language as I am. It feels like I’ve been trying to communicate with crude charades without getting through, until now.

When you feed me, I feel cherished. My parents fed me for my entire life and never made me feel like this. At dinner every night I am warm inside, from more than the soup.

But you also care about me— not just for me with meals or homework help. You care about me with private telling glances and appropriately-placed worrying. You care about me with early morning wake-ups and late night (occasionally comatose) cuddling sessions.

I never know how to say the things brewing inside me, but you make me want to. You make me want to tell you everything, and not just the stuff I know you want to hear. You make me search for myself and turn what I find into words.

You teach me so much. Not only with the astonishing array of facts you carry around in that head of yours, but with the way you live. You teach me to be better, to be kinder, to think more and to try harder.

You show me a man that I could love— if love were an acceptable, operationally defined term, that is. But if it is never defined, how do we know we aren't missing it?

What if that sleepy smile you give me over oatmeal and chocolate milk, and the kiss you leave smouldering on the back of my neck when you go to work is—

What if the comforts of my embrace as you shift between nightmares, or the purposefully neglected silk I leave home in favour of your discarded clothing is—

What if it isn't? I'm much less prepared to accept that.

In conclusion, I love you.
By default, by design, if not entirely by definition.

Let's redefine.

Yours, Truly.

My Childhood Room

I didn't think I could do it... leave you behind for good...

I remember the slumber parties, sometimes me and a friend, sometimes just me and you. And either way, I'd be up much too late, singing or giggling or reading like a fiend.

I remember when I was scared, when the world was crumbling under the weight of adult-sized yelling. You held me in your four compassionate blue walls and hid me from what I couldn't understand yet... when you could.

I remember living in you, and feeling so relieved after a hard day to sink into your depths and finally take a full breath...

When I saw your new face I balked... You are blindingly shiny, brand-spanking new-- showing me what I'll be missing, I get that. I'd do the same in your position, get repainted into a weak facsimile of cheer. But Butter Yellow was never a good colour for us...

I didn't want this to be goodbye, forever... but that's the way things have to be. It's not up to us anymore. It never really was.

Stop. Just Stop. Don't give me that blank-wall stare. Just listen:

I just came to get my things and move on with my life, just a little more broken... but you stare accusingly with all the ire 27 beanie babies can muster. You've shed my paintings and greet me, bare-assed bare-walled, showing that if I don't need you to hold me, you don't need me to fill you up.

But someone is going to love you, and soon.

It is time, to let go of this petulance, and start to forget this heartache.

Let us say goodbye like lovers do. Lingering; soft words and violent passion in turn.

I'm not leaving you to be cruel, I need you to know that.

Just because there is no room left in my life, doesn't mean my room is gone from my heart...

Yours, Truly.

Goodnight moon, goodnight room.

Goodnight books, at least I'll see you soon.

Goodnight desk in blue and white.

Goodnight lamps with coloured lights.

Goodnight glowing, stick-on stars.

Goodnight to the sound of cars.

Goodnight closet, goodnight air.

Goodnight always, just know I care.

To Melancholy

Hello my old friend. Have you come to stay again for a time?

I want to say I've missed you, but that's not quite the right thing to say. When you're gone I don't usually spend my time thinking about your cold hands, and if I do, you always seem to know and simply show up at my doorstep. Like tonight.

I will just say, I am glad to see you.

...But again, that's not exactly true. I am not glad, I am immersed in you. I am lonely and introspective, my mind is waxing poetic and my voice is silent, the world is an installation painted infinite shades of grey.

But I finally get to take the time to appreciate the variation, the wide spectrum of individuality found in a single gloomy cloud.

Or to reflect on how lonely it must be to be a snowflake, lost in a melee of other grey faces that we like to pretend are white. Anonymous in the crowd, surrounded by other snowflakes yet entirely solitary, the only one of your kind...

You're looking well... or unwell. You're looking down. But I suppose so am I, when we're together. Lost in my head and in the beauty that blooms everywhere. Everywhere but here, in my heart's sleeping garden. Waiting on the sunshine of a smile, you help me to plant the seeds that will grow into wonder, gratitude and insatiable thirst for more beauty, more sadness... more life.

And not the "life" you see on television sitcoms where there's always a funny quip to solve your problems... Real Life. Real in-your-face-hardships-may-or-may-not-make-you-stronger-teeth-bared-heart-on-sleeve-blood-sweat-tears-and-passion Life. Fuck yeah.

That's why I love you-- even as you take me in your cold gripping embrace. Even as you erase the smile from my eyes and replace it with cool and detached appraisal. You make the good days good, because I know I've earned them. You make colours brighter, because I know what it is to go without. You make my heart bloom into an Eden that far surpasses what I could do alone.

Because there is good and bad. Light and Dark. And I won't hide from it, won't hide from you.

You make me stronger; when you push me down into the depths of misery's arctic pools, I am swimming, pushing, kicking for my life, and learning to do it harder every time... Because breaking the surface and taking that gasp of fresh air, basking in the joy of sunshine and making my way to the shore is better than having stayed dry. Better than warm and safe and boring.

Better than ignorance.

I guess I can do without bliss.

I'll forget utopia for even a taste of Real Life.

And that's on you.

Yours, Truly.

Le Premier Abord.

Firsts; you can be beautiful, educational, cruel.

My beginning was not for me—my first steps, my first words, my first injury. They were for my parents; to show them my growth, to reassure them of their good parenting and to remind them how very delicate a life is. How delicate my life is.

Next it was my turn for some revelation and along came my first day at school, my first bully, my first crush. And I learned that being different isn't easy, that not everyone is going to like you, that learning could ignite my passion...
and that boys are stupid. And so are girls.
But they are both pretty great.

And as I grow, I collect more and more of you: first time I got drunk, first time I thought I was in love, my first apartment, my first driving lesson, my first car accident, first time I had sex, first time I had sex outdoors, my first vote in a federal election, my first surgery...
The first time I thought I might die... right there on that hospital bed.

I needed to learn my mortality too. Learn how delicate I am... learn how fucking strong I am.

I needed to know that good comes around but so does bad and both make you live harder... if you're smart.

I needed to know that people come and go in your life and the most important person to love is yourself. Even when it feels like someone else is your whole life... which would be a first for me.
I guess I learn fast.

Some people live their lives afraid that they will run out of firsts and be left with only higher denominations of "been there, done that".
I am not afraid. I will not hoard my experiences; lock them inside little boxes of achievement to prove who I am and where I came from.

I will wait, and one of these days, this stage will end. Firsts will once again stop being for me, and start being for us— whenever I find someone to be an “us” with me, of course.
We can explore them together, the triumphs and mistakes and unpredictable staggering blows. We can be human, and act like we’re children, and live like we love being alive— because that’s important.

And one day I will watch my baby smile for the first time, and know for sure, as I've known in my heart... that life will never, ever get old.

Yours, Truly

PS. After writing this, the word first has lost all meaning.... the down-sides of repetition.

Old Clothes

I'm writing to you all today because I think we need to talk.

We've known each other a long time and the fact is, I've grown out of past you. We had some great times but it's been a long time since you made me look feel desirable.

I have loved you longer than you deserve, and kept you around because of the good times we had and the great memories we've made... but the time has come, and you're falling apart I'm holding you it together. So smarten up!

I will always remember the feel of you on my skin-- covering me up, keeping me warm. I almost want to keep you, but I know deep down it's just to avoid throwing you out losing you. I might need you one day! For a... who can dress like a toddler contest? To plug holes in my roof? I need to be realistic, and also I need to be fair to you. You could be out there being loved by some fashionless tween, being celebrated as I once celebrated you.

It's time, for someone else to love you. To fill you out up with their insecurities and dreams. You've remained empty, sitting in the background of my closet for far too long and it is time for you to get out there and live until you wear yourself out.

It's not you, it's... well yeah it is. But I'll still miss you in spirit.

But really, corduroy floral?!?! What was I on??

Yours, Truly

Curls

Smother me, I can take it.

There are worse ways to die than tangled up in you.

Not a restraint, merely a disguise, a tantalizing display of plumage.

Not a fire, though you make me ignite.

Not a drop of cold ocean, but a dark sea of curling delirium.

There is gasping for breath and a fair amount of sensory deprivation, but I'd never complain. To breathe even for a moment this sweet clean scent; to see just a glimpse through this tangled canopy-- it's enough. I'd much rather be here, in the forest, watching the wildlife do its thing.

Out there are complications, salutations, social mitigations... I want to smile for hello, and to throw polite out with every single elastic I've acquired.

Why quell this sweet madness? You deserve to be celebrated.

Tell Rapunzel never to let you down again.

Tell her to let you free.

Yours, Truly.

Romance Novels

Dearest Friend(s),

I glow with happiness that you grace the earth with your presence. I crave your strong text to whisk me away. We'll elope to far off lands, where I get to be sexed up the princess, the lady, the heroine... Instead of the undergraduate student, the ungrateful daughter and the listless insomniac. You take me, as I love to be taken.

I feel the anticipation building, longing to run my fingers up your spine. I hold you close, clutching your sides, as I look at you--into you. Penetrating deeply, and grasping what is inside. At your climax I gasp for breath, breasts heaving I struggle to take it all in. Then the dénouement-- I lie quivering on the bed soaking it all in, just taking in your soft and comforting words.

You tell me what I want to hear and I love you for it.

Your decadence is comical to some, but my fluttering heart disagrees.

I want you-- every word, every inch. The thicker the better.

Yours, Truly

PS. this might have been one giant "that's what she said" joke... who knows.

Oh My Love

My Darling, I've hungered for your touch. A long lonely time... approximately exactly one year. How have you been?

There's been a lot of gossip about you lately. The usual things: you're not a real holiday, you're never good enough, you're just commercial, and you don't care about people's real feelings. I know they're just rumours. You've never tried to hide what you are--

A chocolate lover, a flower lover, a lover.

Haters Gonna Hate. But why hate on something that we all need?

You don't need to be dressed up, glittered and glammed over the tippy-top (as people seem to anticipate) to be beautiful. A simple word, or a hug, a call home to Mom and Pop-- those are the things that make you so worthwhile and wonderful to me. The humble appreciation for everyone we care about is an important thing that often isn't expressed enough. You give us that kick in the pants we need.

So thank you, Valentine's Day, for telling me what I want to hear.

I love and appreciate you too.

Yours, Truly.

________________________________________

Ps. I also just really love excuses to give out handmade cards, I'm bad-ass with a pair of safety scissors.