I’m a writer and I’ve written my fair share of love letters. Reading many of them again, there’s an air of wishful and wistful rather than sensual or sophistication. Partly that’s because as opposed top fiction it’s real life and I’m big on everyday appreciation and showing it in a variety of subtle and overt ways.

I think perhaps, my impressions are colored by knowing the relationships didn’t work out, and I’ve just colored your reading of this, which isn’t and wasn’t a love letter at all. In fact, this could be characterized more as a letter along the lines of, I’m pretty sure this isn’t working but damn I’m curious as to why because you’ve never actually told me.

Before I finish crumpling up this first page and tossing it away, here’s this, circa late 1997. It’s to a person who I was long term friends with and still am. During a summer we also had sex and slept together, often:

XXYYXXYY,
The very first thing I want to do with this letter is express my apology and regret for whatever words of description I put together which caused you such discomfort.

In thinking of that lapse moment a chill runs up my back. Words are powerful and I can’t even think of pushing you away by using them carelessly.

I don’t remember what I wrote, but I am sure I had no intention of provoking disapproval. With that in mind I obviously made a misjudgment. I am very sorry and I hope it is a mistake small in measure compared to the activity of other people who have let you down. The rest of this letter is formed around this idea of how I could make that and other errors of judgment.
(DEEP BREATH)

By leaps and bounds I increasingly realize the planes of your personality and character which my efforts thus far have yet to harvest. In other words you are a woman who has a mind working overtime.

I am not yet as close as I thought to uncovering and understanding the creative reasoning behind your actions, reactions and decisions. Often there is contradiction, of which you have said you are sometimes aware.

For example, you want to arrive back in America and would be willing to stay at my parents’ house — but only as long as I wasn’t there. Ouch. You said this, though in a different way. Words such as these are confusing to me, sometimes pulling away, sometimes celebratory of our relationship and what I bring to it.

It is very possible to feel both of these, to be both welcoming and cautious. This I do understand. But I can’t get over this one seeming contradiction: You miss me, but you want to wait until days after you come back to see me again, to meet me.

Because, in my ignorance, I can’t quite fathom what this means, I cannot deny I was and am hurt by this. And it isn’t because I feel I am owed anything but because I do not understand what kind of threat you think I am to your independence.

It is your independence which is perhaps the single most thing I like about who you are. It epitomizes who you are, the very essence.

Whatever those xxyyyxxyyyx [a country's] men shy away from, you seem to know it is related to your strengths. They are afraid of your independence, they want someone who will do everything they ask. I believe that’s what you are saying. I want to discover more and share. The power of your search for … …

Also, this particular letter is couched in deferential language as I’m trying to elicit explanation though I don’t necessarily think the fault of any uncertainty is mine. That’s a little cringe-worthy because admitting you’re wrong is different from doing so without knowing to what wrong you’re admitting.

I suppose I’ll find the second page at some point.