#DearMe

A letter to myself

Dear Me,

 

Dear 4-year-old me, Dear 6-year-old me, Dear 8-year-old me, Dear 13 year-old me, Dear 18-year-old me, Dear 19 and 20, Dear 21, Dear 22, Dear 23, Dear Future Me's........ I'm going to tell you all something. Something that you may never fully understand or accept. Something I'm still not sure I understand as I write this, but I'm going to tell you this thing believing whole-heartedly it must be true. Get ready, Me's, because here it is:

 

Everybody Leaves.

 

Everybody.

 

Dad leaves. Boyfriends leave. Your siblings all leave. Your friends leave.

 

Even you leave sometimes.

 

It just happens. And you need to accept that you can't hold everybody to you. You've got to let them go on with their lives. Even Violet is going to leave someday, and you're going to have to let her.

 

And don't take it personally. Most of the time, they aren't leaving because they're trying to hurt you.

 

Nobody is trying to hurt you.

 

I know it hurts anyway, it always does. But what they say is true: As long as you think of the people you love who aren't around anymore, they're still with you.

 It's okay to hold on to your memories. It's okay to mourn.

And to take your time until you feel better.

It's okay. Even when you're not okay, it's okay.

It's okay to not be okay.

But you've got to let go at some point. You've got to walk away from it.

You've got to accept that people leave, sometimes whether they want to or not.

 

And you need to learn not to take it personally. And you need to learn that it is inevitable. We are truly alone in this world, Me's. Always. Even when you're surrounded by people, you live alone. You experience alone.

 

And someday you will die alone.

 

But you know what?

 

I will always try to be there for you. Because we're all we've got.

 

I'm all I've got.

 

And I love you, even though you don't believe me.

Reviews

[Alisa Trudel]

This was very well-written, and I like the drop off at the end--your conventions and sentence structure are on point :) though I must say that I don't think you're ever alone.