14/166: change

Hey F,

So what's interesting now is that instead of writing and believing you are reading these words, I am writing with the belief that you will not be seeing these now - or anytime soon - if ever at all.

That changes how all this will go, because writing to you now serves some other purpose besides cheering you on.

(Don't worry bruh, I am still cheering you on, loud and proud. It's just more nuanced now that it's to you and not to you at the same time.)

I wonder if you knew I looked for you. I wonder if you knew I'd been reading your words and feeling your hurt. I wonder if you had hoped that I hadn't found you, and hoped that I didn't message you. I wonder if you were glad I was listening.

My topics were almost always random, but I can see how they may have felt as responses to your writing, and how that may have hurt as much or more than helped.

I said I wouldn't go looking after today, and I am 100% sticking by it. So all those things I wonder, I may continue to wonder, without really knowing. I don't know what you'll ever see or get from these moving forward.

It's weird to think that those pieces of your story would have been lost and your farewell missed completely had I not looked for you when I did. And it's weird to wonder how you would have soldiered on if I hadn't said anything, if it would have been exactly the same or entirely different.

Change is scary, and weird, and hard, and good. And it's more than a change - it's an entire paradigm shift - really putting your needs and feelings first, when you're so used to everyone mattering more, to the point you either explode at others or implode on yourself.

(We really are parallel when I think about it, I just have quiet explosions and level 99 implosions. :)

Anyway. Maybe lighter topics. Maybe unsolicited advice. Maybe saying what I'm up to. Maybe musing on what you're up to. No idea what I'll say from day to day.

I would have written earlier, but after that four hour carpool I had to spend two more hours with my parents (woohoo... nope) and then another three hour solo drive. Sooo happy tomorrow is an off(ish) day.

I hope your first day of detox goes okay. Detox is a bitch and a half.

Thinking of you, F.

~BFR