Dearest

Dearest,

How does one start a letter like this? With an apology? No. I’m fairly certain that isn’t what I’m supposed to do. Maybe, in fact, the opposite. Maybe, that’s been the real trouble all along. Taking responsibility for something that wasn’t my doing. And maybe when we spend our energy blaming ourselves for things that weren’t our fault, we miss taking the blame for the things that are.

Or maybe that’s just me playing The Blame Game, again.

Now this, of course, is where we both imagine a set from a 1970s game show, like a Match Game or a Password. Lots of big, round lights and shag carpeting. Names like Merv Griffin and Mark Goodson adorn the credits and Brett Somers is somewhere giving somebody hell and a hard chuckle. And, there’s music. That jazzy, jingly 1970s game show music, a soundtrack to another time before it became so acceptable to trade in all of your personal ethics for a handful of cash. Back when people didn’t violate their ethics, they just didn’t have any.

After all, you don’t keep the right to vote away from people or enslave them altogether and have a stiff, upright moral code. That code bends, baby. It arcs. Maybe that code never truly gets off the ground but I digress.

We imagine The Blame Game is brought to you by Turtle Wax or Rice-a-Roni (the San Francisco treat). Those, of course, are also the parting gifts. We would kill at The Blame Game. We’d pick the correct curtain or give the cheeky, innuendo-filled answer and head back home with a brand new matching washer and dryer or a super swanky living room set, complete with wet bar and HiFi console.

But, again, I digress...

Now is not the time for The Blame Game and maybe, just maybe, we’ll turn that show off forever. Maybe we stick to Jeopardy! and Card Sharks. That being said...

Things did not always go the way we wanted them to. They didn’t always go the way we thought they should. Let’s be real, things didn’t always go the way we told ourselves they did. There are a lot of regrets, a lot of should haves, floating around in the past. And that’s where they should really stay. The past should always stay in the past. And the future relegated to the future.

We only have the time for one thing and that’s got to be the present.

But I know you’re worried. I know you’re afraid of all the things that the past has turned you into. I know you’re still convinced that you’re being haunted and that you probably always will be.

You don’t have to. Worry, that is.

I’m here.

I’ll take care of you.

That’s what I’m here for.

And it would kind of be my honor to keep you safe.

You’re important. You’re precious. You’re worth making you feel at ease.

And it’ll make me feel better, too. Just knowing that you’re not worried will help me to feel stronger and more capable. It’ll help make me a better person. A person who doesn’t need to rely on other people but instead chooses to do and be better by accepting and giving help. In tandem and in harmony. Because no matter who you are, life has a way of making itself and its power known and in those times, support is pivotal.

And dearest, please be proud of yourself. Please give yourself credit for the things that you didn’t let them take away. You could’ve easily let them take water away from you but you didn’t. You held onto it and claimed it as your own. In a pool, in an ocean, in a stream just a five minute walk from your childhood home. The stream you and your best friend spent hours of your time creating a world all of your own.

I think that’s why you feel so safe there, because you kicked them out of that home of yours for good and you never let them back in. And I’m so, so proud of you for that. For not allowing them to make you feel uneasy or unsafe in a place you consider a sanctuary. You picked a safe haven as your church instead of handing over your life to someone else who says that if you follow them, they’ll bring you closer to God.

You don’t need snake oil salesmen and you never have.

Maybe your past is what taught you to be wary of those selling trust. And that’s a lesson almost never learned without pain but, still, a lesson that must be learned for fear we become the peddler.

For that, dearest, you are my hero.

The strength that you carry so casually inspires me. You think you don’t have it only because you’re unaware of what your strength is and where your strength lies but it is so prevalent. I see it in everything you do, in everything you are. I see you sling it over your arm like a purse and slip into it at night before bed.

Rest assured in your strength, my love.

You have come so far. Farther than you’ll ever realize. You’ve run emotional marathons; competed in mental triathlons and flipped tires heavy with repressed memories. And still you stand. Still you continue forward with your head held high and your eyes willing to meet any and all. Please, don’t forget these things. You’re view of yourself is essential to your happiness and success and you so deserve to be both of those things.

So, go forward. Give the past a small smile and a little wave and tell it that you’ll think more of the fond times than the not. And then, bloom. Blossom and bloom and let yourself grow. And when you’re feeling your lowest, remind yourself that you are a survivor. You may still have demons but that only means that you haven’t given up the fight.

That strength and resilience is your power. You mustn’t be intimidated by it, by yourself. For you have always been your own everything.

You are your own planet.

You are your own ocean.

You are your own moon and sun.

You are the wind and the change and the providence.

You are the notion and the nuance.

You are the mist.

You bloom with the flowers and fall with the snow. And you spark with the flash of lightening in rain.

Embrace yourself, dearest. Hold your hand and give it an extra squeeze. For you are the comfort you’ve always needed most.

And I am here for you.