We met one another
my freshman year of college. In the naiveté
of youth, I thought that you were everything I had been looking for. You made me feel like no one had before; more
mature, a little dangerous, independent, yet still warm and comforted. I was vulnerable and innocent, and you knew
that, you saw that in me somehow and purposefully led me astray, making me
believe all the lies you told me night after night.
Every time I caught
a glimpse of your true self, I would pull away, crushed by my own
insecurities. When I would finally move
beyond your pull, you would return like a lover in the night, as though
somehow, this one time, things would be different. You would make me fall all over again, head
over heels, for that sweet thing I first met under a July moon, with the small
of summer heavy on the night air.
It makes me sad even
now, how much love I have wasted on you and the memories we once shared, or
more accurately I guess, the lack of memories.
I could say I wished I’d never met you, but it would taste like a
lie. The truth is, I’m glad we had our
time together. I think sometimes we need
to go through hell, in order to appreciate heaven. You taught me about pain, hurt, loneliness,
and betrayal. Because of those hard
lessons, I now truly understand what it means to hope, to have faith, and to
love.
Please make no
mistake, my gratitude ends abruptly there.
You are a temptress and a Jessabelle, and I have no time, energy, or
patience left to pursue you further.
This goodbye is not
an exercise in simply delaying the inevitable.
It is a declaration of a new found will to live. You are not welcome in this life I am
building for myself and for my family.
You are not welcome in my thoughts, or in what I hold to be my fondest
of memories. You are not welcome as a
guest in my dreams.
If my experience has
taught me anything over our years together, it’s that you will not take this
well. You never did like to be told
no. Inevitably, at some point sooner or
later, you will extend an olive branch,, in hopes of once again being friendly,
if only casually or for old times’ sake.
I accept this as it is your nature, and you have always held some power
over me, that even now I do not fully understand. You must realize my dear that this is a
battle you will not win. I am no longer
that insecure boy who ran too you time and again, in hopes of finding comfort
in your deceptive warm embrace. I have
been without you long enough that I no longer taste your harsh kiss or your
sweet perfume. If for whatever reason I
should begin to remember, know that I am no longer alone. I have friends, family and fellowship, more
than ready to put you and your whispers back in the ground where they belong,
dead to us.
And so, I leave you
with words from that first dance years ago, “while the last goodbye is the
hardest one to say, this IS
where the cowboy rides away.”
Goodbye,
-J
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