An Open Letter not necessarily for Closure.

Dear Waffel,

It has been 3 months since that November wednesday. I debated with myself for a bit whether to expound on what happened here. I have always been circumspect when it came to talking about us. I had double meanings, ambiguous statements, inside jokes and pet names. This love that I held so close just came to an end. How could I bear to spell it out? I don't know how but I will try. So this is the first honest post where I am actually confronting what we did.

To be honest, the stark reality of the decision that we came to did not settle in on that faithful wednesday. I had some sort of defense mechanism where I said yes to everything and anything. And that was how I began to experience. I got tipsy (and drunk) for the first time. I went to a pub for the first time. I danced for the first time. I took on more responsibilities. I overwhelmed myself with debate tournaments week after week. I willed myself to make some friends (and while I have still remained solo most of the time, I am no longer as lonely as I used to be.)and I now have people to hang out with when I want to. I watched plays. I drew and took more photos than I have ever done. Evidently, some were silly, some were brainless but most of them were eye-openers. I heard once that we don't, and shouldn't, pick experiences based on how pleasant they are. They are a culmination of who we are. And in the brave new world, it is this culmination that births compelling people and ideas. And I suppose, as far as spontaneous writings can go, this is the thesis of this humble letter of mine.

So I did all these and they were great distractions. I only faltered deep enough to have sorrowful nights, but they never extended beyond dawn and it surely never showed in my exchanges with you when you were the one who felt the pain more at the early stages. It was brilliant. I thought I was coping well. I thought you and I were special: we would be able to sustain a loving friendship with no grudges and we would not drift like many couples inevitably do after a fallout. And it is funny, isn't it? That I thought we had that special spark at the start of our relationship that would endure to the end of a rose-peppered aisle with fading faces all around, and look where we are now?

I have been feeling a renewed sense of pain lately. I don't think I have cried so much in so many inappropriate places for the past 6 days. It felt worse than the actual break up. Why, you asked? That was a smart question. Why? I have two answers to that. My distractions have trickled. The novelty of some wore off  and for the others, well, there is only one: debate. You already know how beaten I feel about it. I had a tough week where the resilience, which kept me fighting in debate no matter how hopelessly I was paddling behind the heavyweights, unravelled as I plunge into frustration at my lack of achievements in so many fronts.

And in that frustration, the trapdoor caved below me and I was smacked deadface once again, with the memory of us no longer being us. More than that, I came to confront the last lifeline I had grasped on so tightly to keep from hurting in the same state I am in now- I had survived on the notion that we would reunite in the future. But one of us has buried that hope. One of us stopped and went towards another direction. One of us does not love the same way anymore. 

Perhaps it wasn't too idealistic of me to have held on to that thought. It is entirely possible for that to happen. But you have said of the variety of factors coming into play. And I am aware of the odds, the immense luck, the pulling forces of different goals, the changes which would be the culmination of our beings in the future- where we would have severed much influence we used to have (and to a degree, still, now) on each other. The idea that we would eventually arrive in this place where we become neat stacks of pastel memories, only to be agitated by familiar sights, yet so for only a fleeting moment- it hurts me to know that.

If we can only helplessly and unconsciously adapt to the changes experiences impose upon us, then we must understand how that same factor had made us broken. Have we not always loved each other, through and through? But what happened to us, love? It was not the earthquake of one horrible mistake which tore us apart. They were little things which snowballed to an incomprehensible map of blame, where, just by looking at it, we can no longer accurately pinpoint the start of the fall. I remember you cutting me out. I remember not being graceful. I remember being vengeful to us and myself. I remember the hurt. All of these, exarcebated by the strain of distance which seemed to stretch wider as our problems deepened. But I also remember how amazing we were at working things out in the rare periods we were together physically. And as I lash out to my friends about us, it was never specifically about us. We were, and are, so wonderful together. Forty-year-olds kind of love. I didn't realize I hit a chord as I punched passionately on my phone about why I am so angry: this love was living in a hostile circumstance. A circumstancial problem is icky, because there is no being to jab a blaming finger on. We just flailed about until one of us went raving mad. I now know, very bitterly, how relevant a favourable environment is to sow a healthy relationship. And nowhere in there had continents in between and uncertainty to the next reunion.

But haven't we been great? We loved the same things. The things we didn't love, we grew to love. I have been rewired to appreciate things which would have passed under my nose unnoticed if it weren't for you. You learnt to appreciate my quirkiness. Remember how eager you were to have our first fight? An old friend told me that 2 years since his relationship broke down, he still remember the fights. But he never could recall what they were fighting for. What has not changed was his unequivocal love to her. I am sorry for all the grudge I held which we both seemed to throw at each other like daggers as the strain became tauter. Why and how could we do that, in the knowledge that 2 years down the road, these fights would be reduced to inaudible films playing at the back of our heads, reminding us how ridiculous we were? Because I love you I love you I love you would be the only thing that sticks through time. If there was one reason why we were so great, it would be the enthusiasm we had for exploration- Ghibli films, unchartered areas of Sunway, Kuching and Singapore, music, film, putt putt boats, debates- and on the other extreme, our astounding ability to do and say absolutely nothing as we spread across the sofa in your living room, with only the soft hum of Bob (your laptop of which I had the liberty to christian, as with most of your other properties) to fill in the air.

I still hold on to the hopes that we may eventually be in the same place without worrying the next deadline when either of us would depart. Maybe as friends, maybe as lovers. The sad part is knowing the spectrum of possibilities also includes the likelihood that we would be strangers. Funny how this world revolves, pulls and abandons. Funny how I may not hold on to this hope anymore in the future because in this span of time between us to non-us to you, there, and I, here, so many factors vary. Perhaps in an alternate universe, we are still together, and happily so, offerring glimpses of what we could be if not for the unforgiving distance. In that universe, I could walk out of class and the sight of you, possibly deep in thought as you always are, would take my exhaustion away, I no longer have to fear the dreaded sound of a dropped Skype call, seeing you disappear through the glass walls of the departure gates did not make me choke, sputter and cry at the helplessness of the situation. But this is the brave new world. I will eventually adapt to it. I will eventually be part of the experience. And you will too. Move on, move on, move on.

But before I get there, let me linger in that moment when the snow started to fall upon Coventry, when I succumbed yet again to another crushing defeat in debate, and I could imagine your presence, your scent, your hand just relishing in this white landscape. The most parts of our relationship were weaved together by imagination, after all. And perhaps that is what hurts me more. That break up was so terribly symbolic- No desperate hugs nobody would let go of, no careless kisses, no tears. Nothing of that sort. Just the sound of a dropped skype call. And perhaps that is what hurts me most.

If there is a new start we can forge when this pain ceases to throb so ferociously, it would be the rewarding friendship we had and can still have. Even if I wish I could have more. But I learn that I can't choose us without the fucked-up situation that comes with it. But we were oh so good.

Goodbye and hello, love. I miss you and us.

Yours,
Ida. ------------------