An Open Letter To The Men I’ve Loved, The Men Who’ve Loved Me, & Everyone In Between
This goes out to all the ghosts, fuckbois, forgotten trysts, and guys who’ve forgotten they had sex with me. To the guys I’ve idolized, fantasized, or pulverized in some sexual fantasy or real life. To the guys who’ve jilted me, pulled stunts, been stunted, and acted cunty. To the relationships in my head, my bed, or that are dead.
Please Forgive Me. I was raised thinking taking on your fear, pain, or sadness was loving you. That to worry about your safety, to try and fix your problems, or to protect you was loving you. Intrusive unsolicited advice was my love language. Boy, was I wrong?
I thought trying to fix you or heal you or spare you inconvenience would make me more lovable to you. Now I realize that might just be how I was colonized. I thought to push you or push into you was love. To pull you into conversations, or emotions, or moments you didn’t care about was you loving me.
I thought maybe if I was inside you, I was inside your heart. If I owned even a piece of you I could love myself more. Little did I know I was just filling voids while filling up space until you found Mr. Next or Mr. Right…After Me. I find solace in knowing I made an impression if not on you then in you. But enough about toxic masculinity.
I’m sorry I let all of my fear consume me. It engulfed me in its dark embrace. I got caught in the undertow of the swamps of sadness. Artax!!!
Or maybe I just watched Interview with the Vampire too many times. Thinking a depressed but sexy AF Brad Pitt who didn’t kiss or touch other guys was what love might look like for little old me. Don’t mind me I was a child at the time. That homoerotic lack of physical intimacy and tenderness was supposed to be some Spartan take on male romance. But hey, internalized homophobia was so 90s.
Long tendrils of dark thoughts and toxic feelings blind my face. Just like the long locks of your hair. I just want to twirl my fingers around like the teenage girl who lives in our heads. You know the one. The Regina George of your subconscious. She’s the one who always knows the best clap back and always tells you you’re fat. My weight. I just want to lose 5 pounds.
The weight on my heart robbing me of breath. Missing the weight of your body in my arms. The weight of my art pushing on my chest. The weight of my problems weighing on my mind. The weight of feelings unexpressed, unhonored, unseen weighing on my spirit.
I wish I could just lose myself in your eyes. Meanwhile, I was too busy fucking with fear to know what was best. Or to even notice you’d packed up and left.
I created holes in my heart. I pulled it apart like pieces of bread. Trying to feed the hungry. Jesus was so into feeding the hungry. He was a hot emotionally unavailable man, too. Is this a trend?
Starved for love? Here have a piece of my heart. You politely take it but then spit it out when you turn the corner. You were too polite to tell me you were vegan. Just kidding…Vegans love to tell you they’re vegan.
You gladly took those small pieces of my heart. Swallowed them without savoring them. You didn’t care it was a piece of my heart. You just wanted more, more, more. The brightest parts of me you dragged into the darkness.Too far if you ask me.
You’d comment it was too spicy. Too much. Or some other vaguely racist thing. They weren’t to your taste but you enjoyed them anyway. You only cared they were bright. You were happy to let them light your way in the abyss. To use them like someone uses a match or a flint. But did you ever call to thank me?
They lit the darkness inside you so you could heal, fix what’s broken, and peace out. You refused to acknowledge that spark between us. That light that I gave you to stoke your fires. I wasn’t hot enough, or muscular enough or masculine enough or enough enough. But let’s be real I wasn’t white enough or basic enough or limited enough to make you feel like you were big.
I refused to bend reality to lift you up while also making you feel worthless in that kinky self-destructive way you love so much. Like the cigarettes you smoke, the drinks you guzzle, and the drugs you snort. I was vulnerable because I loved you. I was vulnerable, not because you were my superior because I thought we were forever. Endgame. I love you 3000.
Meanwhile, you loved me 2. I could tell as you’d rush to look away from me that you hated your reflection in my eyes. Me seeing the best in you brought out your worst. You ran from the pressure of being the person I knew you were inside. Better to be comfortable and let people give you lip service. Let people fill your cup rather than learn to fill it up like a fucking grown up. You’re an adult, Peter. Neverland is just a summer destination.
I know I created chasms between us. I tried to reconcile my hurt feelings and tortured past with your simple reality. I lived in a fantasy where you cared to know the whys of my behaviors and my sordid history. I closed my heart and put up walls. I reacted to things that were not attacks. I tilted at windmills like that mad man in that Spanish book. I’d say the name but indigenous people are not getting any residuals after my ancestors were raped and murder. And still, I have the courage to open my heart?!?
I didn’t see the things that were pretty abundantly clear. Pardon me for not learning like everyone else. I had to grow up so early some ideas are through the eyes of the child. Little did you know it was those closest to me who had done the most damage, caused the most harm.
Small shallow cuts and herbal salt rubs on the wounds. I learned early the true pain love could bring. It’s not sweet anguish when it’s family. And the fact that it’s this kinky BDSM moment makes it super inappropriate. People are wowed by my pain tolerance but never ask how much can it hurt? How traumatic could it be? That was my normal. Trauma and Drama were my Eros & Psyche. My salt and pepper. My frick and frack.
I’d see romantic films and have no frame of reference. A different culture. An illogical use of energy. Why is no one ever saying what they really feel? Wasn’t that the real love that I learned at home. “Only I can tell this to you because I love you.” my mother would say. Little did she know the world was itching to circle my problem areas, list my shortcomings, and press my pain ponts.
I’m not stupid. I get it. You weren’t ready for me. I run too hot. I’m too “firey.” My passion burns like phoenix fire. When I’m pissed… look out. Jean Grey destroyed a planet and she was being nice. I was fully content to destroy us both knowing I’d rise again with childlike wonder and innocent blindness to the past. But who knew I’d stupidly look for you when you were gone?
Rather than set a boundary I grabbed you like the Incredible Hulk and flung you into another stratosphere. I was surprised by my own strength. Who knew carrying everyone else’s burdens would give you such great upper body strength? But it’s spiritual. Sorry, I don’t have pecs. It’s hard to work out when you feel uncomfortable in your body. It’s full of secrets.
I’m sorry I hurt you. I let the sins of my past, those emotions unexpressed, those tears unshed flood our space. They eroded like tiny gaps into jagged caverns. Did you know water could bring down a mountain? Maybe not, I paid attention in Earth Science.
I am sorry my love is sharp and complex and not neat and tidy like some Jeff Brad, Brent, or Becky. The rush of my love is intense and unwavering. The bursting of the supernova of my heart scared you. You ran off like a toddler running from a wave.
It scared you into a whole other dimension. I changed the channel now you’re far away from me and my crazy, stupid love. While I sit here watching Crazy Stupid Love…now on Netflix. Wondering if Steve Carrell or Ryan Gosling or Emma Stone can sum up how I feel. Or maybe I’m just Emma Stoned?
While I can empathize with you I will no longer take your opinions as my own. I will not let you present your opinions as facts. I will not accept your false readings of my intentions. Your assertions of my aspirations. Your Cruel Intentions fantasy projected onto my misguided attempts at remedial love.
I gave you my best. You saved me the scraps. I humbly and hungrily lapped them up. Like a lapdog. I gluttonously gorged on the texts you sent as afterthoughts. I devoured your word vomit, petty problems, and self-imposed drama to fill the void you made in my life because you would never tell me how you really felt.
You kept me on the line. I hung there bleeding my heart out like some fish on one of your well-mannered, wholesome “I have a father” outings. You kept me hanging on the line just because you could. You could have thrown me back and let me find my home in some fish sandwich or some kid’s fish tank.
You were word perfect in keeping it vague. Letting me know there was a chance but not when. A point zero one percent chance? Maybe if you get to 40 and are still single? It was the reason why I felt unsettled. Why I felt I wasn’t enough. That proverbial itch on my soul. The scab that wouldn’t heal. I took that maybe as a yes rather than an obvious no. A fuck no. My bad. #consentculture
You didn’t care. In your mind, I was the Se(XBox) you’d turn me on when you wanted to play with me. You’d leave me on pause. “That will break the machine.” my dad would say.
Well, I just want to say I no longer have the mental or emotional real estate for you. The rent is just too damn high. The price is too damned high. Perhaps try a different area code. I hear Austin is up-and-coming. I’ve had hoes in different area codes. I’ve been around the world and I can’t find my baby. I believe in a thing called love, just listen to the rhythm of my heart.
I forgive you for knowing not what you did. I forgive you for hiding your tender heart from my fierce spirit. And I forgive you for wounding my tender spirit with your fierce heart.
I thank you for holding the pieces of my heart while you did. You held them in your heart, your hands, and sometimes in your ass. Some of you treasured them and put them on your mantle. Some of you couldn’t afford a mantle. Some of you cast them aside.
And some of you attacked me for even deigning to love you. Some of you dropped little bread crumbs for me to follow into a better future. My love layaway plan. Doing the best I could but still finding myself alone. But finding I was no longer lonely. I love myself more.
I thank you for the lessons. For those bitter jagged little pills whose delicious anguish took me to the other side. Hello from the other side. Please welcome to the stage, Adele!
I thank you for the fantasy. Hope. Something to believe in. For giving me fuel for my dream engine. Investments in my spank bank. The kind of love that just keeps me hanging on. Set me free why don’t you babe? Why am I quoting the Supremes? Or was it Diana? Her daughter was on Girlfriends. Is the reason I’m single that I don’t have girlfriends? Is it that I tried to jump on and climb into all of my friends who loved me for me?
II love you not just for who I wanted you to be. I love you for who you actually are. You probably didn’t know but I saw you. I saw the little things no one else did. Those quiet moments, those soft asides. I saw the light inside you. Sure there may have been a little extra sheen due to my rose-colored glasses. A little razzle-dazzle I added in post. But I saw you. I didn’t know how to say the words. I love you for what you taught me. I love you for how you helped make me me.
I open my heart to love that pushes the levies. That pushes the floodgates open. I open my mind to a love that will astound me. That fills my mind with awe and makes me dumb. Awesome! I open my heart to a future whose brilliance blinds my eyes and I open my spirit to a love that can unite us all.
I release all the energy I wasted damning up my heart. I rebuke the energy I hoarded armoring my thirsty yet ever giving spirit for attacks that never came. I release the baggage that weighed on my mind making me blind. Those chips on my shoulder those boulders in my soul. I release the idea of a hole in my heart. That story that I am not enough. That I am too this or not enough that.
I take into myself the idea that I am free. I am whole. I am full. I am enough. I am everything. I am a seed of the divine. While I may try to fill the holes in others I learn that’s me poking holes in myself. And to my future lover, I say just this. I am ready to be loved. To give AND receive. To embrace you with arms outstretched and heart wide open.
I open the channel to feel not just partial feelings and embrace half ideas but the whole of human experience. And I will stop saying hole so freaking much it’s inappropriate. What can I say? My biological clock is ticking like this!!! Marissa Tomei really did deserve that Oscar for My Cousin Vinny.
Dramatic Exit!
Con mucho mucho mucho amor
Christian
