hi.
i'm still working through in my head what went wrong. not in 2005. i understand that, and didn't really have a problem letting you go, then. we agreed it was a mutual breakup due to different life goals. it's what happened in 2010ish that i can't figure out.
i'm realizing that my memory of our communication between about 2005 and 2010 is very poor. i remember you coming over sometimes. i remember walking in the experimental farm with you. i remember eating lunch with your family up at catherine & bank. i remember fixing your computer. but i also have some fuzzier, stranger memories - like not going to see you when you had amnesia. i don't even know if that actually happened, if you ever even had amnesia or what i was thinking if it did. it seems uncharacteristic. i may have been thinking that it's for the best, but it doesn't seem like to me to think that. and it may even be the answer i'm seeking.
i think a part of the reason my memory is so poor over that period is that my diet was terrible. but i dream a lot, both awake and asleep. i live in my own head. and, i'm consequently not sure what really happened and what didn't. combined, that's a problem, because i may remember things that didn't happen, and i might have forgotten things that did. my behaviour and statements may be glaring contradictions, because i have such a difficulty pulling out what happened and what i imagined happened, during or after it happened.
i have to consequently resign myself to not being able to figure it out, unless you explain it to me. which is all i was ever looking for in the first place.
i don't really remember what i typed in all those emails, either.
standing where i am, now, 500 km away and with little chance of ever communicating with you again, i'm just wishing things turned out better. a little self-reflection demonstrates the point that i'm sort of crazy - i'm telling you that i can't discern between history and fantasy, or remember freaking out, or even realize when i'm contradicting myself, and that's maybe a little unsettling. but, people like me need some support structures, too. you need to take us as we are, or not at all. i've just been unable to process your decision, as i didn't think it was in the realm of possibility. and, even now, i'm still thinking this is temporary - even though it clearly isn't.
maybe it's pathetic. i guess i've just had very few friends. actual friends; i don't mean people you hang out with, but actual friends. in fact, i think you might be the one and only friend i ever had, besides my father. so, i'm sorry if you ever thought i was more than pathetic. again, you have to take us as we are or not at all. not with a level of sympathy, or even a level of empathy, but just with acceptance. and i just can't grasp that you aren't - i'm searching for blocks, misunderstandings, misinterpretations....
i've been compiling data on my earliest musical releases in order to put them away permanently: building biographies, gear lists, facebook timelines - things like that. but when i'm done i'm going to dive head first into the music i created when i knew you. that's going to bring back a lot of memories - no doubt both real and imagined.
i'm not writing this to warn you of a further breakdown. if that happens, i'll keep it to myself. if i felt there was a purpose in talking things through in 2010, i don't feel there still is, today - you've made your disinterest clear.
however, i think that you have the right to read my summaries as i put them up, and to suggest corrections if you feel it's worthwhile. so, i feel the responsibility to send you links to these pages when they're published. it's up to you to decide how to respond.
you will be referred to simply as "sarah". nobody that doesn't know me will know who you are, and people that know me will know you who are, anyways.
i think a part of the reason i'm holding to some of this is that i never completed the recordings. working through complex psychological issues is a part of being an artist; needing art to work through complex psychological issues is a common theme in people with mental illnesses. for years, i put it off to avoid it, and then the shit hit the fan as i was - i should add that, in addition to the instability brought on by hormones, i was working out songs about you when i freaked out.
as i work these pieces out to their final conclusions, i will finally be working through what i need to work through to get to some kind of end point. i think so, anyways. i hope.
my future is not what you may have imagined for me at some point. i live alone. i don't work. i immerse myself in the things that are important to me. i've actually been very stable and very content the last few years; where i am right now is that i don't want things to change. i'll probably live this way for as long as i have left to live....
but, i think i'll stop contacting you when i get these songs down. there's a lot of them, and it will take a while. but that closure is on it's way.
i apologize for being incapable of getting to this end point sooner, for not being able to understand what's happening around me and for persistently bothering you, for many years, to help me understand it.
it'll be done with, soon.
i think. i hope...
j
