my mother says, "...but she used a razor."
i say, "i use a razor."
"you use glass, too, though, don't you?"
"only on the ones here. all the rest are razor."
"but what about those thick ones on your arm? how do you get those?"
"i press really hard."
and her face slackens for a moment and then she laughs and says "okay, i don't want to know." this is how it is good between us, lunch spread before us, the aunt and the grandmother. there is no shame here. and only the faintest trace of sorrow.
a few months ago she tells me a story the aunt told her. of how my cousin kate cut herself to try and understand how it is for me. the aunt asks, "what was it like?" and kate replies, "it hurt."
i wrote this on august 12 last year.
dear kate,
it's 6.22 in the morning according to the clock on the computer. i think it's a little fast. my sleep patterns are odd these days, i think because of the medication i'm on. i wanted to write this letter now before i forgot or before it stopped seeming like a good idea.
writing has always been easier for me than talking, for as long as i can remember. sometimes i find it impossible to talk at all. these last few years i've lost the line between what's me and what's my illness. i suppose this is my explanation for why i'm writing this instead of talking to you.
it's 6.35 now. i think i've forgotten why i decided to write this. it's stopped seeming like a good idea already, but i will keep going.
sometimes i think about when we were little and close. now we are strangers who just happen to be related. it makes me sad now and then. we have just had such different lives and we are such different people from when we were children and we don't know each other anymore. i don't know how to get past all that. i would like to get to know you again, but i have so much fear in me that i don't know if i can. and maybe you don't want to get to know me now. and i could understand that. there are days when i really don't want to know me either. there are just so many things i don't know how to do anymore, i don't know how to have normal conversations, i don't know how to leave the house without being afraid, i don't know how to make friends in person. pathetic, isn't it?
i know you have your own life and your own friends, but sometimes i think maybe they forget to tell you about all the good things inside you, about how you are beautiful both outside and inside, about how you are intelligent and kind and gentle. and i know you don't see these things in yourself. or, at least not enough.
we were talking about you at dinner last night because i mentioned a gift i wanted to buy for your baby when it was born, but no one else seemed to think it was a good idea. i realised then how sad everyone is that you don't have people in your life who really appreciate you. i don't know your friends and i am not trying to judge them or you. but i just wanted to say that i appreciate you, or at least the you that i used to know. i'm sure she is still in there. and maybe she will understand why her crazy cousin is writing her a letter at 6.45 on a sunday morning.
love,
v--
but i never sent it.
i say, "i use a razor."
"you use glass, too, though, don't you?"
"only on the ones here. all the rest are razor."
"but what about those thick ones on your arm? how do you get those?"
"i press really hard."
and her face slackens for a moment and then she laughs and says "okay, i don't want to know." this is how it is good between us, lunch spread before us, the aunt and the grandmother. there is no shame here. and only the faintest trace of sorrow.
a few months ago she tells me a story the aunt told her. of how my cousin kate cut herself to try and understand how it is for me. the aunt asks, "what was it like?" and kate replies, "it hurt."
i wrote this on august 12 last year.
dear kate,
it's 6.22 in the morning according to the clock on the computer. i think it's a little fast. my sleep patterns are odd these days, i think because of the medication i'm on. i wanted to write this letter now before i forgot or before it stopped seeming like a good idea.
writing has always been easier for me than talking, for as long as i can remember. sometimes i find it impossible to talk at all. these last few years i've lost the line between what's me and what's my illness. i suppose this is my explanation for why i'm writing this instead of talking to you.
it's 6.35 now. i think i've forgotten why i decided to write this. it's stopped seeming like a good idea already, but i will keep going.
sometimes i think about when we were little and close. now we are strangers who just happen to be related. it makes me sad now and then. we have just had such different lives and we are such different people from when we were children and we don't know each other anymore. i don't know how to get past all that. i would like to get to know you again, but i have so much fear in me that i don't know if i can. and maybe you don't want to get to know me now. and i could understand that. there are days when i really don't want to know me either. there are just so many things i don't know how to do anymore, i don't know how to have normal conversations, i don't know how to leave the house without being afraid, i don't know how to make friends in person. pathetic, isn't it?
i know you have your own life and your own friends, but sometimes i think maybe they forget to tell you about all the good things inside you, about how you are beautiful both outside and inside, about how you are intelligent and kind and gentle. and i know you don't see these things in yourself. or, at least not enough.
we were talking about you at dinner last night because i mentioned a gift i wanted to buy for your baby when it was born, but no one else seemed to think it was a good idea. i realised then how sad everyone is that you don't have people in your life who really appreciate you. i don't know your friends and i am not trying to judge them or you. but i just wanted to say that i appreciate you, or at least the you that i used to know. i'm sure she is still in there. and maybe she will understand why her crazy cousin is writing her a letter at 6.45 on a sunday morning.
love,
v--
but i never sent it.