Dear Tom;

It's hard to know where to start.  I know that we said that we'd always be friends, but after all this time I'll wager that you are surprised to be receiving a letter from me.  When I think back on the night that we broke up, I keep hoping to find some dull ache to remind me of how much you meant to me, but the only thing I feel is empty. 

It's been nearly a year since that night and we've both moved on, figuratively and literally.  I can't believe how much has changed for me in such a short time.  I can't believe how much I've changed since we first met. 

There's a charm in innocence.  I liked my life before you became my boyfriend.  I liked how uncomplicated it was.  I knew who my friends were.  I knew to whom I owed my loyalty. I knew what I wanted for myself.  It's funny how one kiss changed everything I thought I knew. 

With you I learned that I could do terrible things to people I love, and that if those relationships were strong, that I could still be forgiven.  If nothing else came from our relationship, I'll always know the strength of true friendship.

In the time that we were together, I did so many things that frightened me.  In some ways I grew from those experiences, in other ways I died a little bit.  Not that the things that died were all good.  I'm grateful to you that I now know that love doesn't have to be permanent; that I can survive beyond the need for your approval and acceptance.  I will however miss my ideals about love.  Their death was inevitable, but in my mind, you will always be the one that smothered them.

Then there is my writing. You convinced me to share it with the world.  Of all my fears, revealing my most personal thoughts was the most terrifying.  There are so many ways to be rejected.  I still don't know whether to thank you or to curse you.  Writing for myself was safe.  Now that I have a larger audience to consider I walk a fine line between pleasing them and pleasing myself.  I admit that I like the praise, but I also admit that I pander to the basest elements sometimes to achieve it.  The alternative is dreadful to contemplate, stories that only I can appreciate.  You awoke my need for admiration, and it is a Pandora's Box of concession.

You were the keeper of my confessions.  The things I was afraid to tell my family or my friends found your ears.  I let you judge me and I performed the penance that you meted out.  I found a haven in your comfort. Why did I think that you knew more than I did about what I needed? 

I am writing this, after such a long time, not because I harbor any hatred towards you.  On the contrary, I still look at our time together affectionately.  It's just that so many things went unsaid, and it's important to me that I say them now.  I needed to gain perspective, to see everything in stark relief against the background of time and experience.  When we parted last year, it felt mutual.  It seemed as though our time together just ran out, and that was fine at the time.  No blame, no recriminations.  It is more important now, for me to understand why it was that we failed.  Why is it that a relationship that once seemed so important, important enough to throw away something precious for, suddenly became superfluous?  Am I a failure?  Or did you fail me? 

If we didn't have a burning passion for each other, if we didn't love each other in a fiery torment, then why did we do it?  I don't know if you have any answers.  I've been contemplating it for a while, and I can't find any. 

One thing that I have learned is that life is full of disappointments.  It may be that I'll never understand why we were together, and why we eventually separated.  What I hope to find is how I can recognize true love, since clearly we never had it with each other.  It may be that it's in our nature to keep trying people on, like sweaters, until we find one that suits us.  Have you been more successful than I have in finding a good fit?

Thank you for everything that you taught me.  I am a better person for having known you, and even if I could change things, I wouldn't.  I just hope that some day it all makes sense, since today, it doesn't.  Sadness weighs me down, it is the burden of knowing that I once compromised in love, and that I won't again, and that may mean that I might be alone forever.

I hope this finds you well and happy, I am both, in my way. 

Take good care,

Daria