open letter to a favorite bedmate

dear hank,

i'm writing to get the things out of my head that i want to say to you.

i feel guilty that our contact is built on random occassions of sex over the last two years. several times i've tried to assuage that guilt by reaching out to create a friendship with you. i thought that if i knew you and could count you as a friend, then i wouldn't feel guilty about having sex with you. but that never worked out; i don't know if you really never found me attractive, were absolutely repelled by my sexual aggressiveness, or if you were just scared that i could become someone permanent in your life. regardless; i feel guilty that i have used you when i needed someone and i've tried to make that right, but i see now that i can't.

you and i don't know each other. you don't know my kids' names. i don't know your siblings' names. i don't know where you work, or really what you do. the first few times i saw you, i thought your name was hank, even though i used to call you robbie. and all the other cloak and dagger details of those first encounters. a bit twisted now that i look at it.

anyway, i need to say i'm sorry. i owe you an apology. i owe myself an apology. because regardless of who you've known me to be, that is not me. the conflict of it has bothered me every time, but moreso since this last time, because i've walked away from the life that i was tied up in when i first "met" you. the divorce crazies are in my past now, but you seem to have held on in my heart, or at least in my libido.

i still wish that we had cultivated a real friendship. i find myself wanting new people around me that i can really care about, but not having the motivation or the time to pour myself into it to make it worthwhile. but we didn't. and now a new year is closing in and i am assessing myself and finding that there are words unsaid that i need to get out so that i can move into 2007 with clarity.

i used to think that i could be with you for real. especially in my drunken moments when i waited for you, i had fleeting thoughts that this could be the time we followed through and the next morning we would carry on without a broken connection to meet the sunshine. it was delusional, i think. it was an attempt to rationalize what i was doing and i'm sure you sense that which is why you are not returning my texts. or maybe you've found someone real and want to forget the dirtiness of our relationship and if so, i commend you on it. i hope you find love, real love. and i hope i do too.

happy christmas. happy new year. happiness always.
maybe i'll see you around sometime.
jewels