Key:

Peace!

I am writing about something I should have sat down and talked to you about a very long time ago. Although my actions say otherwise, I love you as if you were my own son. I did not think about these feelings until I talked to your brother about it and he admitted that you remember more about our time together as a functioning family then you do. I had to point out that I have known you since you were 6 months old.

When your mother and I broke up, I thought I would continue to be considered your father. It makes sense right? You were calling me "daddy" since you could talk. Since that time, while home on leave or on liberty from the Navy, we spent more time together then I did with your mother. When we had no car, I took the almost 2 hour bus ride to drop you off at school. I remember the times your mother went out to the clubs on Thursday and Friday evenings and you and I would eat a whole pint of Haagen Daz ice cream together.

When your mother told me that our relationship as father and son had to end, I was heartbroken. To be honest, I never forgave your mother for that. When she made this suggestion I protested. Of course, she shot me down. She was your mother. Before I dropped the subject, I told her that she would regret that decision. Ironically, your mother never hesitated to ask for money to help purchase an item you needed.

There were also times when your mother complained about you and I suggested having you live with me and she refused. I will also point out that a good number of things that I reveal in this letter I have never told anyone else before except my wife.

Over the years, you have stated how you were upset at my approach to our relationship. When I came to pick up your brother, you wouldn't greet me. At times, you were disrespectful to me and my family. I ignored those acts with an understanding that you did not know what you were doing. I want to point out that despite the fact that I didn't fight for you when I should, my family has considered you a son and have argued that I should have stepped up when your mother asked me to stepped down.

I have come to learn that your mother has recently kicked you out of her home after she finally got married. It broke my heart that your mother washed her hands of you. While I admit that you have been difficult, the things you have done are very, very trivial and I find them to be the rebelliousness of your youth. I know you are a good
person. At times you are misguided and like the rest of us, are emotionally wounded. Yes, you are a product of a rape but that doesn't make you less of a person.

I miss and love you and wish that I had been more aggressive in the manifestation of that love. I should have been more vocal when your mother made that decision. Yet I just did the motions and stepped off. I should have snatched you up to live with me all those years ago when you had trouble in school. When you were in trouble with the law, I should have arrived in court to support you. I should have called you and said, "come stay with me, brother."

I know at times you look at me and my family and wonder how it all might have turned out if I stepped up. At times, I do the same thing. I only ask that you find it in your heart to forgive me. Yes, I do accept blame. It's a tough pill to swallow and forgiveness is a tough thing for me as well. It does not change the fact that deep down inside, I still see you as a son.

Sincerely,

Dan Tres Omi

Dear Steven,

*sigh*

I've written many letters and have not sent them. I always say, this time I will send it. I've written them in anger, and when I've been happy. If I thought for one moment you could take it, I'd give you them all, but no. For every step we take forward, we go back five.

You were someone I really liked, and for me, that says a lot. You're everything I want or I thought wanted. You've made me grow up a lot in the last two years. I'm older than you but only in age. Me being a virgin is the only thing that has kept us friends this long. No matter how many times we tried, it never worked out that way for us.

I want you as a friend and we are slowly making our way. I hope one day I can stop thinking of you as mine, and learn to share. Until then I'm going to hate every bitch you bring around....because you're mine. Your presence calms me. Your voice makes me smile. Your happiness make me happy.

I don't like many things about you, especially the lying and half truths. I wish we had a friendship where you felt comfortable to be your whole you. One day, maybe. Or maybe it's just not meant for me, and that makes me sad.

I should've known to let go you earlier on. I mean, at one point your name was "shady ass flacky ass steve" in my phone. So I guess you showed me who you were and my dumbass looked at your potential instead. I'm living and learning, and you've been one of my biggest lessons. And I keep learning from you. One day I'll say your name and feel nothing.

Well at least that's my hope.

Signed,
Thanks for the Lesson

Dear Pa,

I almost feel guilty writing this to you. I have always played around with the idea of telling you how I feel but have changed my mind, for fear that I may be out of line. I wish I could go back into your childhood and understand why you are the person you have become – emotionally distant, a dogged hardworker and awfully abrasive. With the exception of the emotional piece, I see myself in you.

Those similarities are what drive me insane. As a child, I wanted to be near you at all costs. I wanted you to be around me and enjoy my company. I saw our physical similarities – the eyes and the nose-- and as a trivial youngster thought that was enough to make a connection. Even when we tried the whole “normal family living gig” I was struck by the similarities in our impatient attitudes and way we dismiss people – with our hands.

Or maybe, I took on those mannerisms just to be like you – craving the attention I never received. I would love when you came around – even if it only meant you threw a few 20’s at mom and called it “child support”. Yeah right. You owe that woman more money than you have ever made. You owe her your complete gratitude and appreciation for raising a child that you barely wanted with such selflessness and commitment.

The real reason for this letter is to ask why you have never said I love you. Just three simple words- not simple but hopefully honest. I mean, I cannot imagine how hard it may have been to grow up without your mother around –craving attention from your grandmother who probably had just enough energy to put food on the table and protect you from being a victim of the rampant poverty in central region of DR. Maybe your mom or your dad never told you they loved you.

I wonder if it is because your plan never included having children – seeing them as a distraction towards your rampant conquest of any Dominican woman dumb enough to fall for your crap. Maybe. I do not have a fucking clue why you would not love me. Well, maybe because I do not call you enough or seem to care about you. Or because I seem to only respond when you buy me something – the car I drive and so much more. Forgive me but it was the sole way you seemed to ever show me that you cared as I grew up– with your wallet.

I have tried to do it all to make you love me more – not becoming a statistic, going to an Ivy, not becoming a teen mom, not cursing in your presence, going to church, working in a well respected profession, and even losing weight. Yup, even that. In the back of my mind for the past years, I wondered if you did not love me but I was not thin enough. But, to date, you have not even mentioned anything about my weightloss – positive or negative.

I am rambling at this point, but my question is simple. I know that you are proud of me. I think that you have at least said that before. Well not directly to me as that has never been your style. But your friends and some of the family has mentioned it in conversation. As you get older and the everpresent reality that your tenure on Earth is coming to , as your only child – your daughter – I just need to hear you say it.

-MG

Dear Tiffany,

You are not OK. You haven't been OK for a long time now. The faster you accept it, the sooner you can move forward and get the help you need.

Standing at the threshold of your 28th year is the time where you should be taking a look around and figuring out your options.

While no one expects you to put the rest of your life together you should have some idea of where you're headed and some way of getting there.

Thus far, life has been fairly easy for you. You've managed to meet all the goals you set as a clueless teenager from Podunk, North Carolina.

While most people would see being the first in your family to graduate from college, doing it early, working in your career field and managing to break the family cycle of children out of wedlock, you have managed to convince yourself that you are a failure.

You've taken life's little setbacks and turned them into valleys so deep that light can't get through.

Thus far, you've been able to compartmentalize and shake off depression in order to complete minimal tasks. But as of late, you lack of focus, inability to concentrate and unwillingness to leave your bed on weekends and face it, some weekdays, has started to frighten your family, your friends and most of all yourself.

Depression is an evil bitch that you don't have to fight alone. All you have to do is ask for help. If not for your family and friends, do it for yourself. They don't deserve to watch you suffer and neither do you.

How many more days can you go without making eye contact with yourself in the mirror? How many more nights can you go with only two hours of sleep, if you get any at all?

I'm begging you, please, talk to somebody. This time, don't just make the appointment with the therapist, go. Hell, go early. You're fucking up and this ain't you. #fixit

Love,
Yourself

Dude,

I have this 34 year old stigma that has sorta disallowed me to accept that someone could actually like me. It's one of those things I could blame my mother for (one of the many, MANY things I could blame her for) but I figure that since I'm in my mid-thirties that I should really take responsibility for fixing it. And I really want to believe you're interested in me ... LAWD, I really want to. But the signs aren't nearly as blatant as I need them.

Blatant - you know, like you screaming at me about 2 inches from my face, "I LIKE YOU!" That's the blatant I need. And you're clearly not giving me blatant.

And the reason I want to know is because I'm crushing on you something awful. I can't even be bothered ... with myself! I'm totally stupid about it and the time we spend hanging out is such bitter-sweetness. Sweet because ... well, it's ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. And bitter because ... your'e not fucking giving me blatant.

I've been advised to take it slow and enjoy the ride. That, sir - has never been me. Slow does NOT equal enjoy the ride. Slow = meplayingheadgameswithmyselfoverwhetherornotyoulikeme. And hence this letter. That you'll never see.

Never.

Because my neuroses are splattered all over this here place like I'm a windshield and it's washer fluid. Sure - it wipes off, but it's always there, on the fringes. So, you seriously can't know ...

... that I laugh uproariously on the inside at every funny thing you say - and that it takes my mustering every ounce of *whateverthehellitisIuse* not to literally ROTFL with each joke

... that I pathetically check my cell phone throughout the day JUST in case you sent me a text I missed

... that I ponder seriously how to respond when you DO text - and I often times have a few drafts before I actually hit send.

... that I seriously almost throttled that other dude that was hitting on you right there in front of me and God and EVERYBODY. Or that I seriously despise him now and there's not hope for his crossing over into the friend zone. ever.

... that I keep a mental list of the things I'd buy you if we ever WERE an item.


And you really can't know that I'm not fixated on sex - it's you. The way you carry yourself. The way you speak. It's your worldview and your sense of humor ... your dedication to a goal. The person that is you attracts me ... and it feels like I'm being sucked into a vortex.

But you best believe I'm going to continue to be easy, cool and not-crazy-like whenever we spend time together. Because, dare I say it, even if you aren't feeling me at all ... It's cool that I know you and that we get to be boys. Even if we're not (marriedlivingtogehterinahugehousewithanenormouslawnandawhitepicketfence) an item.

-me

Dear Lil Sis,

How do I even start this letter? How do I find the words to tell you, little sister, it was NOT your fault. None of it was ever your fault.

In the last few months you've been sad and spiraling into the curse that has plagued our family for years...depression, and I know you see it, too. So let's talk this out starting with our Father. Yes I know you would like to paint a rosy picture of what life would have been if he was around but that's because you were too young to remember him and his trifling ways.

No he never hit mommy or cursed at her; he tried to break her emotionally. And I'm sure in private she had her moments but then she looked at us and knew it wasn't worth it. HE wasn't worth it. Our mother chose to raise us. She wasn't abandoned as so many single moms are. She called to her ancestors, her father long passed away and she prayed for strength and they delivered her and US. Though a crucial part of our lives was without the daily presence of a father, we were 10 times luckier to have a mother that moved mountains. We were afforded opportunities that other kids never would have had.

Take a minute and look back on our lives: you were 10 years old in Hawaii, a featured dancer with your African dance troop, and spent an entire Summer in Spain. How many kids did we know that could say these things? Even with two parents.

Mommy worked hard for us, going to a dead end job so she could afford to finish her studies, even taking us to class with her sometimes. She never complained, she just did it! She never once blamed us for his behavior, she even kept his last name to stay connected to us, and she never made us feel like he was an evil person. Her exact words "Some people just aren't ready to be full time parents, but you should still love your father, he loves you".

As we got older he'd appear here and there but mainly it was a check in the mail, a birthday card, an amazing drawing of the three of us but that never filled your void, never filled mine either.

And then I turned 25 and I made a decision to get closure on my own, because clearly he wasn't going to ever provide that and honestly I wasn't interested. I've been free of him for 10yrs now. And in that 10 years I've taken the path my mother prayed for all those nights and now its your turn! You're a beautiful, smart, and talented woman and you are throwing all that out the window because you want for a father, a father that even now manages to only appear when he feels the need to. He hasn't changed, HE WON'T change. But you have to before this eats you alive.

If you don't do it for you do it for your daughter and your mother. But it's time! It's time to stop blaming yourself and lay that emotional burden at the feet of your God and walk away. I promise you it's a lot easier and painless. When we were kids you would recite John 3:16 over and over "for God so loved the world he gave his only be gotten son" well Lil Sis he gave his son so you would never feel like you had to save the world, the people of the world, YOUR FATHER included.

Now you're grown and you feel like some of the bad decisions you've made relate to him. Well, maybe they do. It's still no reason to continue making bad decisions. You're not 17 anymore. My point is that you've learned to recognize the bad so now you need to rid yourself of it and reclaim your happiness. A happiness that you're only entitled to if you participate in it.

I'm sure if you got a chance to read this letter you'd ask me why I'm writing this? Well I'm worried about you, and more importantly your daughter. She's experiencing the same thing only worse because she's an only child. Who does she have to turn to and hide behind? No one. We were lucky there were 3 of us. If she can't depend on you to be strong and selfless who will she ever be able to depend on? When her teen years roll around in a few short years, and her hormones control her every thought, she'll need to have some foundation and she won't if you're depressed.

Of course she'll have us but you and I both know there is nothing like a parent's love in the moments where you're torn. I know you want so many things for yourself, that's normal. But right now you need to focus on her and what's to come in her life.

So I beg of you, stop blaming yourself for what was never your fault and live guilt-free for the sake of you and your magnificent daughter.

I love you with all my heart!

xoxo,
Krishna D.

The Ex-Factor 1.10.10

Dear XXXX,

I just want to let you know that I don't hate you. You did a horrible thing and I'm still trying to figure out why, but I don't hate you.

We knew each other for four years. Forget the whole 'relationship' aspect of what we became, you were my closest confident. You counseled me through some of the most difficult periods in my life. Though we were long distance, you were there more than people who made up my immediate circle. You seemed to work very hard to get me to trust you and then I do, only for you to tell me you're married with kids.

Four years. I'll never understand why you let this thing go on for that long. When the truth came out, we both said hurtful things. I meant what I said. You are a shitty person. Yes of course, some of my anger came from my own ego of having allowed someone to shit on me from a great height, once again, but there's certainly no denying that you are a shitty person. The things you said on the other hand, were lies. To say you never cared about me and the whole thing meant nothing is completely untrue and you know it. You put an awful lot of time, effort and money into someone you never cared about. It's about actions, remember and your actions showed you being a presence in my life virtually every day for those four years. You cared. Your immaturity showed when you only told the truth about your situation after I said I was over 'us'.

I'm not wearing that like a badge of honour. It certainly doesn't warm my heart to know that I thought someone else's husband was my boyfriend and genuinely cared about me. But however much you try to deny it, you did care.

I was mad for a couple of months, but I released it. The anger won't help me progress. I just have to believe that not every man is like you. Please God don't let every man be like you! I just feel sorry for you and your family for what you're doing to them. I feel guilty that all that time you'd spend on the phone with me at night, you should have been with your sons, helping them with their homework or cuddling with your wife. I hope that you're doing everything in your power to make it up to them now. It's infuriating that all the things I want (a marriage, kids), you have and are quite happily pissing all over. If I had those things, I would cherish them.

Here's the thing, I'm still heartbroken. Because I loved what I had with you and I'm sad it was all a lie. But mostly I'm heartbroken that any human can go out of their way to hurt someone like that. I'll be okay. But how do I ever trust someone again? How do I allow someone into my life and not think they'll do the same thing? Eventually I'll figure it out and I'm sure I'll spend my life with someone worthy. You on the other hand, will most likely continue to lie your way through yours and for that, I can do nothing but pity you. What a sad, sad existence you have.

I do genuinely hope that one day you man up and do what you're supposed to do.

Sincerely,
Muireann