n.2. a story to tell

What you are participating in is halfway between a social experiment and a writing therapy approach.

Few weeks ago, I made a list of receivers. They don’t have a real connection the ones with the others, a part that I have something I've never told them. Among them: a couple of friends, an ex boyfriend, two relatives, and a semi-stranger. This is not a 40 years old crisis. Rather the opposite. I am doing well lately. Well, better than last winter for sure. I would call it more a turning point, towards what though...i still don’t know.

Tonight, my list says I should write to you. This is the second letter of the seven I planned to write. The non-relation with you it’s a part of my incomplete puzzle.

Yeah, well…maybe I am slightly late.

Last time I saw you, it was about two years ago in Paris. I remember, at Gare de Lyon, the feeling of you leaving was a mix of frustration and de-stress.

Two years ago. It seems almost unreal. That’s why I can write about it now. Even if I don’t remember precisely every hour of that visit, I do remember that, by the end, I was pissed off.

Oh gosh, I started writing to send you this, but now I am only considering to let you know what has been going on in my mind. Well, if you are reading this, it means that I finally found the strength to keep on going with my writing project. All in all, I think a letter is always something nice to receive, don’t you think? I mean, if it does not contain any bad news, of course. For me, it’s a writing therapy, for you… I don’t know, but I guess it’s nice to get something unexpected and to see that our passage leaves something to other people.

I am sorry, I have been an horrible host in Paris. The reason is that I am uncomfortable in taking decisions for others. Being a mother is different. I decide for my kids all the time. It’s normal. At work, I leave my assistant as much freedom as I can. Well, at least I give her some possibilities to choose. In general, I don’t like to feel responsible for others. The responsibility becomes a burden if the person “depending” on me is someone that does not completely fall in the category “friend” or “kid” or “assistant”. Do you know that there are two kinds of persons? Dogs and Cats. For most of my life I thought to be a cat, or I wanted to be seen as such. Then I became a dog-person. I liked the idea of stability. No more loneliness, no more decisions to take. Lots of wagging tail and cuddles and life is easy. I am serious, for a while, it really was.

Basically the main issue with you, and the reason for this letter, is the unclassified thing we had. Not because it was “unclassified”, but more because we didn’t even said each other that we wanted it to be “unclassified”! Before you came to Paris, I was scared. I had promised myself to ask you why you came and what you were thinking. But finally, I did not manage to surprise myself, and I let you go without pulling a word out of your mouth.

I’ve never been good at relationships. And I am even worse at talking about relationships. Really, words just don’t come out. Since I was 14, I found boys who, facing my aplomb, were forcing me: “please Susan, tell what you think, its not that hard…”, they forced me saying, somehow, what I wanted. In front of it, I have to pull myself together. With you, I really wanted to know, so I should have been the one asking. But I badly failed. I really have problems with questions. I never told you, but I even studied to become a journalist. That would have been the limit: a journalist afraid of questions. It might be because of some traumas in my childhood…bah, who knows. But, you, you put me in front of a big challenge without even being aware of it. I was happy you were finally there. I spent months longing for a new meeting with you. Then when you wrote me that you would have been travelling to Paris for a work meeting, I passed from being happy to insanely scared. And when the time came and you arrived, I discovered myself so shy and clumsy. For days I’ve been constantly trying to find something intelligent to say, but I was too scared of doing something wrong or saying some bullshits, so I always opted for silence. Classic. While you opted for bullshits. I understand.

There is one thing I am proud of, but at the same time it can turn to be a disadvantage. I can’t lie. I mean, I can’t pretend to feel fine if I am not, I can’t laugh if I find a joke stupid. But verbal communication is all another story. During those days in my mother’s flat in rue de Merlin, I felt the less attractive person on earth, while, usually, I’m kind of self confident in my being an interesting person. That wasn’t me. I couldn’t really react. Even if I was realizing it, my mind was completely out of service. I don’t remember that well how it was during those days, but all in a sudden I felt we were sleeping together just because we were bored. You were not saying anything. You were there, we were deadly bored, and you were like everything was fine. I hated this. Did you have a good time? I don’t think so, since you completely disappeared. In Paris, I did not have expectations about you declaring love of anything close to that. I was happy with being your sweet great escape for some days. I just wanted us to enjoy our time together. I don’t even know if you are married now, or you have a girlfriend, or two.

Hey, wait, maybe I didn’t expect anything, but that doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t have liked that to happen. It’s unbelievable how the pale idea to press that “send” prevent me from saying what I feel, even writing. Were we not compatible or was it a question of miscommunication? (Ja, rather non-communication at all).

Besides the awkward boredom of those days, I remember the night we were on the roof having an apéro at my Polish colleague’ place. You put your hand on my knee. What what what? This inscrutable stranger is opening a bit up- I thought. But, with my exaggerate dose of optimism I thought it was just because of the wine. So, even later, when we ended up hand in hand, I retreated mine straight away after few seconds. I had this period when I wanted to behave like a man. Not a normal one, but an asshole like many. The worst thing is that when you play a role for sometime, then you get used to it, and you cannot recognize anymore which is your real nature. You get lost in your character.

I was protecting me from something that I was looking for. Leaving my husband home with a lame excuse. Travelling all the way to Paris to protect myself from an emotion, the verve that I couldn’t find anymore in my marriage.Absurd.

I’ve always liked the idea to have a non-string relation like the one we had. It’s like a game. Hopefully, I still love playing. That unclassified thing we had has been something standing out of a boring daily life. The kind of exciting thing you can tell your friends, you can write a story about, especially because it was illegal. Like when, after graduation I jumped naked from a 10 meters diving-board, I got my tailbone broken and a technicolor ass for one month. This one is definitely the best story of my life repertoire. It was before I started sitting everyday behind my desk 9-17. I was still fit. Now, with 10 kilos more, the impact with the water would kill me, no doubt about it. I’ve never wanted to jump. It was just because I was bored and I needed something to tell to my future nephews. Sorry about the wandering… I was saying, those few days, that sweet parenthesis out of the world, helped me in accepting my being a mother, a bored wife and an unmotivated boss. I wanted our meeting in Paris to be like it was the first time in Frankfurt, when I came for the book fair. Yes, actually Frankfurt: episode number one, for me was an unexpected earthquake. I think it is because of those days that you still pop-up to my mind. It is because of that time that I still check you out sometimes, sending you lame sms. After Paris though, I lost any hope, you never answered one of my attempt to reach you.

I don’t know if normal people write letters like this one, after years. Maybe it just happens in the books I sell. So what I am doing now is basically trying to turn my day, once again, in a story to tell.