A Letter to 2015

Goodbye 2015,

I know that is neither the correct nor the formal way to address the head of a letter, however, you are going away. The only time I will ever see you again will be in my mind when I play back our memories.

If I’m being honest— which I always am— you were a fucking disaster. Due to my own negligence, I promised to focus on myself during our time together and fell a distance short. Looking back, I realize that I told myself one thing then did something completely different. I started off with you lying to myself about what it was that was holding me back from what I truly wanted. It was me. You taught me that I am truly the only one who can stand in the way of my own happiness and that it is important to figure myself out before I try and figure anyone else out.

In a way I suppose I did find myself a bit more than I thought I had just a few minutes ago— and I tell myself that the year after you will be for myself too— but the truth is that every year is about me. As selfish as it sounds it is utterly true. Each year (past and future) shapes me into the person I am becoming. And I suppose it’s odd to put it that way because I don’t ever expect myself to “become” someone. I used my time with you to become who I am now, and objectively speaking, the years in the future will have done so too.

You taught me that I will never settle. I will always be in search for a way to evolve myself. I have come to terms with the messes that I have made this year which ultimately led to what I referred to you as, a disaster. At this point in writing I have realized that yes, indeed, you were a disaster. But a beautiful disaster.

A mess of the failed words, failed romances, failed efforts, failed jokes, failed emotions, and failed promises shattered into a mural that now covers the floor. I was walking to the end of our road with my head down about all of those failures and somehow managed to miss the picture that it left on the floor. Now that I’m looking at it, I almost can’t fathom that they weren’t failures but flukes. This picture is my life with you and my motivation for my life this upcoming year.

Thank you so much for the time we have had together. I will cherish it forever because I have also really come to terms with the fact that time is a fragile element and we aren’t guaranteed any more than we think we ought to be.

You’ll forever be in my book of  blessins’ and lessons.

Yours Always,

Delany Breitbach

Haunted

And when he said goodbye, I thought that everything about him would change. I thought that the him I had found myself so wrapped up in would remain as so only in the stardust of my memories.

But I was wrong.

His eyes still pierce mine with a deadly hazel stare. His smell still entrances me every time I catch a hint of it. His voice still makes my heart jump every time it spills out of his smirking lips, giving me hope that maybe someday his words will once again be meant for my ears.

I won’t forget the things that only I knew, they will remain trapped in my mind. No matter how many times I set them free, they will always come in with the rain and flood the empty heart where flowers once bloomed. Maybe at one time I was special, I was different. But things change and people do— I guess — too. Not their mannerisms but their desires. And how painful it is to be unwanted. To know that someone who was once addicted to every single piece of me, now craves a new taste.

The things that once surrounded me with comfort are now haunting me in my sleep. I thought at least I would have some freedom when I shut my eyes, but every time I close mine, I see yours. Taunting me like emeralds behind a glass case, reminding me that I can look all that I want, but I can’t touch.

In the end, I just want him to be happy— even if I can’t be. I want him to find what will fill him with joy when the sun rises and hold him at night when it sets. Now I can’t stop thinking about how ironic it is that they tell you to find someone who makes you happy, but not to depend on others for happiness.