04-27-05 @ 9:14 am EDT

To I., who I addressed in an earlier entry this month:

I., I am sorry if I hurt you in my entry. It was not my intention. My ONLY intention in that entry, and in the note I left you recently, was in the SLIGHT hopes that perhaps something could be salvaged. I did not mean to attack you. I meant only to present my side of the story. I had hoped that you would read it back when I posted it, but it looks like you do not read my journal. That was why I left the note. I would have sent it as an e-mail--but you've seen our history with e-mails. I really, truly did not think you wanted any from me.

Your friend's words to me I found incredibly hurtful and uncalled for. I have not read your notes yet and I do not have the heart to. By now, all I will read from you will be a personal e-mail, and you would have to give it a clear subject so I will know where you are coming from--if you are angry with me or not. Because I am so hurt by now that I can't read anything else. THAT is why I never read any of your notes. I was too afraid of what you would say. I was afraid that you would say, "Fine, f**k you. Go away" or some such. Because frankly, I would probably say that to me, too. My behavior gives people plenty of reason to do that.

I tried to defend myself in response to your friend's note but there was no response to it. I still feel I was not completely in the wrong, and your friend was unnecessarily harsh in response. I know she was only defending you, but she assumed some things about me, incorrectly, while believing that I should know things I had no way of knowing. Please allow me to defend myself again here, just so you can get a picture of what was going on in my head when I wrote that, since your friend tried to do the same for you.

Recently, I have lost contact with a LOT of people who have been in regular contact with me for months or even years. I see them online a lot, but they no longer write to me, and I don't know why. This has been ongoing in the five years I've been online. EACH of these people, when I dared to ask what might be wrong, assured me it was not my fault and they would get back in touch with me. And so far, most of them haven't. So can you really blame me so much for thinking this was another example of the same? All I knew of you was that you had been online enough to post some survey and meme-type entries, but not to reply to me. I DID NOT KNOW you were having such difficulties--and honestly, back when we were writing, you didn't seem to be having them--you were just busy with school or something. If you DID post about these in your journal, it must have been late along because I was not reading it by then. I'm sorry if I missed it. But I really cannot be blamed for not knowing what you were going through, if I had no way of knowing. I'm sorry if I assumed incorrectly, but all I had to go on was past experience--which so far has proven completely right, every time.

You told me, repeatedly, that my long e-mail was no problem. Your friend now says it was ridiculously long and hinted that it was foolish of me to send such an e-mail to a "stranger." I explained that I did not see us as strangers since we WERE in contact in the past--I know about your writing, your art, your websites; we e-mailed each other (I remember commenting on your Zarbon drawing, and I remember you telling me repeatedly to write back soon, something I failed to do :( ); I even read your journal back then (I remember you being grounded once); I even have a piece of your art on my site! You drew it specifically for my story--remember? Perhaps your friend did not know this, or perhaps I was stupid to assume we could be that close. In any case, I did ask you and you said that you had no problem with the long mail. When you did not reply to it I did offer you, a few times, the chance to back out of any friendship with me--to just close the door on it. You said you did not want that. So I decided to wait.

The thing is, I have had so many people in the past make me wait for months, years even, that I really do not KNOW how long somebody is supposed to wait. All I know is whenever I make somebody wait for even a week I get grief about it and am told that I am being a bad friend. So, I don't understand it when people say that I have to wait. By now, I really just can't stand it. If you had told me long ago that you would not be able to get back to me for a week, a month, six months even, I would have accepted it. Completely! If I had reason to believe that, once that week/month/six months was past, you would write to me. All I know is, you said you would write back...and never did. I really didn't know how long I was supposed to wait. From the looks of it, forever. I know that other people get upset when made to wait. I wish you could have at the very least either told me back then that it would be impossible for us to correspond, or that you had just sent me a short note letting me know that there would be no communication until a certain time. And then of course upheld that promise. I am fully able to wait and be patient as anything, if I at least know there will be an end to that wait.

I apologize if that comes across harshly--but I don't know how it is that you do things with your existing friends. If you know you will not be able to keep in touch with them for a while, do you let them know? I would do this with my friends, if I had any. So far though practically no one has ever done this for me, so I might be wrong. I really can't tell. I have no model to go on for how to be a good friend because I've never had any that lasted very long!

I apologize that I never read your responding notes. The truth is, as I said, I wanted you to e-mail me then, not respond to the notes. I am too afraid to read them. Especially now that your friend has spoken up. If how she feels is how you feel, then completely disregard any of this entry and forget I ever wrote a word to you. If however you do not feel completely the same way, then please keep reading and hear me out. I am trying so hard to not be so judgemental but to still explain my own reason for feeling hurt. Perhaps I reacted in the wrong way--fully possible--and I'm sorry if I did. But I do feel I had good reason to feel hurt.

The only reason I even bothered so long was because I thought we had so much in common. Even now. I wrote up a VERY angry, bitchy entry before this--and one before that--and then I took a breath and sat here to type this. I should be writing fiction right now, but instead, I'm writing this. I don't even know if I'll post it, and even if I do if I'll dare to draw your attention to it, because, no offense, I am afraid of offending your friend yet again. Her note truly embarrassed me. If how that made me feel is how my entry made you feel, then I apologize from every single part of me. I NEVER intended that! I had only ever meant to explain my case so maybe you would understand and we could try again. It looks instead like I blew it, as always.

I didn't know you lost your story. Don't you know you could have contacted me and asked for it? I think I have it somewhere, though I'm not sure. :( Sorry. But I sent you the short stories long ago, and even up until I tried to burn the bridge (i. e., when I noted you the other day), I would have been fully willing to send it to you. In fact the only reason I drew your attention to that entry recently was in the hopes of trying to reconcile. You asking for your story, I could have used that as an attempt to reconcile. Even now that I'm fairly certain you want nothing more to do with a bitch like me, if you still don't have the story, I would be willing to send it if I have it. I'm pretty sure, based on your friend's note, that you in fact have the story again, and I cannot be of any help (if I even have it--it's not on this computer, at least), but I wish you had known you could have at least asked me. I can only imagine how horrible it would feel to lose such work.

God, I am so hoping this entry does not piss you or your friend off...just for my sake I'm going to make it no notes. I ask ONLY that your friend not respond in any way...that you be the only one to respond, if you even do. You do not have to--by any means. I would understand. I would not even post this publicly if I were not so embarrassed right now. But maybe I should post it publicly, to let you know I really mean it, and to make up for the older entry. I did not mean to be hurtful. If I'm being hurtful yet again, again I do not mean it. If it were anyone else I were writing to, but for maybe two people at the moment, I wouldn't have tried so hard. And them only because one of them, like you, is so similar to me, and the other I have known for so long. Everybody else who let me down, I bitched them out and pushed them away and never gave them a third chance. I hope you do not think I am speaking here about "giving you a chance," because I am asking if you would give ME a chance. Perhaps the reason you never wrote was because you had given up on me or didn't think I wanted to hear from you? I always wanted to hear back from you. Even now. Even with as angry and hurt as I feel (not toward you, but toward the note, and the situation), I would like to hear back. I wouldn't even bother trying this if I hadn't grown to like you and your work so much in the short time I knew you. (And I do still hope someday that you will finish that thing! When you have the time, of course. I really have no clue but I had hoped once you would enjoy my story with all the Set warrior guys having sex with each other. But then again I don't know you that well...)

I don't know if you got a single positive thing out of the "I Suck" entry--but I did mean them. I really did like your writing, and I really did want to be your friend, and your fan. I just really felt that YOU didn't want that. Was I wrong? The great majority of my brain is saying that yes, I was. But in the tiny shred of a chance that I wasn't, I'm writing this last entry.

If I can summon up the guts I will attempt to leave you one last note--which I'm not sure I can do, since I took you off my friends list and you probably took me off of yours. (I haven't had the heart to go see.) If I can't, then maybe I'll leave a note in response to a note you left me, though I still cannot bring myself to read any of your notes--sorry. I spent all of yesterday night and morning crying, and hitting myself, because after reading the note I did I felt so awful and stupid for ever bothering you. If your notes to me were angry then I cannot bear to take that chance right now; I can't bear to break down crying like that yet again. So I will do this cowardly little thing and try to leave a note so you will notice this entry, because I don't think you will read it otherwise.

If you are angry and feel the same way as your friend, then do not respond, and I won't bother you anymore. I'll take your drawing down from my site and you can forget an unpleasant person like me ever existed. If however you would want to try again, afresh perhaps because all of this has become so awful that I don't even want to deal with it anymore--just pretend I never even sent you that stupid 60kb e-mail--then please, send me a private e-mail...and tell me your state of mind in the subject. Because if I don't know the tone of it, whether you're going to be happy, upset, angry, or what, I will not have the courage to even open it. I need to know if things are safe before I read them now, after what I went through yesterday. -_-

I would even send you my snail mail address if you wanted it. If you can't communicate online it's fine, I never had a problem with that. It's just that by the time you stated that, I was too hurt to read your response, and did not think you wanted to hear from someone like me. Almost none of those other people who lost touch with me has ever written back, so maybe you see why I felt that way, and even now still do?

I do not blame you if I never get an e-mail from you. It will hurt so much, since I hate such endings especially after trying like this, but I'll accept it and not bother you again. Whatever you do I apologize that I was hurtful, and if you really did not want me to write to you, then I apologize for bothering you too.