A love letter to myself.

To you. The person who has my heart, quite literally. It is there, beating in your chest sustaining us. Loving us.

There was a time when you were the person I hated most in the world. When I wanted you dead. When I was so sad that you just kept waking up in the morning. There have been times when I have questioned why people like you or why anyone would ever care about you. There have been moments where I have thought of you as the lowest of the low, not even worthy of being called a person. It has taken me years to move passed the doubts and the belief that you were a disappointment. I have to admit that I still have my moments, but they are few and very far between now. I have come to realise that I actually quite like you. Not only do I like you, but you might also be one of my favourite people.

I love you. I love the way you like to nap in the sun. I love the way you are only funny by accident. I love the way you fall in love with new thing all the time, and that you fall hard every time you do. We have known each other longer than we have known anyone else. You are always the first person to know my secrets and the last person to say good night before bed.

I love you. I love that you treat your car like a person, Derek (the car), deserves it for putting up with us. I love that you put comfort above all things. I love that you always have more than one project of the go at once, usually a few more than you can reasonably manage. We both agree that pyjamas are the best clothes and we both wish that we had the confidence to stop caring about what other people may think and just wear what we want, when we want. That silver, velvet cloak looks amazing on you.

I love you. I love how messy your room is, it makes me feel safe. I love how you plan stories that will never see the light of day and put as much effort into them as you do into the ones that stand a chance of being read someday. I love how your hair looks in the mornings, ringlets standing proudly on the top of your head like Medusa’s snakes. You provide me with endless entertainment. Stories. Songs. Silly dances. I am never board when I listen to you and I am always inspired when you don’t hold back.

I love you. I love the way your chin disappears into your neck without a trace from time to time. I love the way that your body keeps moving even when you’ve stopped dancing. I love the way you can’t sit still to save your life. You give great hugs, and you are comfortable to curl up on. The extra layers of squidge keep you warm all the time and make sure that you don’t really need to change your wardrobe for different seasons.

I love you. I love that your ‘to read’ book pile is ever growing. I love that of all the things you could organise you pick the DVD shelf 9 times out of 10, even when it’s already perfect. I love that you want to make things, anything, just because you can. I trust your judgement, even if you’re slow to act. I value your opinions even when they are harsh. You never fail to find something interesting in every conversation and your choice of friends is second to none, you really do pick the best people.

I love you. I love that you have to say ‘cat’ whenever you see a cat, just so everyone else can appreciate their majesty. I love that you know your limits and that you have learnt to say no. I love that you spend more time and energy perfecting fictional lives than you will ever spend on your own. You are the person whose company I seek out when the world is getting a bit too much to deal with. You are the person who bears the brunt of my anger and the person who is able to wash the rage away and calm me down. I know it took practice, but you are usually the one who tells me that my fears are irrational and that no, that stranger over there does not think you are a disgusting blight on society.

I love you although we may not always agree. I love you even though I lash out and say cruel things about you when I’m feeling vulnerable. I need you to know that I love you, always. It has taken years to come to this realisation. So many painful years of misplaced anger and loneliness. But when I look at all the things that make up who you are, I realise that there are far more things that I love than I hate.

I need to remember to tell you more often that I love you, because it’s true. Failing to acknowledge the things I love about you just caused us pain. You need to know that you are loved and who better to tell you that than me.

Like all things with meaning in my life, it is easier for me to write down how I feel than say them aloud. So I will write it here as many times as possible just to send the message home. I love you. I love you. I love you.

I love ME.

At last I love being me.