The Letter You'll Never Get To See

I can't believe I'm sending another email to you even before you've replied to anything.

Really don't mean to bombard you with so many messages.

It's quite pathetic, really. It's a Friday night and I'm sitting at home trying hard not to feel sorry for myself, and pouring my heart out to a friend whose name I'm unsure of and whose face I've never seen.

At times I wonder if I made you up. Maybe you're Hobbes to my Calvin. Does that make me insane? Yeah, probably.

And yet I still write.

The gig that I mentioned to you is going on now. The gig that should have been mine. It should have been me on the floor, not some last minute replacement.

I tried to set up clubbing for tonight, just so I'd have a distraction. But it's not happening because one of the girls has gone to Germany. We'll do it when she gets back, I suppose.

And remember I said that my best friend was coming over tonight, and I was looking forward to that? Well, as my luck would have it, something happened and she's not coming after all.

And so I find myself in the very position I didn't want to be in, despite all the effort.

I like being alone. I like my own company. I can sit on my own and just read or think or do whatever for hours. But God, it's lonely tonight.

Even WoW is not as alluring, at least not without you in it. I logged off soon after you left, even though I'd planned to quest and push Vash to 49. It actually got pretty lonely without you. What have you done to me?

My dance partner and I once went to an island resort. It was beautiful and idyllic... white sand, warm breeze, swaying palm trees, gentle waves. I made him jump off the dock with me. He's too conservative, too sensible, too... safe. And then I made him dance with me at the shoreline, where the waves washed up on the sand. He lifted me on his shoulder, and I felt like I was flying. He twirled me around, we spun and twisted and stretched and laughed and had the most wonderful time. The tourists... all those Caucasians trying so diligently to tan themselves... sat up and watched, and some even cheered and applauded.

How I'm going to miss all that.

I wish it were easy to find another partner. If I could, I'd find one and start dancing again tomorrow. But I always tell people that finding the right dance partner can be more impossible than finding the right LIFE partner. People don't realise it, but there are so many things to consider. Other than height, experience and ability, there's so much more that can make a partnership brilliant, instead of just bearable.

And like love, you don't find it easily, or often.

I hate it that my dancing, my joy and passion, is so dependent on another person. I hate it that I am a much better dancer with than without a man. I hate it that I can't say "screw them all" and dance myself into my happily ever after. I guess it's the price I pay for falling for Latin dance. It seems so capricious. It gives me wild joy, it leaves me in despair. I've felt the most exquisite ecstasy, and the most crushing defeat. It gives and it takes away.

In a way, I didn't choose Latin dance, it chose me. From the minute I first saw it, I fell hard. I can't even remember the first time I saw my first boyfriend, but I remember clearly the first time I saw a couple dancing Latin. They were doing the rumba, the dance of love. Figures.

Partner dancing is so beautiful. Two bodies in motion, creating art, creating poetry, telling a story. You bring out the best your partner's capable of, you show each other off, and you use each other to make your own dancing better, and reach new heights together that you couldn't possibly achieve on your own.

Darn, got interrupted by a call on my mobile. Some guy who's been trying to get me to go out with him for the longest. Ironically, he calls me on the one Friday night that I'm available and could do with a distraction. But I'm really not in the mood to socialise, put on my happy face and make light conversation with someone I barely know. And now I've lost my thoughts.

Ok, now I know this email is not going to get sent to you. Somewhere along the way, it turned into another ranting diary entry. Maybe I'll edit it and put it up on my blog. The shallow satisfaction of baring my soul in anonymity, lost in the noise and buzz of the web.

In this tiny way, we’re alike, you and I. Sometimes, I just NEED to write, even if it’s just for myself and never read by another human eye. I have to, or I’ll a) explode, b) be depressed or c) go stark raving mad.

I suppose one of the reasons you won't be reading this is because it's so full of me, me, me and the great big morass of negativity I'm wallowing in right now. I like to think I'm a good listener. And a good listener hears with her heart, not just her ears. And she hears what's not said. Which is why I felt your heartache when you told me everything that was bothering you the other day. I'd like to think I shared your pain, and in that way made it more bearable. A shared burden is a lighter burden, isn't it?

So while I was still aching from your break up and your problems with your boss (the nasty little prick), along comes my dance partner's break up (what a melodramatic disaster that was) and my own subsequent problem, which is the loss of said dance partner. It all culminated into what I'm feeling now.

And I'd spare you this whole unwanted piece of junk if I can. And I will. Just in case you're as good and involved a listener as I am. :)

I want to have a picture of you so I'll know you're real, and so that it's not so lonely tonight. But you won't know that.

Goodbye, Dance

It's been a beautiful, bittersweet, incredible two-and-a-half years.

I remember wishing it would never, never end. I remember thinking that I was SO happy, that I could spend my whole life just like this.

As they say, all good things come to an end.

The pain hasn't hit yet. I'm holding it at bay. I'm going to try to lose myself in WoW, in friends, in whatever distraction I can find.

I don't suppose I can blame him. Hell, who's to blame in any situation like this? Do I despise him for loving his girlfriend so much? Do I curse the fates that they broke up? Do I fall into deep despair because he wants to move to the UK to be with her?

I suppose I'll have to learn to let go myself. Yes, he was a fantastic partner. We hit it off so well, we had such great times, we were friends as well as dance partners. I couldn't ask for a better one, and there has never been a better one.

And so it's moving on time. He may not want to move on: he'll cling to his relationship with her to his last breath. Which is why I'm forced to move on.

It makes me wonder... if I was forced to choose, what would I do? It's not a matter between love and dance. I love dance. Dance is my Grand Passion, my great love, eversince I was a child. Dance was here before any man.

I guess this is where our paths diverge. I knew from the beginning that his hunger was not as great as mine, that the fire did not burn as bright. Besides his girlfriend on a high pedestal, he often puts work first. Priority Number One. And then there's all work-related activities.

We haven't had a decent practice since April, more than two months ago. First was his trip to the US (work-related, as usual), then he was moved to a different project where he was so busy he hardly had time to breathe, much less dance. And now the girlfriend.

Am I complaining? Do I even have a right to? Hell, yes. As his dance partner, I'm entitled to SOMETHING. Some small part of his priorities. I don't expect him to put his life on hold, but I've spent more time than I want to think about just waiting... waiting for him to call or sms to let me know whether he can make it for practice, or for a dance-related function we'd agreed to attend ages ago.

Maybe I should be grateful that I had the prep time before the big blow. I have a reasonably soft landing. For two months now, things haven't been quite right. We haven't practiced much, I haven't seen much of him, and when I do, he's exhausted and morose. We haven't talked in a long time.

So, counting my blessings, at least this didn't hit me from out of nowhere and knock me over senseless.

Do I start the hunt for a new partner immediately? Do I wait it out? No, enough waiting.

I WILL dance again, someday, with someone. Hopefully that someone will be a wonderful person too, but we'll see.

(I just realised I'm always upstaged by unwitting girlfriends. My partner before him also left me because he wanted to dance with his spanking new girlfriend. As I predicted (not to him, of course) it didn't work out. And then he tells me he should have stuck to me. Tell me something I DON'T know. Men always make such messes of themselves and their lives.)

I need to get away. I need some time out. I don't want to think. I don't want to feel.

Coz, man, it's gonna hurt like bloody hell.