I am breaking my code today. I am so tired of hearing about Valentines Day – the one day of year which features commercialised romance, wilting flowers and lack lustre performances of love and adoration.

For some.

This morning I awoke in my new apartment to the sharp reminder as to why I am still single. Do you know what that sound was?

A women begging her partner to leave her alone. Screaming. Shouting. The tell tale signs of Domestic Violence.

I´ve been there. My mothers been there.

When all fell eeringly quiet but for the faint sobbing of a broken woman I felt a selfish sense of relief. The memories of my own experiences eased and I could begin work. During the course of the day my feelings of guilt crept into the limelight, the selfish betrayal of another woman in need. Two years ago that could have been me. Forty years ago that could have been my mother.

Happy Valentines Day. I´ll stick to my small box apartment, eat my Pizza and watch my movie.

Its like beginning to write or draw on a fresh piece of paper or cracking open that brand new notepad or journal for the first time.

When I decided to return to Wordpress after several years of Expression Engine I planned to transfer over all the old entries. Eight years of them to be exact. But the archives never were transferred over. I wrote the module. I tested it once to confirm it works succesfully and then, after all that work, I selected the content and clicked delete. All gone. Every last one.

It was immensely liberating.

You see, after all I have been through this last eight years, the deletion of the old in order to begin afresh was symbolic. I was tired of the constant flicking back to remind myself of what had been – the good and the bad. The old entries, interesting as some were, held me in a past from which there seemed no escape. My writers muse was blocked by eight years of complete and utter gibberish.

I wanted a fresh slate.

So I didnt wipe the old slate clean, I smashed the damn thing. Not only here but in my personal life. I´ve clung to the past too damn long and now I intend to begin anew. I´ve wallowed in guilt, relied too heavily on others, and I have hidden away from life.

Its time to take a fresh approach to writing, to blogging, and most important of all, to life.

Welcome to Topical TuesdayTopical Tuesday – a new meme where we try and get people to just discuss topics on their blogs. Topics are posted on Tuesdays. Post your thoughts and opinions on your own blog! Pass it around!
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Topic :: The Time to Tell Them

You are invited to write a blog entry, a letter or even a poem (if that’s your thing) to someone. This someone could be someone you know very well or it could be a stranger you met briefly but who had a great impact on you. It could be to your partner, your parents or your high school teacher who believed in you. It could even be to someone you have never met before but whose actions you read or heard about and changed the way you see something. Your post should be about how they affected you and how one thing (maybe even more than one thing) they did, big or small, gave you strength, inspired you or changed your life. Tell them how you feel and how much they mean to you. It doesn’t matter if you have told them before, do it again

Dear A,

I remember your face so vividly – those twinkling eyes, and laughing smile most of all. You had the most amazing skin. You always smelled so good when you gave me “dos besos”. Thats what I remember most about you. That, and your enormous heart.

I had seen you in the bar a few times during the course of the first month there. I thought you extremely handsome, and extremely funny. But you first approached me on my lowest day. I had been mugged, and had lost a great deal of money. You came up and gave me a dos besos and a hug, and told me that I had friends now, and I wasn´t alone. You never once broke that promise.

I have so many good memories of you. Most of them centred around the bar, when we would play games. There was the time we were really silly, and spent a few hours playing by the bar when you had finished work. I kept sneeking up and knocking your hat off. We really made people talk that day, and subsequently your girlfriend became less than friendly.

People were so sure we were more than friends. I spent so much time arguing the contrary that I never stopped to consider that maybe they sensed something we both didn´t – or chose to ignore. You were always so loyal and good.

You winding Dave up when France was beating England in the football. You were so proud to be French. You and M dressed up as women for the yearly festival. You both looked more feminine than half the women in that bar, especially M.

Remember the fancy dress party? I didn´t have a costume, and you rescued me, and we dressed as Geisha´s. You were very drunk A! The date was the 7th of March 2008. We won the fancy dress. You behaved like a complete loony, but it would not have been as fun without you. You were the life and soul of any party or bar. For the first time I sensed that maybe there was something between us. We were walking from your flat to the bar, arm in arm. You were telling me what a fantastic person you thought I was, I was so busy thinking how I wanted that moment to last forever.

Two weeks later I found you drunk outside the bar. You told me it was the anniversary of your son´s death. You were in so much pain. I sat and talked to you for two hours, convincing you that you had everything to live for. You kept saying you wanted to die too. That you had nothing to live for. I am glad you told me that you wanted to live the next day, because of me and what I had said.

Two weeks later, to the day, (the 7th of April 2008) I was sat outside a house with dozens of people, equally desperate for news that you were alive inside that calapsed cave. We waited, and waited, as various rescue teams attempted the delicate task of finding you and M amongst that rubble. The cave was very unstable, and it was a dangerous job. I saw you come out, I knew it was you because I had heard that you were closest to the door when the cave calapsed. I knew you would come out first. Even seeing you and M being brought out in body bags did not prepare me for the news that you were found “sin vida”. To this day I still cannot handle it being said about you. I heard the news you were dead around the same time we entered that bar dressed as geisha´s just a month ago 10:32pm.

I went to the viewing. M was in a closed casket, although he had an Orthodox blessing and so we saw him when they blessed his face. You were in an open casket. I am afraid I broke down. Various people thought you looked asleep. I think they must have been seeking comfort, because for me, the essense that was you had gone. It was just a shell.

The day of the viewing the only comfort I could find was a recurring memory, which I treasure to this day. Its a simple one, but it was the last time you, M, S and I were together. S was behind the bar , stood at the corner. M, as usual, on the opposite side of the bar, but stood at her side. I was stood next to M´s side, and he as usual was taking the piss out of me whilst flirting with S. I looked up, and you were stood at the far side of the bar. You looked at me, smiled and winked. This was Saturday night. We were happy to be together, completely unaware of what was to come.

It took your death to make me realise that there was some grounding to those rumours. The saddest part was that a note was found a short while ago, from you to me, telling me how you felt. It was the same. I miss you so much. I have left the town now. But I will never forget my Frenchman. I just wish I could hear you sing “I believe I can fly” once more. You were a terrible singer A, but no one sang it like you.