A LESSON IN COMMUNICATION.
Recently, I have been experiencing so many different communication exchanges and/or lack of communication, period, it is hard to keep track what kind of communication exchange I have with Person A, Person B, and Person C.The first instance is mandatory avoidance. The message is: Do not talk to me. Do not email me. Do not text message me. Do not call me at 7 a.m. Do not leave me voicemails. Do you understand. This is mandatory for my happiness and sanity. I hope you understand, but if not, don't call me explaining to me that you don't understand.
The second instance is the deceptive avoidance. The message is: Yes, of *course* we can hang out; yes, I like you and our friendship. You are great. I am great. We both are just plain having fun and life is great! However, I will not text you back or call you back ever. You know when I said that we will hang out? I had good intentions but I never see anything through. Even though I received a phone message from you a couple of days ago, I cannot call you back and why on earth do you think I would? I am a loner. How dare you expect me to be honest.
I am on the receiving end of the deceptive avoidance and I hope it is not due to death, dismemberment or a serious affliction.
The third instance (my favorite) is lost communication found. I constantly am writing in my journal(s), on my laptop, personal computer, work computer, backs of receipts and on a million post-its. Eventually, I will be taken over by paper and full hard-drives but until then, it is tolerable chaos. I do lose journals. I do lose handwritten letters. I do lose things.
While cleaning through boxes in storage and reading diaries from years ago, out of a plastic bag fell a neon yellow diskette. Being I rarely, if ever, save anything to diskette to transfer to another computer (so Neanderthal), my curiousity peaked. It peaked in such a way, it was as though I found a key to the lock that opens wide Johnny Depp's zipper.
Scrambling on my way to work this morning to see what the diskette would reveal, I hesitated: Would it be something completely stupid or embarrassing? Would I feel awkward? What if it is nothing? It is nothing. It is probably work product from a law firm I worked at years ago. But what if it isn't? No one will see me reading it -- no one is here so if I open it and read it, I don't have to act like it is no big deal if it is, in fact, a huge deal.
I opened the one document on the diskette. The document was titled February 14, 2005. I backtracked in my mind, recollecting and remembering where I was and what happened that day. Seeing that it was 12 pages long, I was unsure if I should read the painful letter. So I sat here, with all 12 pages, eyes wide, mouth dropped to the floor. It was a very difficult letter for me to read because I am still in contact with the intended recipient and the last two years have been *very* tough. I never printed or sent the letter. I never did it.
And now it is three years later. I had to give it to the original recipient. I emailed the following with the letter as an attachment:
I want you to have it. I never gave it to you. I saved it to work on it later and, apparently, I either saved it for a day that never came and/or I never gave it to you. I am pretty sure I did not have the courage to give it to you. You can have it now.
I don't know how the letter will be received. I am not really concerned about it. I did not do it to cause controversy, but I thought to be fair, that I should send it having found it and never having sent it before. I don't know if that is bad, but I am sure to find out.
Maybe.
[panic]
Picture: Communication by Isabelle Cardinal
Labels: letters, stop reading my weblog
