Unspoken Words to all the Men I've Loved

Dear Ken,

Fuck you! I hope you’re miserable.

I don’t really, but I thought it would feel good to say that. It didn’t.

My head tells me she’s ugly, but I wonder if I’m saying that because I feel that inside (or maybe even out) I’m uglier. Obviously, she is more desirable. After all you married her, and left me behind.

Why do you get to seem so happy, when I feel so all alone right now?

I wish I could sell the ring and do something amazing with the cash from it. I’d travel all over Europe and become a Buddhist like in Eat Pray Love and I’d never look back. But I don’t even know how that story ended. I got sick in the theater and I had to leave.

I’m glad you’re happy. I’m just going to keep repeating this to myself and listening to the song “Best of Me” by Chrisette Michele until those words ring true in my heart and soul. I just wish it didn’t take so much effort for me to mean that simple phrase.

I’m glad you’re happy. I’m glad you’re happy. I’m glad you’re happy, and I wish you all the best.

I suppose it’ll come in time.

Dear Mike,

I’m mad at you.

I thought I’d miss you more. It surprises me how little I do.

I think about you every time we’re in Colorado. Actually, it’s of interest to me that I’m the one who brings you up even before Mom does.

It breaks my heart when she says she’s never going to call you again. This means I have to do the same. It’s just another man I’ve lost. But I’m not quite sure I ever really had you in my life. I’d like to think I did.

I wish I could say your face was disappearing from my memory. But it never will. I’ll always remember that great smile and the occasional boyish giggle while out in the wild.

And for the record, you deserve better than your new girl. She seems like a real bitch.

Dear Chris,

I still don’t understand.

It’s been a long time, and I try to tell myself that now that I’m older I get all the reasons you left me behind after calling me your own for nine years. I don’t.

I’ve looked up Tracy, Olivia and Vincent. Tracy hasn’t changed, and man does Olivia look like her! Vincent looks just like I imagined he would as a teen, and you no longer look like the man I called my father. I wish I could have known you all.

I was on the phone when Mom called. I heard your voice change when she said I wanted to talk to you. That tone said a lot. I wondered then, if it hadn’t been only me heartbroken for all these years, and maybe you and I both need closure.

I’m disappointed that neither of us will likely ever have that remedied. It sucks.

Dear Chuck,

I’m still hurting.

My heart aches a little every time that I am forced to compromise for her, when she won’t bend an inch for me.

I wish I could address you as Dad but the word just won’t come naturally from my mouth. Padre seems like it will have to do. At least for now.

I’m still confused as hell as to how to have a father-daughter relationship. I don’t have a clue as to how that whole thing goes, and I think that’s rather unfortunate. For both you and I.

I know you say if it came down to it, you’d choose me, but all past experience with men in general, and even with you, has proven otherwise. It makes it hard to believe. But I’d never tell you that, so instead it gets to stay here.

Thanks for calling me your daughter. Please don’t ever stop.