Philotic Web

Dear You (yes, the You from my last post),
All that being said, if for some reason you ever do see this, I am happy the way things turned out for you. I see the accomplishments you make, and I can't help but feel pride in them. I wish I could tell you that. That I'm proud of you for working on your degree, that I'm glad we didn't get married and have kids young and have you wind up as a young stay at home mom, I don't know if you would have been happy in the long run, which hurts to think about, but strangely helps as well. I watch your life from afar, knowing only what you share with the world via updates and such, and I am proud of the woman you are. The woman that you have always been. I am happy for the life you've made for yourself. I just wish I could be a part of it again. You were always my best friend. You will always BE my best friend, even if we never speak anymore. I miss you so much. I just wish I could talk to you again, but like I said before, I'm terrified to even try. I don't know if it would be worse if you still felt something for me or if you hated me, or if you just put that entire part of our lives behind you and forgot all about me. I know I probably sound pathetic right now, but it's not that. I just never got the chance to tell you the things I wanted to, for seven years I wanted to say this, and this is me saying it.
I hope you have someone in your life who loves you the way I did, the way I do. I hope that he knows you the way I once did. And I hope he knows how lucky he is.
We never really said goodbye, did we?
I hope we never have to
But if so, then at least now you know the things I never said
-Bean

Dear Yous,

I AM NOT A RECEPTIONIST! I have VERY KINDLY ended up answering the phones ALL DAMN DAY today, despite our agreement parceling out shifts. So, yeah. Sorry I keep answering the fax machine and sorry I didn't ask who was calling for you, this is USUALLY NOT MY JOB.

*Probably actually more frustrated with myself than you are with me, but here we are.*

Me

P.S. On the other hand, I think I'm developing a really nice phone manner, overall. So there's that. It's a good skill to have.

Dear You,

I'm trying, trying, trying to take you seriously. I know a person can dislike the winter no matter where they live. I understand that to you it feels legitimately cold. I do.

But there is a windchill of -55 here today, and we aren't allowed to put our thermostats above 65 degrees because of the burst pipeline in Canada, and you should maybe know that when 7 days out of the 10 day forecast you link to show highs in the mid to upper sixties -- well, people who are not from your region may have a hard time not scoffing at you, shaking fists at you, or generally responding in very invalidating ways.

Me

Dear You,

It's not that I exactly wish bad things for you. More like if I heard you were horribly mutilated by a pack of wild dogs, I wouldn't be upset.

Me

Dear You,

You work in a children's department. You're supposed to be our fearless leader. LEARN TO LOVE -OR AT LEAST ENJOY- READING CHILDREN'S AND YOUNG ADULT FICTION, a******. Helping kids and young adults find reading materials is a HUGE part of a our job. Sorry it's not all about mismanaging your staff and pretending to be worthwhile.

Love,
Me

Dear All of You,

Sorry for the long absence! Turns out this whole infant thing takes a lot of time, effort and energy. But I miss you! All of you.

I'm going to try to be better at posting here.

<3
Kimmie

Dear you,

Yay! <3

Dear East Coast Yous:

Be safe! Geeze. Sounds like it's kind of a hellish, snowy nightmare over there. People have died SHOVELING? That's nuts!

Death by shoveling isn't actually super uncommon. It gets your heart rate up pretty quickly in a way that people often aren't expecting.

Dear Yous,

I miss you. Let's rewind, for just one night, and have a late night chat the way we used to.

Me

Dear Sun,

I'm ready for you. Bring it!

Me

Dear You,

I am terribly sorry we were all cursed with the third most common surname in the US of A. And I have to say, part of me would like to share experiences of our common first name. How do you pronounce it? How do react to its mispronunciation? Were you commonly called "Kristen?" I have a bit of fondness for you, just due to our shared circumstances, really.

However, dear ladies, you in Seattle and you journeying to Yale, I have to inform you of something. I've had my gmail account for nearly a decade. I got it before you. There can only be one Kirsten dot lastname at gmail dot com and she is me. So knock it the heck off, would you? Please? I'm tired of your spam. I have enough of my own. I'm tired of news from your relatives and professors. This is not your email address. It's mine. Put some alphanumerics in it at the end or something. Stop directing your traffic to me.

Sincerely,

The Original Firstname.Lastname

Dear Yous,

Okay, SERIOUSLY. I already reproduced one time for you, world. Why is it that now that my son is two, suddenly everyone feels free again to start asking me annoyingly personal questions about family planning? NOT COOL. Feel like I should frame a Mirena label and hang it over my desk. Argh.

Me

Dear You,

It frustrates me to no end that you think you deserve or have earned to sit up on high and look down on me when really, you're an unforgiving, hypocritical bitch. When you take actions that f*** up your life, it's excusable and forgivable and you're some kind of victim but if I do something that I'm genuinely sorry for and have regretted for years, I'm a piece of s***?

Seeeeriously. Go f*** yourself.

Love,
Me

Dear You,

Posting "This is horrible" along with a video of a man being mauled, dragged, and eventually killed by a tiger, without any sort of warning of what a person watching will see if their curiosity gets the better of them, is a s*** thing to do. A really s*** thing. Sure, it's horrible, to say the absolute least, but it's also highly disturbing and graphic and needs a damn warning or description.

Love,
Your cousin

I don't understand why people would share that video at all O_o

Dear You,

Three years ago today. We make a damn good team, wouldn't you say?

Love your face,
Me

Dear You,

Three years ago today. We make a damn good team, wouldn't you say?

Love your face,
Me

This makes me smile!!!

Dear You,

Three years ago today. We make a damn good team, wouldn't you say?

Love your face,
Me

This makes me smile!!!

Me too! D'awwwww!

Me three!

Thanks, guys. Me, four.

Dear you,
You're a figment of my imagination. A character in my story. I should be able to continue writing. Tell me what happens next so I can finish and publish it already!

Frustratedly yours,
Me

Dear You,

Please explain how you work, I don't understand it and it would be extremely useful to know.

-Me

Dear you,

I understand you want to spend time with me but I value my privacy and alone time.

- Me

Dear You,

5 assignments
4 books
3 weeks

...and then you're done. Stay focused. Beat the exhaustion.

You can do this.

Love,
me

Dear you,
10 years 20 languages. . .
running translations of your first writings in ways that count could count in the end. . .
Ariadne Awaits. . .
~can I talk any slower?~

Dear You,

Forever and ever and ever, THANK YOU for taking aside my middle-school self when I was sitting alone at the church lock in and teaching me how to play speed. You have no idea what an awesome bonding tool that game has become in my professional life.

Me

Dear All of You,

Happy New Year! I hope all of the loveliness of 2015 continues and all the crap of it comes to an end. Can't wait to see all the beautiful things you get up to this year.

Love,
Me

Hear, hear!

Dear License,

Where are you? Are you lost? Did the mail lose you? Are you hiding? I'm so worried about you! Please come home soon.

Love,

Me

Dear Every Piece of Mail that is Not My License,

GO AWAY. I do not need you to raise my hopes to have them dashed. You are hereby suspended without pay until my license gets here on the grounds of being a nuisance. Wait in f****** line.

Me

Dear State of North Dakota,

This rule that you are not licensed until you have actually received your license in the mail is f****** stupid.

Sincerely,
Still A Resident for f***'s Sake.

Dear Everybody I Wrote to Yesterday,

Thank you for your prompt attention to that matter.

Sincerely,
Finally A Psychologist

Congrats again!

Wooooo!

Dear You,

Please do not use the "Unfortunately, the so-and-sos always let us know about events at the last minute" line on me again because if you do, I am likely to scream. Not necessarily at you, but at least in general, and that's not terribly professional. They may not have exact dates but they are a type of institution that lives and dies from having a certain kind of regularity. If you don't know that certain events will always take place in a given month or slightly but not terribly larger time frame, you just plain suck at your job. Which, you do. But it's about time you figured it out.

No love,
Me

Dear Teachers of the World,

I think you need to trust that, at this point in my life, if I haven't corrected my pencil grip it's maybe not that big a deal.

("WHO TAUGHT YOU TO WRITE?" one gasped, recently. Don't blame them, dear. They did their damnedest. What my mother always says about it is, "We tried really hard to fix it, and then we thought that maybe if we fixed that we'd break something else.")


Sincerely,
Grown-ass adult

Dear person right above me,

I also have an unconventional pencil grip, and even now, as a grown-ass adult and a teacher myself I continue to be self conscious about it. Thanks for reminding me that it really isn't a big deal. I need that from time to time.