Sigh. I have to try to be nice to myself this week, because there really isn't anyone else who can do that for me. Partly this is because I won't let anyone near, not really, so while I complain so bitterly of feeling so alone, isn't it a condition of my own making? I continue to choose it, though....because I know: when you let people in close enough, when you let them become irreplaceable, they're also close enough to really hurt you, and when you lose them, the loss is bottomless.

It's not the answer anyone wants to hear, but I don't know that I'll ever stop missing you. Because despite all the armor, all the defenses, somehow I am terribly, frighteningly vulnerable to you, to an unprecedented degree. And I don't really have the words for what that's meant.