Letters

Daniel, 1/17/10

I’m Melanie and I am a devout religious person. I believe that there is a God and that Jesus died for all sins. I am not the type of person that enjoys going out every night in an attempt to formulate a loving and committed relationship. My idea of a good night is preferably to stay at home and just do whatever I feel like doing. That usually consists of writing in my journal or perhaps pulling a book off my shelf that I have not read in years. I live in a one-bedroom studio apartment like a hermit. At least that is how my friends would describe me. They believe (jokingly I hope) that I perform secret religious ceremonies of the sacrificial kind. Of course, that is not what I do. Since I can remember I have been a fairly secluded type of girl. I feel really intimidated and shy when I am in a public place, but soon enough I can warm up to just about anyone who isn’t threatening.

I cannot stand it when people try to tell me how to think or what to believe. This is where I come to the point of why I have been writing, Daniel. After our relationship of five and half years I have come to realize that you never really tried to understand me. If asked you could not describe me with the terms that suited you. You told me that you were NOT uncomfortable with the fact that I read the Bible every night, prayed before eating dinner and went to church every Sunday. In fact you found it fascinating that I have never missed a Sunday morning sermon. I was seriously under the impression that it could work between us and I being a very understanding person never once shoved the idea of Christianity down your throat. We had a mutual understanding of difference, shared great similarities like hiking, camping, reading, writing and drawing. And those are just some of the hobbies we had in common. The greatest thing about us was we once had the ability to communicate with one another without letting any of our personal beliefs get in the way.

Apparently, though, behind my back you couldn’t keep your mouth shut. Through that good old gossiping grape vine I heard that you were constantly telling your buddies how annoying it was when I talked about church the second I got home from the service. Or the most insulting was when, your downright egotistical, disgusting viral friend Bradley Finnigan called me while drunk to inform me that I was and I quote, “You are a selfish bitch who only thinks about herself and constantly shoves God and Jesus down other people’s throats. Melanie, you are not a good Christian. Hate is what you spread.” Finnigan has no room to speak about spreading hate. I am more accepting of certain things than he is. Take homosexuality for instance. It is indeed wrong to me, but that does not mean I am going to force or tell people to love someone they don’t want to. Or perhaps can’t. Finnigan (if you hadn’t noticed) is homophobic. I can agree with being homophobic in the aspect of feeling uncomfortable with it, but Finnigan takes his bashing with words way too far. There are numerous time when I was out with you that he would make gay jokes, religious jokes, fart jokes and more. Because to him life is a joke and Daniel you should know by now that he is one of the reasons we are no longer together.

My parents did not approve of the fact that their daughter was dating an Atheist, but they warmed up to your accepting personality and in turn I think you taught them to be more open. You taught me to be more open than I already had been. I never once forced you to change. I never once made you the brunt of jokes while with my friends. Yet, I “the good little Christian girl” became the joke. I was the entertainment for you and your Atheist friends. There was so many times that I was confronted by the question, “Do you believe in the flying Spaghetti monster?” Logically, I cannot figure out what that had to do with Christianity, but it was often explained to me that belief in this monster was the equivalent to my lousy belief in an invisible person that lives in the sky. I still cannot wrap my mind around that argument, because it sounds like a poor attempt at creating something frightening. There was one thing that I wanted to remind you of and that was a prank your friends pulled on me during my birthday party of last year. I got over it after lots of arguing and apologizing from you, but now that I look back on it in hindsight it still irritates me like a splinter dug deep inside my finger.

The day was starting out nicely. I was with my girlfriends at the salon getting hair and make up done then was to meet you back at the studio. To my surprise you had it all decorated in my favorite colors. Purple, red and yellow streamers littered the place and even my cake had those colors of frosting on it. I was ecstatic! For that second as I admired the decorations I felt like a little kid again, but then I noticed something hanging above the cake. It was a dummy dressed to look like me. Further staring and through the accumulation of tears I noticed the dummy was nailed to a cross. Then I realized a prank was being pulled on me. To top it off when I read my cake there was piece of paper, snuggled in the frosting that read, “Melanie, thinks she is Jesus.” Normally, a cake reads Happy Birthday, but I was in the presence of your friends.

After that we spent a year together trying to work it out. Then I knew we were going to enter frigid territory and it was going to be much harder for us to talk with one another like before. We found other things to talk about and religion never became that important in our relationship as a couple, though, to one of us, her faith was very important. I really thought you understood that. Unfortunately, the people you chose as friends did not have the same open mind as you and I think they may have polluted yours a bit. Daniel, I think you were too quick to judge how your friends would react. They were the ones who dragged you away from me. It’s as if they did not want to give you up to anyone. They wanted you all to themselves. I wouldn’t tell you to give your friends. You met them long before me and I respect that. I only want and hope this letter made you realize how judgmental you were being. I know that no one can escape judgment, but you made me the JOKE of your everyday life. Honestly, I do know that this letter sounds as if I am trying to send you on a guilt trip, but that is not my intention either. What I wrote about is tender in many ways and tugs on our feeling in whichever way possible. I really hope that this time you will respond to my letter. I have decided that this is my fifth and final attempt to communicate with you.

Melanie











Melanie, 1/20/10

Wow. You’re going to harp on this again? I can’t believe it. I’ve apologized over and over again for what happened on your birthday. There is nothing I can do to fix the pain you feel. I mean, I’m not God. And don’t you remember that many times, God damn it, many times I told you that I put a blindfold over your eyes and brought you inside. That left me outside the studio for a good five minutes, which left my dumb friends alone in the room. As for the “flying spaghetti monster” even I couldn’t help it with that one. It was just too funny, especially when you couldn’t understand. And apparently still don’t. I’ll let you simmer with it while it remains stuck in your head.

But, Melanie, I wish that YOU could understand. You kept writing on about how you want ME to understand, but it’s YOU that doesn’t get it. You can’t blame me for not understanding you when you didn’t understand me. You say that I helped you gain a more open mind. Is that so? I don’t believe I did, because then we would still be together. I tried to keep us together, but I came to realize that it just wasn’t going to work anymore. For a year you complained, EVERY single day about the birthday prank. I don’t want to hear about it anymore. If you still wish to remain friends, let’s for goodness sake, write about something else. The relationship is over and that should be simple enough to understand.

So I am going to warn you. If you write anything concerning the birthday prank in the next letter I will not respond to it.

Daniel



Melanie, 1/23/10



Wow. I take back what I said about you being open-minded. I now firmly believe it is FACT that your friends polluted your mind. You are just as belligerent as them it seems. It’s as if you turned into Brad. Which leads me to assume that you haven’t got rid of him. I’d never tell and did tell you to give up your friends. I respected you too much to make you choose. Now, I sort of wish I had. I may have been in more control of the whole situation. Damn it, Daniel! You make me so angry. I tell you that you don’t understand then you turn it back around and tell me I don’t?

I was going to ask you if you could come back to Colorado for a visit. I am working again at the Caffeine Fix and going back to school. Why I am telling you this? I have no idea. You tell me to talk about something else besides our relationship in these letters, but I still feel as if you don’t care (and after five years that seems impossible). Honestly, I should just ignore you from here on out. I don’t know what I was thinking. I can’t believe I wrote you that many times expecting some decency. The only thing that I can do is laugh at myself. You should be happy, though, that I found something else to talk about. Speaking of something else, how are your friends? I hope they are doing well. In fact I hope that you are doing well. I really do.



Melanie







Melanie, 1/26/10

I am glad you asked how I am doing. You remember that childhood friend of mine Rebecca Spinning? Well, since I’ve moved back to California I have rekindled a relationship with her. We’re engaged. Yes, that’s a big step for me. You see I found out that it is much easier to be with people who are like-minded. Rebecca is perfect for me. She is a Buddhist, but remains so perfectly calm about the way I feel. It’s amazing. We can actually talk about religion and I think that’s where it went wrong, Melanie. We did not communicate about the said beliefs. Rather we just tried to keep them out of our lives, but they managed to shove their way in (courtesy of friends). Oh, wait; here I am being a hypocrite! Not supposed to be talking about the relationship. Yeah, I am not sure where else I can go with this? I can tell you that people just handle life differently.

Daniel



Daniel, 2/1/10

I was in a relationship with a different man for five and a half years. The kicker is: I am not sure me and that man actually knew one another. I hope that this marriage works out for you and Rebecca. She sounds like a lovely woman. Maybe I should have believed in Buddha instead, because you have so much against the Christian god. I may have had a better chance. I cannot believe you are marrying someone who isn’t just like you. There still has to be problems, right? I mean she believes in a god! I am not going to fret and try to wrap my mind around it. I felt a sense of excitement as I wrote that first letter, recollecting past memories and trying to explain. It was as if I was finally able to release some tension and finally get the cold hard truth. I found out that the truth is: You didn’t care. Yes, that must have been it. And yes, I am blaming you for all this. I am, because I’ve also learned that NONE of this is my fault. It’s not my fault and that feels so good to say out loud. I was tired of blaming myself and now you have opened up my mind. For five and half years I believed we had something, I believed it was working. I BELIEVED! It looks like you did not hold much FAITH at all in our relationship.

I’ll leave you with this even though you won’t care: I am going on about my life, remembering that God is there to help me through.

God Bless,

Melanie