In his newly released book Letters to You, Zareh Zurabyan shares the characters that we all know or perhaps, have seen in the mirror.
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I’m sorry…
I have been thinking a lot about our past – what it was, how it could’ve been, and where we are right now, and the only thing I can say is – I am wholeheartedly sorry.
I am sorry for involuntarily making you think you might have had a chance with me, even when I knew since that very first kiss we would never be together. Despite knowing that, every kiss with you felt like the first from that day forward, and I didn’t know how to value that at the time.
I am sorry that you invested so much time, so many colorful emotions, and so much love. I am sorry for desensitizing my feelings towards you and your love while you embraced me with an open heart.
I kept telling myself that we were not compatible, and that was the reason why I shouldn’t get serious with you.
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I don’t know how I was able to do that. I don’t know how I was able to keep a cold heart when it was burning hot inside. As if my heart was dipped in liquid nitrogen and instantly frozen on the exterior while the interior still pumped away powerfully, fighting for us. Sometimes I feel like it still does. After two years, it would be a lie for me to say that old emotions don’t come back to me when I think of you and us. It would be a lie if I said I didn’t feel an emptiness without you.
You were there for me when I needed that womanly touch. You were there when I wanted to feel loved. You loved me unconditionally. You laughed at my stupid jokes, you listened to my craziest thoughts. We fought over stupid things, made love in the craziest places; we looked at each other with naked souls, felt each other’s energies. And yet through it all, I still didn’t show all of me to you. Even though you broke through many walls, forcefully making holes through them and peeking into my inner world, there were many walls still standing, or even being built while we were together.
I knew that you saw it; that’s why you put up with all of my bullshit. You could see that it was not on purpose and that I was simply not mature enough. You hoped that I’d grow out of it at one point, and I think that I did, but it was too late.
I kept on telling myself that we were not compatible, and that was the reason why I shouldn’t get serious with you. But what is compatibility anyway? We are hardly compatible with our own selves. We are constantly trying to be one with our thoughts in a never-ending exploration of the truth.
None of us are perfect, and at the time, I was looking for someone perfect in an imaginary world.
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I am sorry for lying to you about you being the only girl I talk to. I am sorry for sleeping with other girls, even though at the end of the night I always came back to you. That was my way of fighting the feelings I had for you. I understand that now. As if I was trying to prove to myself that I did not love you, by trying to love others. Ironically, each time it was proven otherwise.
I am sorry for subliminally realizing your love towards me, and using it to my advantage to have sex with you. I felt your love for me, and I used it for my selfish desires. I loved you, but I never dug deep into why because I already had my mind made up that you would not be the mother of my children. Instead of working on the things that I did not like about you, I used those attributes as excuses of why I shouldn’t be with you in order to not even try.
None of us are perfect, and at the time, I was looking for someone perfect in an imaginary world.
I know how beautiful a woman’s eyes are, her smile, her hair, her curves, her sexual body, her touch, her brain, her mind, her goal-driven attitude, her ability to express herself verbally, physically, and in silence. It is not about if she can cook, how many languages she speaks, how much she knows about history or politics, her adamant views on moral values or if she likes to ski while shooting bow and arrows at moving objects – it is all about the imperfections that you don’t mind entertaining. It is the imperfections that keep a relationship inflamed. It is the imperfections that make you question things, make you wonder, make you laugh, make you angry, make you happy. Imperfections make a relationship captivating, as long as they do not interfere with communication quality. I realize now that I loved your imperfections.
I kept my love towards you on a physical level, even though those moments where we laid in each other’s arms and had soft conversations were nothing but spiritual. You put up with all of my selfish ways because you saw the kindness in me, and you knew that I would crack at some point and give in to you 100 percent.
Maybe I simply wasn’t mature enough to understand what was going on between us, what those feelings meant.
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But I did not. I let you down. I let myself down, and in a way, you let yourself down for having hope. I really hope that I did not ruin your expectations of men for the future, but I do understand your disappointment in me. I am sorry.
The worst part is that I knew deep inside that that’s what was happening, and I still chose to keep myself desensitized.
I made you play a role in my life when I should’ve played a big role in yours. I noticed how you looked at me, and how much my words and actions meant to you. Whatever role I played, when you weigh out the positives and negatives, I hope the positives were heavier — and if they weren’t, I hope that these confessions add a little more weight.
I held your hand, I played with your hair, I kissed your forehead. I always touched you, you were constantly in my immediate attention, constantly talking to you when we were not physically together, and not letting my eyes off you when we were; something that you do with someone you love, but yet I kept on acting like there was nothing real between us, or that it would never be more serious than what it was at that moment.
I remember our drive down to the beach, top down, when I grabbed your hand and fell asleep as you drove. You kept on driving even when you reached the destination in order to prolong that moment. If that is not beautiful, I don’t know what is.
I never gave it a chance. Maybe I was scared, maybe I was confused, maybe I simply wasn’t mature enough to understand what was going on between us, what those feelings meant. It all happened too fast, and the processing ability of my brain was not up for the challenge just yet.
In a way, I was mad at myself. I was mad at myself for loving a woman who was not perfect, who did not fit the artificial checklist I created in my head. Is this where it stops for me? Am I supposed to be with a girl who is not perfect? How am I going to answer to my family, to my friends, myself? What if a better woman comes along?
Simple thoughts of a young boy; I see it now. At that time, I simply was not in tune with my emotions and logic at the level that I am now.
I am sorry for what I put you through, and I am sorry for taking advantage of your investment in me.
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I hope that you can accept my truth and let the universe help us accept the past, so we can look into each other’s eyes with sympathy. That the misunderstandings of the past can morph into understandings in the present; negative energy eliminated and transformed into positive energy.
I remember our final break-up in the park at 2:00 a.m. after which we didn’t speak for two months. It was a relatively cold summer night. The street light illuminated the park benches just enough so I could see your face. The same face that I kissed so passionately was covered in tears and mascara. You cried by the car telling me how you couldn’t believe that I was doing this – abandoning all of the moments we shared just like that – and honestly I can’t believe I did either. You went as far as telling me that I am not as nice as I act to be, and to tell you the truth, that was a seed you planted in me that made me question my actions in everything I did. It was not easy for me, but I thought I was doing what was best for me. Maybe it was, maybe it was not; but that decision was not based on real feelings, just an illusion of them.
I am sorry for all of that. I am sorry for what I put you through, and I am sorry for taking advantage of your investment in me.
You’ve taught me how to love through my resistance, and the experiences I have shared with you are forever a part of me as I grow.
Whether I wrote this to maybe reconcile with my past, or to simply apologize, I just wanted you to be aware of all these thoughts and emotions that I have lived with, with hopes that your heart would find peace knowing why I acted the way that I did; why things happened the way they did — and how special you truly were, and are, to me.
I love you and thank you for putting up with me for so long.
From the bottom my heart, I am sorry.
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Letters to You is available on Amazon Kindle, as a PDF download and can be pre-ordered in Hardcover.
Photo:Flickr/Breaux