Yesterday I started reading We Need to Talk About Kevin  (finally!  Thank you N!) and am already fascinated.  Some writers have voices that are easier to listen to than others.  For example, when I read Murakami, I am always at an arm's length.  You love Murakami from a distance, and I think that it is his choice, and I love him for it.  Shriver is different.  Her voice let me close immediately, very close, so much so I could imagine the words on the page coming from my own fingertips.  It made me want to begin the same exercise of writing to former lovers to dissect the past.

Dear Tony, I would write.  You always loved your hair so much more than you loved me.  When you told me we would make beautiful children, you wanted me to hear the emphasis on children, but I heard your emphasis on beauty instead.  You were imagining their hair, weren't you?

or perhaps Dear Noah, Whenever I go home to Winter City, I drive past 17th Avenue and can still picture you on the side of the road, standing on your knees to kiss me, and still a whole head taller than me even like that.  You were the tallest person I've ever known in real life.  I wish I had known you longer.  I wish I knew you better.  I would like you to kiss me again like that.



Things like that.

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Dear Shawn,
The sun is out today for the first time in what seems like forever.  I wish you didn't have to go to work because I want us to ride our bikes out to Derby Reach and have lunch in the woods.  And maybe roll around under the trees a little bit.

Things like that.

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