Dear me,
Fuck you.
The very first sentence I wrote to myself four months ago, and 018 letters
earlier.
I don't know what came over me on Thursday,
coming home after a live gig —
two single girlfriends and three margaritas later —
but I sat in front of the mirror, intending to remove my makeup,
and my hand wasn't moving,
and my eyes were glued to the reflection.
I think it was a sudden curiosity.
I remember thinking, so what, are you different now?
My lips were unsettled,
like they were trying to speak,
but there was no one else but myself there.
Who was I intending to talk to?
I put the wet wipe down and stared for another minute.
I said out loud, "so now what?"
I opened my laptop, still sitting in front of myself,
and started reading my last letter.
By the second sentence, I stopped.
Dear me, let's see if you are any different.
So instead, I started from the beginning:I laid my dead memories on the table.
Carefully cleaned the wounds in Letter 001.
Pulled the rubber gloves tight.
Then I made the first incision.
Dear me, fuck you…
—
I started with the spine — Chapter I.
Reading out loud,
my gaze divided between the mirror and the screen.
On one side, my mouth was running;
on the other, my face was observing
like it didn't recognise the subject.
The structure was there — intact, functional — but rigid.
From the mix of reactions, the most unexpected one was validation.
It was accurate.
All of it.
Even the confusion of who the fuck I am.
—
Chapter II.
The hands.
Gripping without substance.
Holding position, but not holding anything real.
A prolonged attachment to an illusion of movement —
like circulation without progression.
—By Chapter III, I was already a glass of red in —
preparing for impact.
The nervous system.
Reactive. Hyperstimulated.
The toxic patterns, the desire, the weaknesses, even the humiliations —
ironically the most familiar tissue in the whole examination.
I think it's because I never allowed myself
to see it from the other side of the table.
But I was there.
I am there.
—
By the time I reached Chapter IV
and made the incision through the chest,
I knew what I was looking at.
No surprises.
Just retained mass.
Something that no longer functions
but still occupies space like it has authority.
—
Dear me,
somewhere between the readings and the observation,
my writing changed.
More fragmented.
More precise.
Less need to explain what I already understand.
—Two hours of dissection.
A controlled autopsy of myself.
—
The report is clear:
Change requires three things —
self-destruction,
truth,
a high tolerance for no,
and a final decision.
I said three. I meant four. Even my arithmetic is becoming.
—
Dear me,
I like watching you in the mirror.
Not in a sentimental way.
More like observing a subject
that finally started cooperating.
—
I think I'm onto a new phase.
A ritual, if you will.
Or whatever this bullshit is clinically called.