hey.

I never in a million years thought I would be writing this to you. Especially when a couple of years back you were literally the closest person I had in my life. You still are the closest person I have in my life. But what does that say about me when you really don't know me that well anymore. I used to share everything with you, and I am not really sure when I stopped but I know that I did. And, at first it wasn't your fault that I was distant, but now it is. Because how can you tell someone all the details about how someone hurt you when they are the one who hurt you. Sometimes I feel like you know you are hurting me with the words you say. And other times I am wondering if you really are that blind to how horrible your words are and what is implied with them. Here are just a few examples of words and actions you have done that are burned into my head: You make me feel bad for staying skinny when all I eat is "junk" just because you can not do the same. Then you turn around and make me eat when I would rather starve so that I could have a real reason to give you about how I am still skinny. You tell me that you would never judge me no matter what, but when a guy you like makes fun of me because of this app that I like, you agree with him. I still hesitate to ever play that game around you or others anymore because I am embarrassed. And sometimes you just make me feel so freaking dumb. Like whatever I was saying was the stupidest thing in the world. Then, later I find out that whatever I was saying was correct, but that still doesn't make me feel any better. You are always down on yourself and insecure, so whenever I see you I like to pay attention and compliment you whenever I like your clothes or your new nails or when your hair looks pretty. And yet you still never believe me when I say you are freaking beautiful. And that really annoys the heck out of me because you are so pretty. And then I turn around and think about myself and recently I realized that the only time you tell me I'm pretty is when I am calling myself ugly. But the thing is, I know you are lying when you say that because your definition of pretty is skinny. Which is why you don't believe yourself to be fricking gorgeous, even though you are. And why you say I'm pretty like it's a reflex for you. You also always feel horrible when you do bad in math and so I refrain from saying how easy the homework or the test was because I am better in math. But then you always make me feel bad when I get a low grade on a test in English. And how could I do so bad when the test was literally so "easy". You have genuinely told me that I "act like such a child" more than one time. You also like to tell me how "difficult" I am all the time. You gave up on our plans of going to college together because you said you would miss your cat too much to leave behind. Doesn't that imply that you would miss your cat more than me? You insult me indirectly. For example, sometimes you ask me to french braid your hair. But then recently, I had just finished doing loose-ish french braids in your hair in a way that I never had before with no video to follow, just me guessing based off a verbal description, no photo to give me a clue of what it was really supposed to look like. And then you started doing tight dutch braids in our other friends hair and about halfway through one of the braids, that was a hairstyle I ask you to do on me all the time, that you learned on me while watching a video, you made the comment, "you know, I think dutch braids look better". And at first I kind of just brushed that off because I kind of agree, and I voiced that but I also said that I think it also depends on the person and their hair. But then a few minutes passed and you made another comment, "I think braids also look better when they are super tight." I was just silent to that comment. What was I supposed to say to that, like I'm sorry that you think my braids look like crap but can you just out and say it instead of lying to my face and say they look fine. You see, you do things like that all the time. I don't know what caused you to change you in this way because you definitely weren't like this to me in middle school. I feel like I am always worrying about what I look like and what I say now around you because I am afraid that you are secretly judging or even going to voice your judgments about me. Because I know that once you have said something like that the words will never leave my mind. I also sometimes feel like you don't believe the fact that there is a high probability of me having anxiety among other things. You belittle me when I am nervous about doing certain actions. You talk about how you were nervous for that presentation too, or you don't like talking to new people all that much either but you put yourself out there and got that presentation over with and look at how you're fine, it wasn't that hard. But you just don't get it, when I say I don't want to present I say that because the thought of presenting makes me feel like I can't breathe, I can just feel everyone's eyes on me and I literally would rather die than be there in that moment any longer. I stutter during presentations and I talk quickly and quietly and stare anywhere but at the audience. While you, you do the opposite you meet people's eye and speak loud, clear, and slow. You finish and then you sit down and are fine. But when I finish I rush to the back of the room to ask the teacher if I can use the restroom in hopes that I can remember how to breathe and stop shaking so visibly. I also can never talk to you about my likely depression anymore because I end being the one to comfort you instead of you helping me with those thoughts, also sometimes you are the cause of my bad feelings. I think the main thing that I struggle with and that hurts me is the fact that I would never ever make you feel this way or do any of these things to you. In fact, in some of these cases, I actively try to make sure you don't feel this way because I notice the stuff that makes you upset. You used to be the one person that I could always speak my mind to and now I don't have anyone I can talk too. And the worst part is you sincerely don't realize that I am feeling this way. Like you honestly don't realize how I lowkey feel like our friendship is really struggling. No, you think that everything is fine when that couldn't be further from the truth. I don't even know how I am supposed to act around you anymore. Just typing this out kills me because all of a sudden I am remembering things that you have done or said to me that I don't think you even remember happening. It also makes me realize that I really have no one that actually knows me. You used to be the one person that I didn't put my fake face on for but that has changed. I feel like everything has changed and I am not okay. I know you will never see this letter but writing this all out has both helped and hurt me more. Because I know that you will never realize the extent of all the pain you have caused me. And I know that after I finish this letter I have to go back to my stupid life full of pretending. Which really sucks because I feel like after putting this much emotion into one place something must have changed, but nothing ever will. Moving on, this ended up much longer than I intended and you aren't even going to read this, so, I guess this is it. I will see on Monday at training and hopefully by then my fake face will be ready again for use because I don't know if I could keep it together if I had to see you any sooner. As it is I will probably avoid all human interaction for the rest of the night because I really don't have the energy to pretend to be happy for anyone right now. So...

bye, for now.

your supposed bestie.

The entire village continued to laugh and mock him. They were no longer whispering behind his back.

Even the village children began to taunt and tease him.  He had been bestowed the title of the deranged untouchable leper.

Some kept their distance from him for fear of unspoken words that may escape from his dry cracked lips.

The monarch's corrupted soldiers kept a close eye on his every move. 

It did not matter that he had always been a loyal subject.

It did not matter that he had saved the tyrant head and the mighty monarchy countless times from crumbling.

The monarch, his stepbrother and his stepbrother's new young queen feared that the beggar's coloured child would reveal the true hidden agenda.

A blueprint that had been kept hidden under lock and key that even the most faithful subjects were unaware of its existence.

"Heed my advice I beg thee. These are not the words of an erratic man," pleaded the beggar's coloured child.

But no matter what he said or did, his words fell on deaf ears.

"These so-called premonitions of yours, what does that feel like," the monarch sheepishly asked.

"O great Czar, like a cold chill that travels through my spine.  It feels like rain on skin." whispered the beggar's coloured child.

"The pimples of a demented goose," the monarch and his soldiers laughed mocking his every word.

The Czar's maid who once vowed to watch the back of the coloured beggar's child betrayed him in the end, in return for riches promised by the tyrant leader.

But little did the beggar's coloured child realise that soon, his time too will come to an end.

For every premonition that was uttered by his lips, he was closer to dying.

For every prediction that came true, his life was cut much shorter.

The Chinese whispers about the deranged freak who claimed to have the gift of premonition spread throughout the kingdom.

But yet no one took notice of the monarch's loyal servants and subjects desperately working night and day to conceal the growing cracks on the monarchy's architectural walls. 

Soon the sandstorm will begin.

The monarch and his corrupted ministers will point their fingers towards the coloured beggar's child. 

He will be accused of folly and treachery and sentenced for the misfortune curse placed on the monarchy. 

The beggar's coloured child will be hauled to court before the monarchy's jury for the last time before being banished from the kingdom forever.

The entire village will gather to witness the beggar's coloured child being dragged away by the soldiers and thrown out of the kingdom's gates.

"Banish the untouchable leper, banish the cursed pariah," will echo the air in unison. 

But not once will the beggar's coloured child plead for leniency nor cry for mercy.

But yet no one was prepared for the worst that was yet to come.

As the last footprint of the coloured beggar's child leaves its final mark on the monarchy's ground, the great and mighty walls will finally crumble revealing the hidden truth.

And once again I find myself back on the same road walking aimlessly with no destination to reach to.

A highway where there is no existence of light, life, love, laughter and loyalty.

A highway where is no evidence of pureness, righteousness, spirituality or God.

A highway that reeks of darkness, death, hatred, sadness and betrayal.

A highway where there is no escaping from but doomed forever.

A hypnagonic state of mind I cannot seem to free myself from no matter how hard I try.  My cries for help goes unanswered despite both my hands raised begging.

My body aches from battle wounds that never seem to heal. My bare feet bleeds from walking on hell’s road garnished with spikes and broken glass. My bruised hands hurt from shielding the impact of my falls. 

The only sounds and vibrations that continuously keep me company are the shuffling of feet coming from the lucipherous demons who continuously dance around me. 

The sniggering laughter each time I fall from being shoved by one of them.

My one wing luminiferous angel fought hard and died a heroic death.  As I held him in my arms and wept, he begged for my forgiveness for failing in his warrior's oath and duty to protect me.

A slow and lingering death the warrior bearer of light died from as I watched the lucipherous demons greedily feast and suck the energy out of him. 

“Narasoma” they chanted in union as they drank from the nectar of immortality.  Each time the Cup of Life was filled and gulped from, I died a hundred deaths.

Each pain and suffering inflicted on my dying angel shot through my body a thousand times more for our souls were still bound by the spiritual umbilical cord.

Whispers of immortality echoed in the air.  The lucipherous demons watched in glee as my earthly blood was used to sharpen the blade.

The chanting became more and more frenzied as the sword was slowly raised high.

I looked at my dying angel for the last time and asked “Why me? What sins have my soul committed for God to have handed down such a severe sentence? 

He whispered, “You have been loved.”

He did it without asking.

We were married at the time - it seemed like a nice thing for him to do.

“I’ve registered your new phone with a service that will locate it for you if it’s ever lost or stolen”, he announced one evening at dinner nonchalantly, tossing his blonde hair. He was so handsome when he was sober. I smiled and thanked him, grateful that he had been so thoughtful. There were plenty of occasions when he wasn’t - like the countless times he humiliated me in public, drunken and disorderly, disrespectful and contentious. “I can never be wrong.” He told me once, red-faced with eyes bulging during a heated discussion about his substance abuse. There are more stories than I can count that start with him and a drink in his hand and end with me in tears, but this is not a story about those days and nights. It is the story of a god-damned cellphone.

For the sake of conservative tradition and my Christian upbringing, I tried to stay with my man, I really did. Despite his drinking, despite his lack of employment, despite the fact that he played video games day-in and day-out while I went to work and returned home, despite the fact that he said “you’re welcome” after having sex with me, despite the fact that he had begun to phyisically threaten me - for years, ten to be exact, I stayed.

Then I couldn’t stay anymore. It was as simple as that, so I left.

I told him I no longer wanted to live with him, that I wanted a out, and even though I had been telling him for years that I was desperately unhappy, somehow only when I uttered the sentence “I’m moving out“ did he realize that I was serious.

I suppose it‘s the fault of American pop culture, that he believed he could slack in every single way as a husband, hell as an adult person, for ten years and then show a modicum of effort and suddenly be accepted back into my life with open arms. There were countless messages and calls begging me to return on that new cellphone of mine, but I stayed resolute. I was done. I tried to move on with my life. I lived with friends while still paying his rent in our old apartment, which was in my name - I needed to keep my credit intact, and I knew if I left things to him it wouldn’t be. I was trying to put my life back together piece by piece after a decade of being an unwilling mother to a fully-grown alcoholic, unemployed husband, but he refused to let me go.

I was out with a friend one night, when a message from my Ex flashed across the screen. I hadn’t blocked him, because I was trying to keep things civil for the divorce. “Where are you?” he asked. I didn’t answer - it was none of his business. Five minutes later an alert flashed on the screen of that expensive new phone. He was tracking me. Back when he announced that he had registered my phone, he failed to mention that it was attached to HIS email address. He prided himself on his hacker skills and often boasted of them at parties. My phone sent him my exact location. My friend suggested we leave to avoid a confrontation, so we did, but this only led to more tracking. Out of dumb stubbornness, I didn’t want to get rid of the phone. I had paid for it - it was expensive, and I didn’t want his obsessive behavior to force me to hide. I’m a writer and fairly allergic to technology, but I did everything I could to remove his ability to track my every move. I thought I had been successful because the alerts stopped. I went on with my life, progressing towards the divorce. Out of the blue, he told me that he was going on vacation and suggested that I come over to the apartment to get some of my things while he was gone. He specifically mentioned that I should get my files off of ’his‘ laptop, which had been ‘ours’ before I moved out. “It’s easy,” he said “you can just email yourself the files and then delete them.”

I hadn’t been in our apartment since the night I had told him, tears streaming down my face, that I could no longer live with him. I was apprehensive, but the season was changing and I needed warmer clothes. I was paying rent at my friend’s apartment as well as paying his rent in our old place and money was tight, so I welcomed the chance to retrieve my old clothes instead of having to buy new ones.

I will never forget walking into our old apartment.

It stank. Nothing had been cleaned or washed since I left all those months ago. Every trash can was full and there was not a single clean surface to be found, except for the coffee table in the living room. It was pristine. Only one item sat upon it in the midst of all the filth - the laptop. Taped to the top of the laptop was a pink note in his sloppy handwriting, “Don’t forget to get your files!”

It felt like a trap. It was.

I opened the laptop with trepidation - it seemed as if nothing had changed, but something inside of me told me to check the hidden files. This was an old trick of his that I knew from his propensity to hide porn on his compter in college. I unhid the files and was shocked to find a file called “Paige - tracking”. He actually called it that. I opened the file and found hundreds upon hundreds of screenshots of my location - at all bours of the day and night - EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. since I had left him up until the day he left on his vacation. I was stunned and resolved in that instant to get a new phone, damn the cost. I called a friend who understands technology far better than I do, and when I told her what I had found on his laptop, she yelled through the phone that I needed to immediately stop what I was doing. She gave me the name of a file extension and asked me to search the computer for it - I searched and found the program immediately. He had installed a key-stroke recording virus on the computer to record every move I made. If I had logged into my email as he had suggested, or logged into Facebook, or entered any other important passwords, he would have had them all via this program and I never would have known.

I looked further into the computer and found photos and videos of myself that I felt he no longer had the right to possess. I was not his property, and neither were my private images. I deleted the image and video files and, thanks to my friend’s advice, placed the files I needed to keep on a memory stick with the understanding that they might be infected with viruses as well and would need to be examined and potentially cleaned before I could access them. I was unsurprised to find new drug paraphernalia in the apartment, despite his claims that he had gotten clean. I gathered my things and, significantly shaken and upset, headed home. That day, I got a new phone and deactivated the old one, leaving it in a drawer, fearful of it as if it were a live thing that had betrayed me.

A few days later, he showed up at my doorstep.

“I see you found the files on my computer,” he said with a sneer of superiority. “Guess I won‘t be able to track you anymore. New phone, huh?”... I started to close the door, but he stopped it with his foot. “I ALSO saw” he said dramatically, pausing for effect, “that you tried to delete our videos and your pictures. That’s cute.” He flicked a small USB drive at me through the slit of the open door. “Here’s your copy.”

Obsession has many forms and is often portrayed as a romantic attribute, but obsession and possession are very closely related. My Ex was obsessed with me because he felt that he POSESSED me. I am not an object to be owned and tracked and retrieved. I am a human being, who has the right to remove herself from a situation in which she is not happy and does not feel safe. No person deserves to be treated in the way I was, but it happens every day, predominately to women of every age, race and religion. My Ex should have been trying to find his identity, his humanity, his sense of decency instead of my damn phone. Whoever needs to hear this: You Are Not Property! Marriage does not equal ownership. You are not a phone.

#Obsession #posession #findmyphone #stalking #technology #divorce

Before I was a doll, I was several dozen rags,

before I was the rags, I was made of hand-me-downs,

I was shirts that were too small, and skirts that had a stain,

pants that had a tear, overalls covered in paint.

Before I was these things, I was bought and sold in stores,

displayed in shiny packages and hung to be admired,

before this, I was fabric, pristine and pressed and new,

and before all this a bushy ball of cotton in a field,

a plant grown from the dirt that I now sit upon and rot,

as a rag doll with one eye, a crooked smile and dirty hair.

I was loved and I was useful in all of my forms but now,

all that I can do is hope I will return into the dust

that gave birth to me, so that I can begin my life anew.

1. When life puts you in tough situations, don't say "why me" say "try me".

2. Having a soft heart in a cruel world is not weakness it's courage.

3. People who say you"ll never suceed give you motivation to prove them wrong.

4. Mistakes are proof that you are trying.

5. Strong people don't put others down. They lift them up.

"Please stay with me, daddy!"

You were walking so fast.

Too fast for my little feet to keep up.

Was it that easy for you to leave me?

I know you heard my tear-filled screams, but you never stopped.

You just kept going.

Farther and farther away, not even trying to get one last look at me.

I punched, pulled, and pushed trying to make you stop.

You didn’t.

You just kept going.

Leaving me behind.

"Please don’t leave me!"

Pain.

I remember it too well.

The heart throbbing pain.

As we watched you leave.

Me and mommy.

My eyes were wet.

Hers were dry, cold.

As if she knew this would happen.

I looked into mommy's eyes.

Her brown eyes began spinning with webs of lies.

Lying to me for you.

How long do I have to wait for you before you realize that what you did was a mistake?

What was the reason you stayed away for so long?

Was it all the stupid crap you did in the past or is it because you don’t want me anymore?

Since you left, I dreamed of your return.

The day you would wrap me in your arms and whisper in my ear,

"I'm sorry for what I did. I promise I will never leave you again, my little Cookie Monster."

Then I wake up, hoping to see you.

Hoping that it wasn’t all a dream.

But reality soon caught up, and the dream quickly died.

I remember all the tears I had rushing down my face

as I saw you leave me and mommy behind, to never return.

I'm so incomplete without you, I need my daddy back in my life.

You deceived me, you said you would always be there.

You pinky promised.

You broke your promise.

How can I trust you again?

Do you still think of me as your "cookie monster" or

a daughter you never loved, a daughter you could leave

behind without a single goodbye in the blink of an eye?

I wish you were here to watch me grow up

but we both know that will never happen.

"I miss you so much! Won’t you please come back to me, daddy? I just need to see your face one last time."

Am I that disappointing I need to work to make you love me?

“Hey, daddy even if you don’t love me I will always love you no matter what happens.”

I bet you didn't even think about how I would feel when you left.

No, you only thought of yourself like you always do.

You missed all my birthdays, first dates, father-daughter dances,

and you may even miss my wedding, not that you even care.

Did you know that I would wait for the postman to bring the mail

and check to see if there was a letter for me?

But there never was.

I eventually stopped going, knowing nothing was there for me.

"Well, daddy looks like you really didn't care about me buts it's in the past.

Now I have a family who loves me, stays with me, and likes for who I am.

I don't need you anymore.”

Daddy, I still need you. Please, come back.

Story time: When I was 6, my dad was deported to the Dominican Republic. I remember visiting him in prison before he was booted out of the country. I was only a child then and I don't remember much but the pain is still there. I didn't ever write down my feelings until my 8th grade English teacher assigned the class a project where we had to write a poem about a struggle that impacted our lives. As you probably have guessed, I wrote about my dad. It was not the best poem and as the years went by I would add more to it, pouring my heart and soul into it. I think the day I presented my terrible poem to the class was the day that I wanted to become a writer. And since then I have written more and more.