164: The Day the Music Died 2 (!)

 I wrote - sometime back in 2019 - about how I found some old papers and some old love letters - Entry 141: The Day the Music Died. These showed how the issues that have mushroomed over the years were always there.

Going through some other boxes, I found the Valentine's Letter 2000 that I referred to in the Entry 141.

I go on for two A4 pages about how much I love her - I was coming back from a trip and wrote this in an airport lounge. 'I love you so much and have missed you so dearly on this last trip. I don't think I have loved you more than I do just now when we are apart. I cannot wait to see you again in a few hours' time, to hold you, to talk with you, to be silly with you.' 

(since our marriage - a few months earlier) 'it is impossible to imagine life without you as a friend and lover. One of my dreams having been fulfilled - ie finding you - I have one great aim left. And that is to be the man that I want to be inside. For now I am too petty, too inhibited, too constrained by complexes, too much of a bluffer. But, with your strength, even that is possible.'

And then I go on:

'Am I allowed to criticize? Just as I hope you will work on me so I hope you will allow me to work on you. [Remember, this was written 20 years ago - in much younger days.] All I would ask is that you be a little more forgiving of others and live by looser rules than you do. You have often berated me for what I believe are, ultimately, some of my strong points - and I've been similarly criticised in the past by my family; I was hoping to get a more sympathetic hearing from you! Yes, I am willing to ring when others have not rung me. Yes, I am willing to overlook slights. Yes, I am willing to go out of my way. As a result I have a strong set of friends and a family which thinks reasonably of me. None of us is perfect but we do think ourselves to be, then we judge others, find that they are not and that's when the trouble starts.

'Life is good. I can confidently say that, amongst my family and my friends and your family and friends, there is not one person who would wish us anything other than the best - let's enjoy that. Let's have an easy life.'

Unhappiness and control - a toxic mixture - how did I have the energy to survive so long and I am angry that my vulnerability has been quite so abused. For the sake of our son, I stay.