SINCERELY YOURS WEEKLY SPECIAL

To The First Of All Exes (Sincerely Yours)

This has been over seven years in the making, yet I am still reluctant to address you as one of my exes.
You were everything I needed at the time. Excellent and more. You excelled in a lot of things, and that was one of the many things I loved about you.

It is weird how we knew each other for over three years, saw each other almost daily, yet we hardly ever spoke. It took a change in both our circumstances for us to see each other differently.
How we went from acquaintances to friends, then close friends, to dating, and ended as exes, then strangers is one that still blows my mind.

Life indeed is a journey. You try as you may, but you can only hope the future is as you desire.
When we eventually became friends, that was a major milestone for me. I can’t remember the start of a lot of my friendships, but yours is one that stuck with me.

Deciding to get into a relationship was probably a wrong step though. We were bound to end as exes, but our stubbornness, or determination, got the better of us.
The feelings were unarguable. Even as friends, our love and chemistry were superb.

Maybe we should have enjoyed being friends and never bothered dating. Maybe we would still be friends rather than exes. Or maybe it was inevitable that we would get together.
There are a thousand and one other maybes, maybe in an alternate universe, we followed one of the several maybes, and ended up with a “happily ever after”.

When we eventually started dating, it made a lot of sense. We knew we were taking a big risk, we knew the odds were stacked against us, we knew a lot of things were out of our hands, but it still made a lot of sense.
The one lesson I learned from that decision is that sometimes, go with your logic, rather than your emotions.

Every minute of dating you was pure bliss. The distance wasn’t fun, but the moments shared are still burnt into my memory.
I never got to tell you these, but I think writing this down is me accepting it for a fact.

Despite the uniqueness of our situation, you were the right person for me at the time. As much as our friends would argue that I was more mature than my age, you fast-tracked my maturity to a higher level.
You made me acknowledge my emotions for the first time, and from then, there was no going back.

All these years later, I sometimes wonder if I would have been ready for “the next” if “we” hadn’t “happened”.
Your personality is one that has influenced my choice ever since. Maybe it existed in my subconscious before, maybe you imprinted it. Either way, I recognized it first in you.

When the inevitable eventually happened, things had to end between us. A part of me still wishes I had taken a shot at resolving it differently.
It might sound crazy now, but right now, I know it was possible.

If I am being honest with myself, back then, I knew it was possible too. Maybe I wasn’t ready though.
Maybe I was scared about the future. A future that would be a thousand times different, but a future we could have handled still.

At that moment, we went with the easy decision. We ended up as exes. I had seen it coming from a mile away, but that didn’t subside the pain one bit.
I can still remember my journey back home. The road was blurry and I could feel the years just along my eyelids.

All these years later, I have a theory that if I had cried that day, I would have loved different from that day forward.
Maybe I would have loved better, maybe I would have been stone-hearted. I didn’t cry though, and I still don’t know if that left me better or worse.

As I write this now, something just occurred to me. In the seven-plus years since things ended between us, I never thought about how you felt or reacted to our break up.
I was consumed by my pain so much that I forgot you were also hurting. Maybe I’m wrong though.

It took a couple of years before we spoke again, but I never asked you how you were doing. I am truly sorry about that.
How did you feel when it ended? Did you hurt as I did? More? Less?
I wish I could have been there as your friend at that moment. I’m really sorry I never asked.

With all I hold dear, I hope you actually healed, made the right choice, and that it was all worth it in the end.
I hope you are truly happy now, and in the future too. We might be exes, but that doesn’t mean we are now enemies.

Our friendship never recovered, but I hope your heart did. Right now, I’m actually wondering if my own heart did.
We likely would have been better friends if we weren’t friends.

My biggest regret in breaking up with you is missing out on your wedding cake.
The worst part of this is that I don’t even eat cakes. And I don’t like parties too. But you were the kind of friend for whom I would have turned up. Maybe ate a slice of cake too.

Hopefully, we get to see again soon. We have a lot of catching up to do.
As exes, our relationship might not have lasted forever, but I hope our friendship rises from the dust like the Phoenix.
In all of these, “we” remain one of the best things that ever happened to me.
Sincerely yours,
Wilson J.

Wilson Joshua is a Video Editor, Content Creator, and Creative Writer.
You can follow him on TwitterFacebook, and Instagram. @IJOSWIL