text: I’m going to write. “Star crossed.” Bleh! Gah! Gross! What a teenage cliché. Are you there John Green, it’s me, (insert name here). But still. I mean, it works, doesn’t it? As a description. The timing probably *could* have been worse, but it was pretty fucking bad. Who would have guessed that...after never connecting like this in my entire life, after deciding a long time ago to settle, after being more or less content, resigned to my stagnation, that someone like *you* would come into my life? It became addicting, the “what if?” What if we had met as kids? In high school? At camp? Randomly or unpredictably, before it would have been too late for both of us? I’m going to write. I tried pretty hard not to think about it at the time, to not let it sink it...just exactly what I was doing, what *we* were doing. I was just trying to live in the moment. It’s a bad (good) habit I developed in college, after struggling to pull myself out of a depression. I tried to stop living in the past or the future. I tried to just live. I even remember my friend Rev asking me about it. The change he noticed in me. I told him about Taoism. He knew what I meant before I explained it. I’m not describing this very well. But it’s not going to stop me from going on. Because: I’m going to write. Is it a good thing or a bad thing we live in different parts of the country? Probably both. Two extremes. Is it a good thing or a bad thing that we connected so deeply? Probably both as well. Actually, you know what...no. Fuck that. It WAS good. It IS good. To be seen like that. To see you like that. To have experienced it, to know that it is real, it is possible. I hope it leads to change for you. It seems like it did. It would be arrogant of me to claim to be the only catalyst for your change. But I’d like to humbly think that I played a part in it. I’m going to write. Because that’s what you were to me: a catalyst. It’s what you have to be. If I was stronger, I think we could be together. If I was weaker, I think we could be together. But I’m too damn balanced. The two extremes canceling each other out. Constant internal war breeds constant internal peace, right? Am I at peace? When we said goodbye, I was sobbing quietly in the bathroom, hoping my coworkers wouldn’t hear. It was the most emotion I have felt in years. I won’t let it be for nothing. It can’t have been nothing. It can’t have meant nothing. I know it didn’t. So: I’m going to write. I’m going to write because you saw my potential, because you wouldn’t want me to be shackled by self-doubt anymore, because you wouldn’t want me to give in to the creeping negativity gnawing at me even now. I’m going to write. And I’m not going to stop. And my first book will be dedicated to you. For Kitten. “And one fine morning...” Maybe it will happen. A book tour. A sea of faces. And there yours is. There you are. I can imagine it now. The way my heart would stop. The way my chest would tighten. I’m kidding myself. Or am I? Will the stars align again? I’m going to write. And I’m not going to stop.