No Friend (Aaron’s Letter)

Found these old letters from years ago. I felt it was fitting to continue that correspondence. Can't help I'm sentimental. Thanks for talking with me today. I hope this is helpful for you. I also that hope Birdie is happy and healthy and staying out of trouble to a reasonable extent.​

What I wrote was sort of my way of finally being able to address how it feels to have anyone look at you as anything but the human you are. Good and bad. For me, mostly bad. A lot of girls will come up to me before or after a show and tell me I'm perfect or that they wanna be like me. While I realize that maybe it's some melodramatic version of what they may truly feel, what I really hear is: "You can do no wrong in my eyes." At that point, I'm not even thinking about my interaction with them anymore. My mind is just reeling, thinking about how much my insides are a complete contrast to what is being projected onto me.​

There were so many seemingly horrible things happening last year. I just wanted to die. I didn't even feel like what I was doing was useful anymore. We couldn't even keep ourselves healthy let alone spread any sort of hopeful message. It felt embarrassing to be trapped inside myself and think I had a purpose. None of these things even begin to scratch the surface of faith and God and where my head was at with that reality. I had nothing else to rely on, no ego, no relationships I trusted, no hope would come easily and these times, I envisioned hope as a little pin prick of light down a long, long, dark tunnel. And this time, there was no tiny light, no nothing. So I just thought about future and death. My whole life, I'd been about trying to make people feel better, but I can't even make myself feel better.​

It's hard to think that we're about to head back out into the wild after being in a safe cocoon for nearly two years. It's kinda hard to see myself in the reflection of people's eyes, realizing that what they see may not even be close to the image I see in myself and I think I might actually be more afraid to let my own self down than anything else. I feel like the man in the story who saw a bear floating in the river and thought it was a fur coat. Twelve years ago, I stood on the shore and jumped in and grabbed the coat. The river was rushing toward the waterfall and my friend stood on the shore and shouted to let go of the coat and swim back to land. I let go of the coat, but the coat won't let go of me.​

In any case, please let me know if there's more I can give you. If nothing comes of it, then just know we are grateful.​