Dear Vince,

It's been almost five years now, but I still catch myself thinking about you almost everyday.
I'm living life in a way now that I never thought I'd have the opportunity to....I don't know whether you'd be happy or sad about what I've managed to do with myself these past few years, but I hope you'd at least respect my choices. I think you would. I'm still here and that, after all, was what you wanted the most.

Sometimes I wonder what life would have been like if you were still here. As much as I loved you, there are so many people in my love now who I love and cherish. When I catch myself thinking about life without them, it's almost like how I used to feel when I thought of life without you. Unbearable. These people make up my life now and without them I am nothing. I never want to be that lost again, even though I think sometimes I get very close. I think I've reached another crossroad in my life, but neither path is very clear to me and a decision has to be made. I remember when we were younger and we made decisions purely according to what made us happy and what, for the most part, made other people happy. Now I have to make decisions according to how I'll pay next months rent and whether or not I want to eat for the next week or so. I wish I could get back to that time when everything was simple, but with age comes responsibility and nothing will ever be as easy as it was back then.

I can still hear your voice in the back of my mind when I'm making decisions. And when I'm having doubts. It's reassuring, but I don't think many of the family would understand. They'd probably, if anything, be a tad concerned, which is understandable. 5 years is a long time and I'm sure they've all expected me to be over you and everything that happened by now. I am. Over you. In the sense that I don't think of you as a lover anymore. I have one of those and he's my partner in just about everything. I believe in him more than anything else in this world, though I don't tell him nearly enough. I think of you now as a friend. A very dear, close friend that I loved and I lost. I still think of it all as dreadfully unfair. I don't know how long it'll take me to adjust and to accept, to stop being angry or sad and just live. I'm waiting for a day to come when it'll all just magically make sense, but deep down we both know that's unlikely. I can hope and wish for the time being for that quick fix...whilst I take steps towards doing things the hard way.

I try not to be disappointed with my life. With the decisions I've made, the good and the bad. I try to understand that every so often someone is landed with a dose of a 'normal' existence and that I'm no exception. I can't always have the extraordinary even though things seem dull without it. I worry about not having that same 'knock me off my feat' feeling that I've had in life before and I worry about worrying about it. I feel sometimes like I've jinxed myself. I hope not. These things take time, but I always was and always will be an impatient sort of person. I'm committed to writing every day, just to get some of those poisonous thoughts and feelings and words out of my system, lest they eat me alive. My biggest fears are regret and being alone. I hope that I can accept them, not as fears but facts of life, as things that occasionally just happen but aren't anything to be afraid of, before I succomb to them entierly.

I don't know what else to write. I think I'm done for today. But there will be more, I'm sure, in the lead up.

Mary.