Letters to my Future Wife

Dear Future Wife,

Hi. We have yet to meet, so all I have to go on about you is my imagination. One of those imaginary trips I took in my mind brought up the idea of talking to you before I even meet you. So via these letters, I would like to get a head start on us getting to know each other. I’ll go first.

First of all, and there will be a few in all, I want to thank you for coming into my life. I’ve never been much of a romantic, or worried about having a soulmate or life-partner, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling this colossal sense of relief for having finally met you. To be honest, there have been times recently where I really wasn’t sure if I was ever going to find you; or worse - if I will deserve you.

I think this would be a good time to tell you where I am speaking from: the year is 2014, and I am (as you are calculating and the answer is…) 24 right now. I’m not going to waste this opportunity to write a double entendre: you, dear wife, are my future. You see the two meanings there? Not only are you my actual future, since we’re married (or about to be in case I gave you these letters post-engagement) for eternity et al, but you’re quite literally my future as well! And yes, my habit of explaining my clever jokes has now expanded to the written word as well. I would apologize for this, but then I would be apologizing every time I do it and it just doesn’t seem fair to either of us if I continue to do things I have to apologize for. So I will continue to do this until you give me a serious life or divorce ultimatum.

Real quick: did you see the thing I did there with turning the regular ol’ "life or death” phrase into life or divorce? So sorry again.

This is the point in the letters where I am tempted to say “Now, I know what you’re wondering…”, but I am not going to do that because I would never ever dare to assume that I know what you’re thinking unless you want me to know what you're thinking in which case of course I do.

So coming back to why I’m using this medium to communicate with you. The obvious reason is that you’re so wonderful and perfect and beautiful that I just needed to find a way to talk to you before I meet you. And also, the possibility that you’ll have this available to read before you actually become my wife is my way of opening up my past to you so you can decide if we can make a future together.

The not-so-obvious reason is that I'm not so sure about this whole love thing. Is it okay if I say that? I hope it is because I'm going to sound very unsure to you for most of these letters. It's not that I don't believe in love - I'm almost sure I do. What it really is...well...maybe we should both continue with these letters to find out. Because at this point it seems like I'm as intrigued by the idea of these letters as you are.

I should stop with this pre-first-letter disclaimer-like sentences and just get to it.

Okay, one final disclaimer-like sentence: you know I like my stories unnecessarily complicated, so to continue with that clearly-working system, this love story is not going to be the usual kind where it is about two people...

This is a love story about me.

Isn’t that a great title? “A Love Story About Me.” I’m totally keeping that as the unofficial second title for these letters. Just wanted to say that. Back to the story.

The One Who Never Knew

Let’s start with an easy one.

Actually...this is more of a consolation or honorable mention thing.

I had been getting female attention since about 6th grade. Nothing serious - just the usual crushes and rumors of crushes and such. All harmless, cute fun. Actually now that I think of it, middle school was probably my most popular time in terms of total number of interested parties. So much potential. So many possible stories.

Well, in (now-)typical fashion, i chose to ignore the ones that were interested in me to go for the one that wasn’t…yet.

Yes, I was super mature at 12.

So…wait. At this stage I’m wondering about how I can continue talking about girls in my past without maintaining their privacy. Fake names? That sounds good, right? Okay, let’s go with that.

So the year is 2001, I'm in 7th grade, and this girl that wasn’t interested in me was named Sarah...

Yes, that’s the first fake name I could think of. And no, her real name didn’t start with a “S” so don’t go cyber-searching for her. Or maybe it doesn't start with an "S" and this is just a big misdirection. To think of it, maybe her name really is Sarah...maybe.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure I would have deleted my facebook account by the time I get married so you won’t have many ways to stalk these women. I guess you’ll have to go by my word.

Super-short-side-note: Are you also getting this feeling that this 'letters to my future wife' thing could very easily be named “How I Met You”, like “How I Met Your Mother”? Well, ignore the similarities because any similarities in style or theme are coincidental since my life is not fictional. Except for the names, obviously. And some other stuff I can't disclose yet since I have yet to write it.

Back to Sarah - she had everything a 12 year old me would be interested in - brunette, pretty, not as tall as me but tall enough, great smile - and on top of all that obvious stuff she was also the smartest girl I had met in my 12 long years. She also had this confidence about her that really intimidated most of the other guys. Those guys were more interested in the sure things - the ones without zero risk of rejection. I was - still am, for better or worse - the exact opposite.

I met Sarah on the first day of 7th grade, which was also my first day at that school. We were sitting next to each other in English, and when the teacher asked a rather difficult question, I chose to make what I at the time considered a rather clever joke. Sarah was the only one who got it and smiled. I looked at her, and I was instantly smitten. I said hi, and we became friends right then and there because that is how middle school works.

i was 12 and had absolutely no worry in the world. I probably had only 5 or 6 major thoughts in my head - at most. So for 12 year old me, what I saw in Sarah was all love needed to be. There was no worry of a future or any other crap that worried me over the next decade. It was just simple.

The problem was also obvious - I didn’t want to lose our friendship by telling her how I felt, she was my only friend, what if she rejected me, blah blah blah. See I know we've all heard this story before. At first I thought it was a bad idea, but after a couple months the feelings went away and all I was left with was a friend for life. See? Typical first love/crush issues.

Well not “for life” exactly. Some other dude did finally get the cojones to ask Sarah to “hang out” one day. So instead of hanging out with me that day as usual, Sarah asked me if it was okay to go with the other guy. One day turned to three turned to no days left for me.

And no, I don't imagine what would my life have been like if I had said yes. I don't need a peek at that alternate universe.

I was a real trooper about it though. I didn’t get upset or anything. I did the mature, good-friend, gentlemanly thing and asked Sarah’s friend Amber (yes, also a fake name) to “hang out”. Yeah, I was a smooth, cold bastardouche (what a great multi-purpose word that I just made up!).

Anyway, Sarah was the one who never knew. And when I said that she wasn’t interested in me - well, I just told myself she wasn’t because if she was I have made a huge mistake and I can’t go through with this future marriage of ours. So…I’m sure she wasn’t.

I don’t know what happened to her, and frankly I don’t want to know. For me she can stay as a half-remembered, half-happy memory. Obviously in this memory she's a grown up person and not a 12 year old girl because that would be weird.

Let’s move on to the next letter, the one where this really becomes a two-person story. Actually, to be accurate, (spoiler alert!) it was a three-person story.

The First One

So all one-sided crushes and attractions aside (even the ones where I am the recipient but the sources didn’t reveal themselves, and yes, I’m sure there were a few), my multi-letter love story began back in 2003.

Tangent: I just realized that it’s been 11 years. Holy shit. I’m sure the statistics are worse for the general population, but just on a personal level 11 years seems like an insane amount of time one can spend to find love.

So it's 2003 and I'm in 9th grade. I don't know what your 13 year old self was like (I'm sure you were an absolute angel), but I was a mostly-harmless jerk. I know that now, but sadly 13 year old me had no clue he was a jerk. He actually didn't think about what kind of person he was. How can that be? What else did we have to worry about at 13?!

So anyway, I have a group of friends that I hangout with during school, and then there's another group which is a bunch of neighborhood kids. I had just moved to this part of town so both the school and the neighborhood were new to me.

The school group has 7 members and three of them are girls. In the neighborhood group there are 5 members and two of them are girls. Out of these five girls, three will have crushes on me over the next few months (or so my sources revealed at the time), and by December (four months away) one of them will become my first girlfriend.

Isn’t that crazy? Here I am, a 13 year old with no experience with girls and suddenly I’m going to have options! The 13 year old me was quite happy with having such problems. Especially after not being so lucky the previous years. This year was quite awesome.

Okay so here’s how things started. I spent my daytime with the group at school (obviously), where I tried to fit in and get to know them (the girls, specifically). Of those three, I knew the one I liked. Her name was Isabel (yes, fake). She had just moved to California from Spain over the summer, and everything about her was very attractive to me. She was really pretty, super cute, ridiculously adorable, and also a good-hearted person. Plus her accent was quite wonderful, especially when she said my name.

Okay so I hope it’s okay with you that I’m describing her like that. Of course in our future (your present), I only have eyes for you. This story is about my past and my (as I remember it) truth. I’m just trying to be as honest and accurate as possible about my feelings at the time. And I'm super positive that the way you say my name beats any accent.

During the evening and on weekends I would hang out with the neighborhood group. This group too has a girl that I had an instant attraction towards, and - because life likes symmetry - she too had recently moved to this town (albeit from another state). Let's call her...Mia. I don't know how to describe Mia, so here's all I'll say: she was the most beautiful girl I had seen face-to-face in my 14 years on the planet.

Remember, this is all relative.

So here I am - 14 years old (yes I had turned 14 during this love story) and on top of the world because I think I’m juggling two potential love interests; and of course this is all in my head since neither of them have explicitly shown interest in me.

Looking back, it all seems so ridiculous. Every small thing seemed so important. 24 year old me wouldn’t spend an extra second worried about things I lost sleep over at 14.

While I would love to get into the details of both Isabel and Mia and this love triangle I was imagining myself in, the truth is that I don't remember much about them or that time period. I remember the events, just not the time around them.

Another truth is that 13 year old me wasn't looking for a good person to spend his free time with. He was just a kid, who let attraction decide his wants and needs. Was he happy? Fuck yeah.

Tell me, in your present (my future), am I still confident-on-the-outside and shy-on-the-inside? Because 24 year old me is. And 14 year old me was too.

I handled this potential love triangle as you would expect me to - I didn't make any moves at all. I had no clue what a 'move' was anyway, so why bother trying and failing immediately? I let them come to me.

I still do that. I'm just better at...well, nope I'm still not good at the whole moves thing.

So luckily for me I had some good friends in both groups that had my back and brought me good intel. See there was a reason I wasn't trying to get too close to either Isabel or Mia - both of them were quite attractive in obvious ways, which only meant that everyone at school (in the case of Isabel) and in the neighborhood and at her own school (in the case of Mia) would be hitting on them. Why would I just want to be another interested party? That wouldn't make me unique - it would make me just another guy. And I am not just another guy.

So time goes by and we're now in November. I have yet to spend any alone time with either Isabel or Mia, but I am starting to get intel that suggests that Mia thinks I'm "cute". Of course, hearing that gave me enough confidence to become a full-time douche. However, there's a school-people party at someone's house, and during that party I run into Isabel and we start talking (14 year old me thought he was flirting, but it was a regular conversation by adult standards). While my confident had been built up because of Mia, it was Isabel whom I saw first, and obviously I applied my 'charm' to the nearest recipient. 

I know. Super classy. 

An hour passes, and we're both sitting my ourselves in the backyard. If my confidence level was at 10 already before this party, it's now breaking the meter at 20. So I make my first ever move - as Isabel is telling me a fascinating story that I'm not listening to because I'm about to make my first move, I casually but surely reach for her hand. And you know what happens next? She doesn't react, she just keeps talking. I did see a micro-expression that could be classified as a smile, but that could just be me falsely remembering the past because of course she would smile.

I'd like to say that the story of the triangle stops there - I've clearly made my choice and it's Isabel. But my brain had too much spare power left to just focus on one girl - so while I held Isabel's hand I was also thinking of what it would feel like to hold Mia's hand. And whether this choice meant I couldn't make the other one anymore. 

What I'm about to say next is what I actually believe happened. I'm not making this up or readjusting the truth. This is my truth, as I remember it. 

As I sat there in the backyard on the steps holding Isabel's hand while also thinking about Mia, I turn my head to look at the party inside, and guess who is staring right back at me ---

Mia.

What happened next? Well, if this was a movie my character would leave Isabel's hand, Mia would suddenly run away, and my character would run away after her exclaiming "Mia! Wait! I can explainnnn..."

If my life was a movie, this story would have a lot more teenage drama and coming-of-age cliches. What actually happened was that Mia and I locked eyes for about three seconds, then Isabel asked me "what's wrong?", which made me stop looking at Mia. By the time I told Isabel that it was nothing and looked back towards the general direction of Mia, she was obviously gone.

And when I say gone, I mean gone. We (the neighborhood kids) were supposed to meet the next day for a movie, but she didn't show up. Before I knew it, she was out of the group.

Did I blame myself? Did I blame Isabel? Did I blame Mia?

Do I remember blaming anyone? Good question.

I'd like to say that Mia completely disappeared out of my life in an instant, but it took longer than that. I saw her around the town sometimes, and she came up in common conversations. When I asked others about her, I didn't get much. When I asked why she was at that party, no one knew that she was there. Actually, they didn't even know there was a party since that was a 'my school' thing and Mia went to a different one.

Mia did disappear completely eventually, about three weeks after the eye-lock incident. Everyone had different stories about her, with the majority believing that her parents were only staying in a rental in the neighborhood, and were just waiting on moving to their new house in the next town over.

I, honestly, didn't care too much. I had Isabel. So one day in December, I popped the question to Isabel: Will you be my girlfriend?

That’s word for word (I’m 82% sure and 48% positive). She said yes (or something meaning yes), and we were dating! It really was that simple in those days. So adorable, so cute, so predictable.

I had a lot of firsts with Isabel - my first date, my first kiss, my first...well certain other things that I don’t know if I should be explicit about with you. Let’s just say I was happy, I believed I was in love (because why wouldn't I believe that?), everything was just great.

Emphasis on the was. Everything was great…until…

The One Who Ruined Everything

I’ve realized how this letter has become pretty long now, so I’m going to speed things up a bit.

Sometime around January 2005, I met a girl.

This girl - let's call her Cruella (yes, that's a reference to an evil character in a Disney movie, and yes, her name is a hint/spoiler to her character in my life) - didn’t exactly “ruin everything”. That was just a fun title for me. But she did make me take actions that I didn’t know I was capable of.

So I’m still dating Isabel in January 2005. We’re doing fine, although I’m a bit bored. There is nothing wrong with the relationship or Isabel - it’s really just me. It’s like everything is still - no excitement, no change, no ups, no downs.

At 24, there’s so much work-related positive and negative excitement that I’d be pretty happy if my personal life was still.

But at 15, all you have is a personal life so you crave any sort of excitement. For me, that excitement was Cruella.

Here’s why: before I ever met Cruella or knew what she looked like, I heard her voice. A common friend got us in touch, and we spoke on the phone for about two weeks before setting up a coffee thing. And when we met, there was just this energy between us. I was attracted to her in an instant.

You know that question interviewers ask: If you could go back in time what advice would you give to yourself at 15, 20, 25 etc?

I’m not one to regret or look back, but if I am able to ever get a time machine, I would go back to 2005 and tell my 15 year old self to stay away from this girl - just to find out what my life would have been like without her in it. The problem is that the 15 year old me would probably still go after her because it would make her even more “unattainable”.

Because she was. From the minute I started talking to her, it became very clear that the life she lived was leagues away from my own. She was from another school, she went to parties, she loved rock music, she had never had a boyfriend but had guys swooning over her - everything I found out about her was blowing my bored mind.

So I did something stupid - and selfish - I decided to break up with Isabel and ask out Cruella.

Why? Because people like 15 year old me don't deserve good people.

Not stupid or selfish enough? Let me explain how I accomplished my goals: I broke up with Isabel - over the phone - on our 15 month anniversary (because at 15 you count such things). And then I asked out Cruella - again, over the phone - just two hours after breaking up with Isabel.

Yeah, I was an asshole.

I should also mention that I didn’t tell Isabel I was breaking up with her because I had met someone else. I don’t even remember the reason I gave her - probably something ambiguous and unfair like “I’m not happy”.

It would have been one thing if I had done those things and felt some sort of remorse. But instead all I felt was nothingness - I was not ashamed or proud of my actions. I labeled it all to “If I’m not happy, then how can I make her happy?”

I’ll be honest with you, I’ve used that justification for most break up speeches. And I believed it every time.

All I can say now is that Isabel didn’t deserve it, and I definitely did not deserve her.

What happened to Isabel? Well, I never spoke to her again, and she moved back to Spain after finishing high school.

Moving on - so now that I’m dating Cruella, the girl I desire, everything should be easy and fun, right?

Of course not. Because karma is real and your bad decisions haunt you until you learn.

Here’s what happened: for three months after I asked out Cruella, she never actually said “yes” to dating me or being a couple. So I chased and chased and chased her until all I could think about was the chase. She broke me down to my most desperate self - all so I could be super sure that she and I were a good idea and had to happen. 

You know what happens when a 15 year old girl tells a 15 year old guy that she isn’t sure they are right for each other every day for 3 months? He goes crazy and makes it his mission to convince her otherwise. So what could have been a really casual let’s-see-where-this-goes relationship becomes one with constant drama mixed with emotional instability.

And I loved it! I completely forgot why I liked her or was attracted to her or why I ever broke up with Isabel - my only mission was to get this unattainable girl to be mine. There was no other option with her - you either go all in, or you end up without a girlfriend.

What did I learn? There is a huge cost to having an ego.

Here’s the funny part: I know all of this now, but back then, I was absolutely on top of the world! I was dating a girl who everyone either wanted or was jealous of! The only price of this happiness was that she would break up with me every 3 months or so for ridiculous reasons and I would have to yet again win her back. It was exhilarating - and most importantly - not even slightly boring.

I tried so hard to be a good boyfriend that I didn’t even care for what she did for me. For me, the idea of her was more important than her actual personality. I never tried to see who she really was. All I cared about was making myself happy by doing things that I thought would make me look like a good person.

Wait...before I move on any further, I should explain why I refer to her as "Cruella". And while I do not wish to get into every single instance, here's just one...

So about a year into our relationship, Cruella and I got into a big fight. What was the fight about? No clue. And that's not present-me saying that. Even 16 year-old-me had no idea what this fight was about. I would like to say that it had started because of a rumor Cruella had heard about me and another girl. It wasn't true obviously (probably), but that didn't matter because it was the perfect bait required to ignite a "we shouldn't be together" conversation. So the fight began, and about 30 minutes into it, Cruella uttered these words:

"I can't believe I haven't cheated on you yet. You don't deserve my loyalty."

Yeah, what kind of 16 year old girl thinks like that?

I really was a very different person back then. I’m trying to remember events and moments, but I’m blanking on most of my time with her. All I have is images - no video, no dialogue. Just moments that explain nothing.

All I can say is that if I didn’t like myself at 14, then 15 and 16 definitely weren’t in my top 20 years.

So here’s the bottom-line about Cruella’s place in my life: in the moment, I was happy. Looking back, she was batshit crazy and I don’t like to think about her or the person she made me. Whatever the 15-year-old-me called it, this wasn’t love. It was just hormonal attraction coupled with unintellectual excitement.

Anyway, I wasn’t out of the woods just yet. By summer 2007 I had to get ready to start college, for which I was moving to New York. Cruella and I had been dating almost two years by now, so I had two paths in front of me: I could be the nice guy who finishes what he starts and does the long distance, OR, I could use the the long distance to set myself free and start fresh.

Here’s the thing though: 16 year old me ran on two things:

A. A sense of honor, which wouldn’t allow me to break up with another girl for selfish reasons

B. Brainwashed Goop, as in my brain, since Cruella was controlling my entire life by then and I had no clue

So when I left California in August 2007, I decided to become a good person who doesn’t go around breaking a girl’s heart (again). I would stay in a relationship with Cruella, and let things be the way they were.

Luckily for me and for you - if you’re still interested in getting or staying married to me - that relationship didn’t last long. Because on the first day of college I met...

The One Who Mattered

A few days before my 18th birthday, I moved to New York to go to college. I had no plans for the future, and I wanted to put as much distance as I possibly could between me and that future thing. So moving to the other side of the country where I knew absolutely no one was a great idea.

What happened to me over the next 4 years is pretty much as close as I’ll ever get to a rebirth. Let me tell you why.

On September 27, 2007, I am entering my first classroom on the first day of college. It’s a Spanish language course - I picked up some Spanish while dating Isabel and wanted to stick with it in case I ever ended up in a Spanish-speaking country because why not. Before I entered this classroom, I had made a few friends, but none of them had any long term value. Just talking heads who in a year will barely recognize me when we walk across each other on campus.

The room is crowded and almost full, so I find an empty spot in the last row, far away from the professor. On my left, sits a girl. I take my phone out, which is the new iPhone which had just come out a few weeks ago, and I hear a voice:

“You got it too, huh?”

Girl, noticed.

Apple, thank you.

We’re at that moment again where I'm going to describe her in a slightly complimentary way, so…yeah. Sorry. It’s all for the story, I swear!

I turn to my left to face the voice, and it’s a face I instantly know I will never be able to forget. She is just beautiful. Quite possibly the most beautiful person I've seen in person in my almost-18 years on the planet. Her face...it just...why can't I describe it?

Oh wait. I remember why I can't describe it. Because it really is a face I will never forget. Because I had seen it before. Because I had felt this before.

I stop thinking because she realizes I have been staring at her for the past 20 seconds. So I attempt to say something in as few syllables as possible --

"Mia?"

My eyes were not mistaken. It was Mia. Mia as in the Mia from my neighborhood who I liked and she possibly liked me but quite possibly saw me holding Isabel's hand and left the neighborhood and I hadn't seen her in a few years - that Mia.

Is fate really trying to correct itself here? 

That's just what I thought in that moment while continuing to stare at Mia because if I said it out loud this letter would end a lot quicker.

"Yup, it's me," she said. So yeah, I wasn't hallucinating. It really was Mia. And did I mention almost-18-year-old-me was still attracted to now-also-almost-18-year-old-Mia?

But I have a girlfriend so I don’t see her in that way.

Not yet.

We start talking, and before I know it the class is over. We continue talking and before we know it we’ve spent like 6 hours together, just talking and walking around campus.

Hours turn into days. Within two weeks, we’re best friends and inseparable. Meals, class, study sessions, partying - everything we do, we do it together. I became better friends with her roommates than my own, and only went home to sleep.

This 18 year old me has absolutely no part of his brain worrying about the dangers of becoming friends with a super interesting, gorgeous girl - someone I had a chance with and could possibly have one again in the future. The same future that I came to New York to not think about. She’s just a friend, he said every time the brain asked before shushing it. 

Everything is going so fantastically well that I completely forget and subsequently ignore my cross-coast girlfriend. She calls, but I don’t pick up. When I do pick up, I cut it short. She asks me what I do all day, and I lie.

I am a person who is doing all the wrong things and doesn’t even care. I am free of my girlfriend’s metaphorical handcuffs, and I’m just loving it. Mia knows that I have a girlfriend back home and since I’m not cheating, so it’s all just harmless fun, right?

Less than four weeks after our first meeting, I’ve practically moved into Mia’s dorm room. We are spending every night together doing something or the other, and one day I get tired and she offers that I just sleep next to her on her tiny dorm-sized bed.

This is my second-first shot with Mia and there is no way I'm letting go of her this time.

So it becomes a daily routine - I wake up in her bed, walk to my dorm to take a shower, go to class or meet her for breakfast/lunch depending on the class time, go to class, meet her for Dinner, hang out with her till we pass out on her bed.

18 year old me is having the time of his life. He is just so happy and proud of himself. Everything is perfect. His life is perfect.

Turns out perfection is just another perishable good. Because one night, in a drunken moment, the no-attraction assumption is un-assumed and we kiss.

So I’m a cheater now. That’s where my life of no-rules and no-worry has led to. I start hating myself every time I’m not around Mia, so it helps that I am around her a lot. Because she doesn’t judge me. Not for a second. Without any verbal discussion, we just became a couple. Our friendship has matured to full-on open relationship. We’re both happy by not letting life tell us what to do, and we keep it that way.

The guilt does start to seep in through the cracks. I am really happy with Mia and the way things are going, but I am supposed to go back home to California in December where I'm still dating R-(oops almost typed her real name)-Cruella. What am I going to do?!?!

I’m stuck. I went from one girl (Isabel) to another (Cruella) only to find another one (Mia) - all without a moment in between to breathe. Who am I becoming? I’m cheating. I’m lying. I’m definitely romantically-challenged. I know I’m not in love with Cruella anymore (or if I was ever or at all), and am now doubting if I ever was. I know I’m not in love with Mia, because she doesn’t need me to be. She is the first person in my life who doesn't need me, and that feels good.

It's also going to be my downfall, but hey! - that's doesn't happen for a few more paragraphs.

So I break up with Cruella. I don’t tell her about Mia - all I say is that I am not happy and not in love with her anymore; that if I’m not happy, she can’t be happy either.

I come back to New York, and besides a couple calls over the next few months, we never spoke to or saw each other again.

Anyway so I tell Mia that Cruella (I actually did call her that in front of Mia too) and I are over, and she continues to remain unaffected by everything I do. Our open relationship continues, without progressing or becoming boring. We’re just happy to spend time with each other without any worry of a future together. My guilt is gone, and am just loving my uncomplicated life.

I'm going to say something super cliche here, but whenever I was with Mia, time stopped. The world around us didn't matter. As long as I saw her face, I didn't care for what happened to me.

Some would call that time Paradise. I didn't call it that, or even feel it, at the time. No, I had to lose it to find that out. Touché, life.

We never talked about our relationship. We never discussed what it was and where it was going. We didn't think it mattered. We just wanted to spend time with each other. That's it. Not too smart an approach, in retrospect.

Because like all things, this paradise had to crumble. And it took me a long time to understand why it happened.

But before we get to the why, here's the how:

Sometime around July 2008, Mia and I were eating lunch. We had been fighting for a couple weeks because I hadn't been spending too much time with her. 

I know that was a hint at the why, but the whole thing is a big realization which I will explain in a few lines.

So we’re at the Lunch, and for some reason Mia is uncomfortable around me. I suspect it’s because of the aforementioned fighting so I don’t read too much into it. Time will heal it, I thought. Then I scraped that thought and asked her “what’s wrong?”

We didn’t talk much about our situation, but when it came it talking, we were always honest with each other. So she told me the truth. She told me that she went to a party the previous night. She told me that she met a guy there. She told me she got drunk and one thing led to another...

Did you know people actually use that phrase 'one thing led to another...' in real life? I thought it was a fictional thing for movies and stuff like having fake phone numbers starting with 555. But nope. People actually say it. And it doesn't sound as clichéd in real life. 

Up until that exact moment when she said that I had no idea how much she meant to me. And how much I needed her. And how much I trusted her. She had made me think all those things that I had no intention of being bothered by during college.

And then she said, “if you want to go back to being friends, I’ll understand."

She broke my trust. I told her I knew that we had never really discussed 'exclusivity' so it wasn’t her fault. I told her that I was surprised by how hurt I was and I needed time to think. I told her I’d see her later.

She asked me, “when?” 

I told her, “I don’t know.”

I wish I could tell you that was the end of that. I wish I could tell you I left that Lunch with my self-respect and dignity still in my physical body. I wish I could tell you I never saw her again.

Because of course I fell in love with her. And I was hurt. So very hurt. I couldn’t understand anything. So for the first time in almost 10 months, I spent a day without her. And another 3 days.

Just 4 days later, it was Mia’s birthday. I went to see her, without any idea about what I was going to say or where we would go from there. I don’t remember much of our conversation.

I probably don’t remember most of the conversation because of the contents of the little bit of dialogue I do remember (this happened near the end of the conversation, probably one hour in):

Her - I don’t want this to end. 

Me - Fine. I am willing to forget it all. I will. Just tell me it was a mistake and that it won’t happen again. Tell me that and we can make this work again.

Her - (long pause) I can’t promise that.

Me - (longer pause due to my heart being smashed by a pink monster truck) Then I’m done.

And instead of copy pasting that think I said earlier about “I wish I could tell you that was the end of that…” blah blah, just assume that this didn’t end there. If it had I would have been very proud of myself.

After that night, I never saw the Mia I knew ever again. She was gone, replaced by a girl I will never know or understand. Or maybe I never knew this Mia at all. Maybe this Mia was the one who saw me holding Isabel's hand that night at the night all those years ago. Maybe this Mia and all the versions of Mia that could have existed never intended to trust me after we started our relationship on that backyard at that party.

Three weeks later, I asked Mia to meet me for Dinner. Same restaurant. I don’t remember much of this conversation either, but here is the part that remains imprinted into my memory:

Me - I miss you.

Her - (no words, no expressions, definitely doesn’t want to be here)

Me - I think…I think I’m in love with you.

Her - No, you’re not.

Me - Saying that isn’t helping. How would you know what I’m feeling? You don’t talk to me anymore.

Her - You don’t love me.

Me - Yes I do.

Her - (short, cold pause) I’m with someone else now.

Me - (longest pause of my life till this point) okay.

Her - I don’t want to lose you as a friend. Can we move on from this and be friends?

Me - I can’t do that. I can’t be friends with you. This is it. We’re done.

And then I walked away. No talk, no text, no meeting. We were done.

What fascinates me is that on that night, I really believed I was in love with her. She was the third person I said those three words to, but at that moment it felt like it was the first time I really meant it.

But here’s the current reality of my love life: I’ve said the words "I love you" a few times to a few different women. And in most cases I meant it when I said it. I really believed I was in love with them. But when I stopped loving them, I couldn't call it love anymore. If I'm not in love at the moment, then I've never been in love.

That realization is still a a couple years away though.

As for Mia, that Dinner was still not the end. Nope - for me it ended about a year later when I figured out why it happened. I'll get to that later.

But to the me after that Dinner it was sooo over. Just a couple weeks of harmless and casual depression followed by emails confessing my love again and asking her to love me back. Just two emails, though - I am still a man (so I told myself).

I was pretty broken because of that for about a month. It felt like I had lost who I was, because the one person who really knew me had left me. But then I realized I had never really been an individual. Not yet.

I am 19 by this point. I have spent five years in three relationships back to back. The most recent one came full circle since she could have been the first one too. 

I was being brought up by women but not growing up. I was doing everything I wanted, getting everything I desired, with almost no push-back from life. So if this was my wake up call to get my shit together, then I better answer.

So I answer the call, and start getting my act together. I realized I was in college and had plenty of opportunities to get over a heartbreak. I start thinking about a career after college, I find new friends - everything seems to be getting to finally head towards some sliver of brightness. But the actual event that led me through the light came in the form of - can you guess this by now? - a girl, yes. This experience was brief, but very important. Because she is...

The One I Needed

We’re in December 2008 now. This Christmas break I don't go back home. I don't really want to see people I know. So I get on a plane the other way around and end up in Scotland. A friend of mine from high school was going to the University of Edinburgh, so I had a place to stay. There, at one of their end of term college parties, I met Thea. 

Thea is short for Theodora. Both are fake names, again, obvi.

Thea was a local Scot from Glasgow, and her voice rekindled my love for gorgeous women with attractive accents. Actually I don't think the love had ever un-kindled. Who doesn't like foreign accents?

I reached Edinburgh on the 18th I think. And I was supposed to be back at college by the 10th of January. So for about three glorious weeks, I traveled around Scotland with Thea. We knew our thing was casual and time-constrained, which only intensified the relationship and made the goodbyes a lot easier.

We lived together, ate together, laughed together, and barely fought or discussed anything outside of our time together. That was enough of an adventure for me. In three weeks I lived a tiny little lifetime with another person who I never would have met in my normal routine through this life.

As is typical of my relationships so far, once I left Edinburgh, I never spoke to or saw Thea again. What we had was good, and good enough. It wasn't love because we didn't try to make it into anything like that. Our time together was like that movie Before Sunrise, except without the ending where we decide to meet again in six months, and also without the subsequent sequels after 9 years each. 

Although, since it's only been 6 years since I saw her, you never know...

Kidding. I'm quite sure you're not Thea. One, because you know your real name. And two, because I heard Thea got married last year.

Anyway, it doesn't matter much. Thea and I both got what we wanted from that relationship, and went back in our own directions, albeit different - if not better (in my case) - people.

When I got back to college, it didn't feel like the same place I left. I was happier. I was happy again. And I didn't want to stop being happy. I was single by choice now, and still just 19.

So, let me ask you a question my dear Wife, what would a single, 19 year old college student living on the island of Manhattan do?

Well, I'll give you a hint. Actually, I'll just make the hint the name of the next letter...

The One That Was More Than One

So yes, I was young and no longer hung up on Mia. I had a new group of friends, and some of them were females. And yes, I did hook up with some females (in the group and outside of it) from time to time.

Okay, so I understand that I could have kept this letter less-slutty, but that wouldn't be the truth. I understand that if you're really the woman I will love for the rest of my life (starting whenever I meet you), then you're not seeing this series of letters as a grand romantic gesture. You're probably also thinking that why the hell would I give you my love history in written form. Am I too ashamed to say it out loud? 

Well, since you're not real (yet), I'll answer that: No, I don't think so. In fact, a part of me hopes that I never have to give these to you, because if you do exist, then I've probably already told you all of this. 

So perhaps these letters aren't just for you. Maybe I'm just realizing that I'm writing these for me. To understand me. To understand what the fuck I've been doing. And what the hell this love thing is.

Anyway, I wasn't that much of a man-whore either. But I'll keep this letter PG-13. During the time of February 2009 to August 2010, there were 6 women. Okay, fine, there were only 5. I have no idea why I just bragged there - considering my audience, it just seems unnecessary. I also just realized that I could have just gone back and deleted 6 and replaced it with 5 instead of doing...this. But oh well. You're in love with a guy who does weird stuff like this. So I'm just going to continue treating these letters as if I'm typing them on a typewriter. Which I know wish I was.

Moving on.

So this chapter isn't just about the ones that didn't matter or last, it's also got a secret compartment which I'm still contemplating to open or not.

Well, let's just open it, since I already mentioned it and now even I'm curious.

Here’s the thing: because of my newfound and fresh self-respect and self-confidence, this year-and-a-half long break from a real relationship didn’t bother me at all. I was very happy being who I was and who I was trying to become. Those 18 months of learning, soul-searching, and experiences are responsible for about 50-60% of my current personality.

Remember how I mentioned that it took me almost a year post-Mia to really understand what had happened with us? Well it wasn't a year. It was actually two years.

Do you also remember how Mia has (so far in this story) appeared twice out of nowhere? First at that party where I held Isabel's hand. Then back again on the first day of college in the seat next to me.

Well, funny how that worked. Because even though we lived in the same giant city and went to the same giant university, I hadn't seen her face since that dinner back in August 2008. 

And where and when of all spaces and time did I see her again? September 2010. Miami Beach, Florida.

Let me set up the scene. I'm celebrating my 21st birthday with some friends. We're all appropriately intoxicated. We're on that street in Miami Beach where everything is a bar and everyone is drinking. It's a Friday night I think. We ended up at this one bar, the name of which is irrelevant but for the sake of story-building let's call it 'Happenstance' because I love that word and it becomes quite ironical when associated with the event about to take place. 

Also, that's just a great name for a bar.

I go to the bar. I order a drink. What drink? Good question. Let's see, I was 21, and had gotten into whiskey and scotch by then (thanks, Thea!), so I probably ordered a Jameson double with a couple ice cubes. It's probably midnight by now and I've consumed enough to know what I want to drink for the rest of the night.

"Since when do you drink Whiskey?"

I knew the voice. But I didn't want it to be her. I really didn't. I was in a good place. I had pushed her out of my head and my life. I'm not going to lie, there were many times after our breakup that I wished and hoped that every girl who tapped me on the shoulder was her. But not anymore. Not now.

Looking back, 21-year-old-me needed it to be her.

"Since I took my first sip," I say as I turn to face her, "Hi, Mia."

"Happy birthday."

"I...you remembered."

I got her a drink. My friends, none of which knew her, saw me talking to a pretty girl and decided to leave without me to another bar. I love the bro code.

We walked to an empty table. 

I wanted to ask her a lot of things. 19-year-old-me wanted to ask her even more things. But I didn't. We kept our conversation light. How is your weekend going? Good? Good. How's school going? Great. Me too. How does it feel to be 21? Awesome. Can't wait.

We killed a good 3 minutes with that amazing conversation filler. And then she asked --

"Seeing someone?"

"No," I lied. 

I was seeing this one girl back in college. But it wasn't serious. We had only been on a couple dates.

She gave me the eyebrow. The "Really?" eyebrow that Mia always gives when she doesn't buy when I'm selling.

"I mean, yes." I corrected my lie.

"What's her name?"

"Why do you care?" I quipped. 

I love alcohol. It lets you cut through the bullshit and get rid of that polite-filter.

"You're right. I don't." She smiled as she said that. 

"You never did," I said, also smiling.

We both laughed. I realized in that laugh how little I cared about her. I realized in that moment exactly why we didn't work out. We never actually cared enough about each other. We didn't have that magic bond that you get by trusting someone you love. I wasn't heartbroken because she broke my trust. I was upset because she never become someone I could trust. And she probably thought the same of me. 

So we kept drinking. We kept talking. We were friends again. We were back to where we would have been had it not been for the inevitable phase of 'taking this relationship to the next level'. This relationship only had one level, and we both saw it for what it was. I no longer felt any anger or resentment towards her for cheating on me. Because there was nothing to cheat on. She no longer felt guilty for breaking my heart. Because I never loved her.

What was even more incredible was that we actually said the above out loud, to each other's face.

And then...well, I'll just skip to the next morning. The last time I ever saw Mia. When we woke up in my hotel room, I knew this was it. She was getting dressed, and ready to leave. We both knew last night wasn't real. It never should have happened in the real world. It was a bonus night, one where the laws of physics and time and space didn't apply. One where our choices and decisions had limited consequences that only lasted and existed until the morning. 

So knowing that, and seeing her leave, I asked her the one question I had never asked her before. The one question I was always afraid to ask. The one thing we never talked about in our entire time together.

"Mia?"

She was fixing her hair in the mirror. She didn't turn around to face me. 

"Hmm?"

With my eyes staring at the ceiling of the hotel room, I said --

"Back in school. 9th grade. There was this party that my schoolmates had in our neighborhood. Right before you moved away. That night. I was in the backyard with this girl. I think I saw you standing at the other end of the porch. Was it you?"

She didn't stop doing what she was doing. It was like the question didn't affect her train of thought. She picked up her bag. She came back to the bed and kissed me on the cheek. And as she walked out to the door and out of my life, she said ---

"No."

C'est la fucking vie, I guess.

The Good One

So we're in January 2011 now. I'm almost done with college. I'm interning at the place I hope to one day work full-time (which I will, or did, technically). I’ve come quite far from that lost 19 year old me.

So one day, at a happy hour after my internship, I meet Constance. Yes, I know, that's a pretty fake name. Probably the fake-est name I've come up with so far. But what can I say? When or where else in my life will I ever be able to use the name Constance in a legitimate and believable way?

Anyway, Constance had just started working in the same building as my job. We get a couple drinks, start talking, meet up a few times over the next few weeks for drinks, and so on. After a few months, we're quite close. She's a year younger, so she still has a year of college left. Like me, she too is ambitious, so we work (for our internships and school) crazy hours and only get to see each other a couple nights a week at best. 

I'm supposed to graduate in May, and my college roommate is moving in with his girlfriend - in our apartment. I need a new apartment, something closer to work. Constance is moving too, and since we already liked each other but didn't get to see each other much, we figured "should we just live together?"

Oh, I forgot to mention one thing: We were not 'together'. By that I mean we weren't dating when we decided to live together. We were just two good friends who hang out a lot - basically two people who spend a lot of their free time together - who were now planning to live together. As roommates! In a very expensive, small, two bedroom apartment in Midtown Manhattan so we can both be close to our workplace (same building) and her campus.

I read a book once where it said that couples who live together before getting married are more likely to get divorced that couples who don't. I think it had something to do with the whole thing of co-owning furniture and co-signing leases that causes the couple to invest in the relationship without thinking of the possible fallout, which leads to marriage as a logical next step but self-realization usually kicks in a couple years into it. 

Well that didn't matter in our case because we weren't a couple so I didn't worry about the statistics. Also, I hadn't read that book yet. 

But here's the thing: after about a month of us sharing an apartment, we kissed for the first time. There was no sign there - it was just a kiss - one of many. It wasn’t the kiss that made me feel I was in love, it was just a step forward. Was it a special kiss? Yes - but not because it meant something, but because of how it happened.

We had both had long days at work. I slaved at an investment bank on Wall Street - working almost as many hours as I was awake each day - and I only slept for four or five.

She was in her senior year still, but she too had an internship. Her hours weren’t as bad, but she was a hard worker and used all her free time either learning something new, or getting ready for med school.

We met for about 7 hours a day. I slept for about 4 of them. The remaining two hours would be split between meals. We always had breakfast and dinner together - and on most days even lunch when she was at her internship. That was our thing. My friends at work told me how much money I left on the table every time I went for lunch with her. But I didn’t care. I didn’t need the money as much as I enjoyed spending time with her. I knew that then, even before we started dating. She had become my best friend.

She always waited for me for dinner. She didn’t have to. But she did. 10pm. 1am. 3am. No matter when I got back, she always waited.

So that night, the night of the kiss, I came home early because it was still my training period and I wasn’t involved in any hardcore deals yet. I opened the door and there she was - standing in front of me, with her back to the kitchen, smiling a smile that makes a guy want to call in to work sick the next morning, and she said: 

“I made pasta.”

After dinner we put in a movie and were asleep half way through. We were both in my bed (the TV was in my room), with me reclining at a 30 degree angle against the bed, and with her head on my shoulder.

I woke up, half asleep, at what I guessed was about 2am. My eyes were still closed, but I could tell by the sound of her breath that we were both laying down and facing each other. With my eyes still closed, I tried to look at her. I had never felt more comfort and happiness. Even at that moment I didn’t know what I wanted - if I wanted her. But all I could think of in my barely awake state was how much I wanted to kiss her. And just then - as if I had willed it so - she moved just a bit closer, and I could tell her lips were not more than an inch away from mine. I couldn’t tell if she was also in the same sleep state, but before I thought any more I moved just a bit further - making our lips meet as if two pieces of a puzzle do only once you’ve tried fitting them - and then thinking why you didn’t think of this before - why it felt so right - and why you waited so long to see that there was only one piece that would match the other. 

It was like looking at a picture that you can’t recognize or make out at first, but once you do, its all you see, and no matter how hard you try, you can’t recreate the blurred unrecognizable image from before.

I would have felt stupid, embarrassed, guilty, and quite possibly shameful if she didn’t kiss back. But she did - as if she had been waiting all along. And there it was - our first kiss. Unintentional, unexpected, unplanned, and totally right.

It's a good feeling, isn't it? That first realization of love. It's like the beginning of a new season or a new year or even just a pleasant morning. You feel good. You feel positive. You are quite aware that the season or year or even just the day - and by extension your feelings - will probably not end on quite the same level of positivity, but you play along anyway because in that moment - you're just happy.

Here’s the thing that you should know about the past me - when I wanted someone, I really jumped into it. I did everything I could to impress them, and basically tried to top myself at being the best boyfriend ever. Now the huge problem with this behavior pattern is that it doesn’t last. By the time I’m done being the best boyfriend ever, I realize that I never even checked if I even liked the girl much. When I do come to that realization, it’s many months into the relationship and I want to get out.

The messed up thing is that I knew this about myself when I started dating Constance, but I was delusional enough to think that I had grown up.

We broke up in December 2013. We dated and lived together for a total of two and a half years, and up until a week before I broke up with her, I was still in “love” with her. Why? Because I thought I should be because a) she was a good person, b) she really loved me, c) she was probably one of the nicest people I’ve ever met, and d) she was good to me.

That’s why I call her a good mistake: there was nothing wrong with her, and even the things about her that irritated me by the end were still traits of a good-hearted person. If we had continued dating, I could have seen a reality where we went the distance. But in this reality, she just wasn’t the one for me. After the two years plus mark I asked myself the tough question: Do you see yourself marrying this girl? It didn’t take long for me to answer back, and that was the end of it. Even thought I was already 24 by then, I couldn’t see myself staying in a relationship that wasn’t going anywhere.

We were two pieces of two different puzzles. and even if we did fit together, it didn’t matter because we didn’t belong together. As soon as I knew that, I told her it was over. It wasn't another woman, or work distractions, or someone cheating, or anything else that a younger-me would justify this breakup to. This was just...not love.

As for my search for an understanding of love, I now had enough data gathered across 10 years and several women to create a basic outline of what love means to me. The conclusion was this - while I have yet to find it, I know what it isn’t.

-

That was almost five months ago. We're now in the present (or at least the present I'm typing this letter in) in May 2014. 

This is where this story gets tricky to write - the past is done, the present is too close to talk about, and the future is unseen.

However, what I can talk about is the possibilities. Whatever will happen to me? When will I meet you? Will I ever meet you?

To answer those questions, let’s visit the next letter, which I must say is the most important one…

The One, aka You

This part of the letter is where I realize how ridiculous this is.

So instead of making a list of all the reasons why writing this letter to my future wife is ridiculous, let’s just talk about the number one on that list: Basically…WHY?

You know I really thought I was a good guy - like the kind of guy that girls would put in the “good” category. I really thought I was that person. But then I realized how dumb that sounds. I’ve been with 10 women in over 10 years - nearly half of which were relationships, which relatively - or even statistically - is an average, if not low, number. But I broke up with most of those girls. I made the decision to hurt them by self-justifying it as “not love”.

When did it become okay to do this? Did all the pre-us people on this planet just get together and decide to date around as much as needed until we felt the satisfaction of true love? That as long as we met 'The One' at the end, all the ones we hurt along the way were just collateral damage?

I know I’m asking questions that are not grounded in reality. And just by asking them I don’t absolve myself of being a co-conspirator. And sure, I also get that 'The One' and 'True Love' are man-made concepts used to sell books and movies. I guess it was much easier to call something all individuals feel individually and in their own way, 'love'. It just works better than 'that feeling you feel for your wife/girlfriend, but not the same because I feel it in a totally different way for my wife/girlfriend. But yes, similar to that, but probably not.'

And maybe, just maybe, I wouldn’t be saying all this if I hadn't been dumped (technically I was cheated on but I call that a pre-emptive dumping tactic on Mia's part) once. Sure, once I had been on the other side of the hurt-giving, it was no longer about collateral damage. Yes, that did make me realize that I’m not any better than the rest of the date-till-you-find-the-soulmate kids out there.

What I do know is that I am not too sure it works. I’ve seen too much around me to believe that the perfect match and the soul mate stuff is real. There was a movie I saw once where the guy tells the girl he loves her, and she says it back too. But then she asks him “Now what? Because 'I love you' is just the beginning.”

After all, “story” is the less-recognized other-half of “love story”.

So that’s my real problem and quite possibly the now not-so-subtle reason for writing this: I don’t think love is enough. Because if it was, we’d all be satisfied with our first love, right? Okay if not our first, then definitely our second. Not even the second? Okay then it for sure has to be the third. Right? Really, how hard is it to confirm that we feel love when we are either not sure of what it means, or are just changing it’s definition slightly every time we take a breath?

I read somewhere that you know it was a miracle when something impossible happens anyway. So if something that has never happened before, happens, that would count as an event belonging to the miracle family, right? So, just considering the historical data, isn’t saying that love will happen to me the same as waiting for a miracle?

Most of me hopes that is true. And if you’re real (and also reading this), then I got my miracle and you really don’t need to read this and start having doubts. So please stop.

Because, Wife, the rest of me needs to be prepared for the slight chance the miracle misses me by an inch and I’m left with living in reality. Because the distance between now and you is not known to me.

I guess a part of me is wishing I hand over this letter to you before we get married. After the proposal, of course. I only mean for this to be read by one person obviously. I hope I have the courage to give this to you. Because if I don’t, I’m afraid it will be because I sold out - I gave into the easier option of just accepting the past as rules for the future.

I wanted to write this letter so I could tell you about my past. About my trial-and-errors. About me.

But I’m afraid I can’t do that. I don’t think I’m ready to tell you who I am because it seems like I’m still baking. Or buffering as the kids like to call it these days.

There’s still some time left before my brain and heart come in sync and see the world around me - including love - the same way. I want to say it might happen the moment I see you, but that would be asking for that miracle thing and we both know they don’t take requests into consideration.

But this is okay too, right? I get to take my time to figure out what kind of love I am capable of. And when I’m ready, I’ll look at you and hand you these letters. So that I can put my past on the table, and let my present (that would be you dear Wife) decide what kind of future exists for us.

That sounds good. Just the right amount of it too.

Because if you do exist, and if you still want to marry me (assuming I did actually give you this, which I now realize is the only possibility if you’re reading this sentence), then I just found love.

Woah, that was easy.

Life and love are so much easier to understand in a flashback. Let’s just hope the forward-playing journey is just as fun.

And with that, we’ve reached the actual present. I’m about to sign off this letter, and the day is May 19, 2014. So considering you’re reading this on (insert date here), it only took me (year in your date minus 2014) years to find you.

Might I say it was so worth the wait? Might I also ask if I flirt with you like this even in person?

Anywho, this weird love story about me is out of story.

In case you haven’t noticed, I am finding this end-the-letter-to-your-future-wife thing to be slightly complicated. I mean, how do you end the link between the past and the present, which are in fact your present and future?

I know. Let's go with this:

I hope I don’t have to come back to this story and write more about my failures at love.

Because as you have just read, love is not something I quite understand right now. But by writing this letter to you, you’ve helped me understand it better than I ever did before.

So, quite frankly, my dear Future Wife, I hope the next girl I meet is you. And that letter - my final one - is one I hope I'll keep on writing.

Love,

Your Future Husband.