Hey Liz, 

Thanks so much for offering to talk this evening. I just thought I’d let you know that it really means a lot to me that you stuck around this year. I know I’m really not the easiest person to be around, and you’re going through some tough stuff of your own.

I probably didn’t tell you this about the summer. When I worked at silent job I told you about, it was about an hour drive away from Silver Spring. The metro by my house was shut down for four months, so I had no way to get downtown after I finally got home each day. And I had no friends in Silver Spring, save one who was very busy all the time.

I literally went weeks at a time without human contact. The only people I would see if routinely were Kevin, my therapist, and Greg and his husband who visited every other weekend. I couldn’t find a friend to spend time with new matter how hard I tried. I got really weird to be around for so little social reference points. 

One morning early August, I went for a walk after deciding to go into work late that day. I kind of blanked out, and when I came to, I found myself having a fully engaged conversation with my reflection in a coffee shop window. 

I was talking to myself expecting answers. 

And I was actually providing them.

When I realized what was going on, I snapped out of it and decided to get a breakfast sandwich from the café. And when I sat down, the entire room went slanted and stayed that way for a minute. Every corner in the room became a forty-five degree angle. My perception of it just became so warped.

I started going to therapy 2 to 3 times a week when that happened, up from the once a week I was doing before. I’ve been on the schedule for almost 5 months now, and I’ve come to understand that I was in a torture-level solitary confinement all summer.

And Greg preyed upon that. He fed me a book with many scenes of homophobic violence upon rural gay boys. He exploited all of my insecurities about my family by constantly implying he would leave. In threatening to kill himself if I showed any agency.

He maybe even caused it, by jeopardizing my only link to my active community at the time: my friend Tony.

He is a sociopath.

Every single person I’ve met in my entire life washed their hands of me when my parents left and I lost my job. My utter solitude allowed all that to happen.

Everyone abandoned me, that is, except a handful of women that I’ve met in each phase of my existence.

You and Becca being the longest active l relationships helped me remember who I was when my entire life vacated from me, gave me a space to deliberate my way out of that awful gaslighting, isolating summer.

My new job is mostly remote now, so it’s still kind of isolating. But we have some new friends that we see most weekends and some in the region that don’t mind coming to see us, for our fear of liminal suburban spaces.

I just wanted to let you know that you mean a lot to me, and I’m really glad we’re still friends.

Take care of yourself out there, Liz.

Talk to ya later ❤️

TK