This Is Why I’m Saying Goodbye For The Last Time

I know this is a promise I’ve made to myself before, but this time I’m finally going to keep it.

I’m tired of writing about someone who doesn’t warrant being written about. I’m done dedicating my time, tears and breath to someone who wouldn’t dedicate a second to me. This is my way of saying goodbye.

I’m saying goodbye because I’ve become vile and cynical since you’ve been gone. I’ve become cranky and unimpressed with life the same way old men sink into an unappreciative state. I don’t watch sunsets the same way I used to, with my eyes set on the reddening horizon. I don’t stop by the flower shop on the way home from work either, and I no longer eagerly reach for the bouquets of tulips that used to fill every room of my apartment.

I move quickly through the days, hoping time will pass me by and I won’t notice how the minutes turn into hours and the hours morph into days and soon enough it’ll be a year since you walked out the door.

I’m saying goodbye because you can’t love someone that insists they don’t want to be loved. I’m tired of begging you to let me care and of asking for permission to act upon my feelings. Every time I spoke I felt as if I’d become an intruder in my own home, as if the words slipping from my mouth were an interruption to the dull silence that cut through us.

I’m saying goodbye because I learnt that you can’t coerce people into loving you back, and that doing so only causes the pain to grow. No amount of romantic gestures at three in the morning can magically transform someone’s feelings into something that isn’t there. Love spells are a thing of fiction, so I’m done wasting my mind on carefully crafted speeches that rip through my heart and barely have an effect on yours.

I’m saying goodbye because in the process of loving you I forgot how to love myself.

I picked myself apart to ensure that you were happy even long after you’d left. I stopped seeing our friends and I gave up on old hobbies fearing you’d be there too, charming as always, filling up every inch of the room while I stood there helplessly falling back in love with this persona you’d carefully constructed. I became a recluse, unhealthy and brittle, thinking your happiness primed over mine. I’m tired of living my life as if I still had to please you.

I’m saying goodbye because I owe myself that much. Because it’s time I learnt to love myself instead.