Zwinkyness|The online playground of a web-addicted teenager

I feel so messed up inside, that I don’t even know myself anymore. I look through the mirror and wonder: who is that girl? Who is that chick, with those dark, broken eyes, staring back at me? I can say one thing for sure: that’s not me. But it must be, because after all, it’s my mirror image. Those blank eyes, zombie-like expression. I feel no will to live whatsoever anymore. Yet I do. I live. I breathe. I sleep. But I’m not really alive.

It’s been approximately ten years, but I still miss you every day. I still blame some of my moodswings, some of my extraordinary behaviour, on you passing away. Perhaps this is wrong: perhaps I should not blame you for anything. Deep down, I have the feeling I am simply looking for excuses, but then again: why should I not? Why should your death not be an excuse worthy enough to blame everything that never turned out right, everything I never could acheive, on? Because after all, more than anything else in my young life, your death changed me, made me, raised me. One day was all it took for me to grow up into adulthood. One desastrous day, that made me loose my faith, my love, my trust and everything else that mattered.

Sometimes I have the feeling that I am alone with my thoughts. The only one looking at the world in this peculiar way - but I know that I cannot be alone, that there are others who think alike. I just don’t know them yet, but I will. Some day. Those others, who look inside-out and see the world, not for what we believe it is, but for the grand sceme it presents, the master plan, our downfall, the apocalypse. It’s not the afterlife that is surreal, it is our life now. Our miserable excuse for a life, filled with dissapointments, pain and sorrow.

I have my moments. I have happy days, but other days, I feel so sad that I could rip out my heart, if that would get it to stop aching. Some days I hardly think about you, other days I cannot get you out of my head. Sometimes I still hear your voice, when I’m home alone, your voice shouting my name. It sounds so familiar, so real, and I must believe that you are still out there - somewhere, beyond my grasp, somewhere where I cannot yet come. But I will get there, someday. All I have to do is be patient - this life is just a waste anyway. Simply waiting for Death to knock on my door, then say “hello” and let him in.

Do not get me wrong. I don’t really want to die, nor am I suicidal. I just know that when time comes, I will not regret dying. Not if that means we can be reunited.

Perhaps the image I have of you is completely wrong, over-dramatised over the years, a fantasy-image that could not possibly be true. Because you are too perfect, too understanding, too good to be true, in my memories. But that does not matter now, does it? Because even if you are less perfect, I will still love you deeply and miss you endlessly. Because, even though you have long left this earth, we are still connected. You still tell me right from wrong, good from bad, and you still protect me when I need it the most. Even over the borders of Death, I can still feel your presence. But that should not surprise me. Just as I knew you died, even though I could impossibly know, I am certain that I will see you again one day. The heart knows more than the mind ever will.

I remember how you read me bedtime stories every night. I remember how we played “Robin Hood” for hours, while you always had to be the Evil Prince John and I always got to defeat you. I remember how you picked me up on your shoulders and carried me around all day, because I had hurt my foot when I was six. I remember how you looked after me when I was ill, how you came to check my temperature every other hour. I remember how worried you and Mom were when I went into surgery, and how happy when I got out. I remember how much you supported my cousin when he was at the hospital, and how much he appreciated that. You were like a second father to him. And you were a father to me.

No, not you were a father to me. You are. Even though you have long deceased, you are still my father. Death cannot destroy our love, our bound, our connection. I love you. You love me. Not loved. Love. We do not, should not, talk in past times. Love does not disappear simply because of some stupid thing like death. I love you now evenso as I did ten years ago, if not more. And you still love me. You are still part of me, your blood runs through my veins: you are still responsible for making me the person I am today. You and Mom are my good side, my intelligent side, my heart, my love, my passion. You two make me a better person, every single day.

And as you used to say: “We’re the strong ones. We can get through everything. Because we are together.” That still counts. We can get through everything, because you are still here, here with me. By my side. I have a more powerful guardian angel than anyone else in this world. But I miss you. I know you have not left me, but still I miss you. I miss you so much that it can even make me cry right now. I miss you so much that, if I close my eyes and wish hard enough, I can still imagine you standing there. I still dream about you, I still think about you, I still hear your voice. It’s so hard, because that way it seems as though you are not really gone. It’s mind-tricking, my stupid imagination. But for God’s sake, it gives me so much hope and despair.

Even now, although less frequent, I sometimes still think I see you, in crowdy places. It seems as though my mind has yet to grasp the fact I will not see you again, not in this life. You know how hard this has been for me, but you know it has been even tougher for my Mom. She’s so alone, so fragile, so breakable. I do not worry about me, I do not want you to worry about me either. Worry about Mom. She misses you so much. She hardly ever says it and never will admit it when I ask her, but she still thinks about you every second of the day. She has never loved any other man than you, and I don’t think she ever will. But I want her to. I want her to fall in love again, I want to see a smile on her face, I want her to be happy. I know I cannot give her all the happiness she deserves. I’ll never be able to do it. She deserves so much more than I cannot give her, and God knows how much I tried and how many times I failed her nevertheless.

It’s so hard living without you. You were what we could hold on to, you were our shield against the darkness of this world. But now you are gone, we’ll have to shield ourselves. I don’t think the pain over your loss will ever really go away. It will always be there, a nagging, aching pain, like a sore wound that is but a scratch over a couple of years. I don’t know if I would be a better person had you still be alive, or a worse person. I don’t know if I would happier or even more miserable. But I know one thing: I still have your love and your protection.

And that helps me to get through every day, battling the pain within me. That helps me to survive. You help me to survive.

I love you, Daddy. Always have, and always will.

Hello darling,

I used to love you. God, you know how much I used to love you. You were everything for me, my world, my rays of sunlight, my hint of darkness, the only one standing between me and madness.

I know I have put you through a lot, because of my sometimes childish behaviour, because of me always wanting things my way. I know I was a fool, I know I overreacted and I know I blamed you for a hell lot more than you were responsible for. If something went wrong, I blamed in on you, due to my own reluctantness towards accepting that not everything can go the way I want to. I acted like a spoiled, immature and stuck-up bitch. For that, I sincerely apologise.

We have gone a long way, lover, and we both know it. We went through happy and joyful days, but also through episodes of pain and dispair. You cheated on me, I cheated on you, but we ended up together after all. To be honest, I don’t really know why. Lets admit that it does not really seem as though nature put us together as Yin and Yang, Alpha and Omega, and so on. We do not get along greatly, we often argue, we often ignore each other,… But in the end, you were always there for me. Until that one time.

That one time, when I so desperately needed your love. That one time, when I craved to hear your voice, you did not pick up the telephone. Not the first time, not the second time, not even the twentieth time. You had lost interest in me, I recall your words. You did not love me anymore. You kept on like that for approximately five days, because afterwards, you missed me more than ever.

Oh God, lover, don’t you see? We cannot be together, because, when we are, we do not get along. When you have the feeling you have me and I am yours, you ignore me and my needs. But when someone touches that which is yours, you overload me with gifts and attention. Your gifts I do not need, your attention and love I crave for. So you wonder still, why I cheat on you frequently, flirt in front of your eyes, and act so innocently afterwards? I do not care about others, never have, you were always the only one my heart trully belonged to. But you give me no choice: if I have to battle for your attention, if only when you feel the danger of losing me, you can trully show your affection, then you leave me no choice but to fight with all the weapons I can find.

That is over now. I have come to realise that, although I still love you deeply and you will always be in my heart, we do not belong. I’ve been blind, but now I’ve seen the light. You do not love me the way I want to be loved. You do not spoil me with attention, you never bought me dinner, you never treated me as a princess, you were never able to fulfill even my greatest desires. What hurt me the most during our relationship? I can tell you right now.

Firstly, the time you cheated on me. Once, may I recall, but it is still burned in my mind forever. If I close my eyes, I can still see it happening. But, I forgave you and because you regret it till the day of today, I will not charge this against you.

But the one time, when I wanted to go to this book store and you didn’t feel like going, you really hurt me. Why? Because I only ask once, perhaps twice a year. If you ask me to come with you to some carshow, I accept, not because I enjoy looking at some nifty car, but because I love you and I like spending time with you and doing what you like to do. Is it too much just to return the favor? I would have really liked it if you came along.

And the final thing is: how come you hardly ever call or send a text message? Why does it always have to be me who shows that I miss you, and why do you never show? Had you shown your love and appreciation, your commitment and friendship more, then I would have never left you.

But sadly enough, my love, I say goodbye. Because I have seen true love, I have felt it through every vein of my body, I have sensed it with every inch of my skin and I have discovered it with every heartbeat. I have found a new love, a true love, a love based on deep friendship, telling each other anything we can think of, spoiling each other with gifts and attention, and so much more. A love so pure and bright that, what we had, suddenly seemed so empty. Empty, but definately not meaningless, my dear.

Maybe I am stupid, maybe I just don’t know what I want, but part of me still loves you. Part of me will always love you and I am certain that, when I am eighty years of age and we meet each other again, I will still recognise you, because I know that, for a short while, our souls have been one. And my soul will always recognise yours, and it will always scent when you need me the most, and in hours of danger, it will always be by your side. But our love, ends now.

You were my first. My first love that lasted longer than a week. I gave you my virginity and I would not rather give it to anyone else. If things could be done all over again, I would do it all the same. Because I know you loved me and I love you. Forever.

But we just don’t belong together.

I’m totally and utterly shocked. I don’t know whether I’ve been putting my head in the sand for the last three decennia or so, or whether I am just as bloody ignorant as my Mom is when it comes to upgrading her Norton Antivirus Installation (something along the lines of: But why should I update? You don’t know how much time that takes. It doesn’t let any viruses through right now, so why would it be better if I update? I have to update it every bloody single day. And so on, and so on).

My ignorance however, is more directed towards the web browsers I’ve been using. Firefox 2, IE 6, could it get any more horrifying? And the most disturbing thought of all was that I was simply too lazy to update them. Sure, I knew my browser was outdated. But why would that bother me…Why would I even care to download the latest version of IE, even if half of my visitors are using that?

It’s stunning to see how someone like me, who used to point my fingers at others saying: Make sure you update your outdated browser! Old browsers are dangerous, etc. has fallen so low. Here I was, telling others about the dangers of using IE 6, while I’m bloody still running on it myself. And especially, while designing layouts, how could I be so utterly foolish to still keep designing using outdated browsers? Ah, the terrors of lazy people will never be fully understood.

Anyway, I came across Save the Developers today, featuring the latest versions of all your favourite browsers. In case you’re a developer, web standard guru, designer wannabe or anything else, I suggest you simply download them all. Like I did, just a minute ago. So far, the new Opera is my favourite (this may have to do with the fact that probably due to some Trojan Virus on my computer - oh, no worries, I’ll fix that soon enough - or other random spyware, Firefox does not want to start. I’m blaming this not on FF 3 itself, because I know perfectly well how sloppy I’ve been when it comes to securing Randy (yes, my computer has a name…) and I think that’s where something went wrong. Anyway, the latest Opera is cool, fast (made me realise just how slow IE is) and easy to use. But you know the saying: good developers use all possible browsers.

That said, now I’m off to download Seamonkey. Muwahahaha.