11

Dear Subaru,

How are you today?

Otsukare for Juusai in Tokyo!

I went on Sunday.
It was a pretty magical night, wasn't it?
There's always that feeling that we're sharing something special with you guys but I felt it even more this time for some reason. Maybe it was the rain. It's kind of romantic, isn't it?
The idea that nothing will stop us from having that night together; not rain or anything else.
And that though we may live in different worlds at the end of the day we're under the same sky, affected by the same rain...we're all just people. Status and fame and all of that just falls away. You guys up on stage, and all of us in the audience, we're just human beings opening our hearts and genuinely connecting with each other for a few magical hours on a rainy summer night.

I was reminded at the concert why I always keep coming back to you guys. It's the connection. That feeling that I'm not going at this alone.

I feel really alone lately.
I always want to cry.
I'll be moving by myself soon and all I can think of is how I won't have anyone to talk to at home anymore. There won't be anyone who really knows what's going on with me, who's fully involved in my personal life. I could just not come back one weekend from work and no one will be there to notice.

There will be good things about living alone too. I know that. But all my close friendships, the deep ones, have basically disolved. And though it's no one's fault, and as far as my roommate goes it's healthier for both of us, I still feel sad. I'm not losing friends, but I'm losing an intimacy and level of involvement that made me feel happy and comforted. I like having a best friend. Someone you can call up on your way home and just talk about your day with. Someone that knows the good and the bad. That you send random messages to throughout the day. Someone that knows what's going on in your life.

I only had that with a couple of people here in Tokyo. One moved away and the other is just doesn't want to be that close to me. We clash a lot and it just doesn't work.

In some ways I feel like I've failed my friends. Like, if I were a better person and friend they would be happier with me and would remain close. I know things change, that people grow apart, that it's not necessarily personal, but it's still sad.
And most of all I just feel scared.
Because I don't know when or that I will connect with people on that same level again.
It feels like I can't connect with people like I used to.
I mean, I've always been the type to have a few really close friends, rather than a lot of acquaintances, but now I won't even really have the close friends, just acquaintances or friends I see every once in a while and that makes me feel more alone than ever.
I don't even feel I can really talk to my family about how I really feel because they have their own, other, more important problems to deal with and I don't want to bring anyone down.

Honestly, sometimes I hate that I'm the kind of person that has to go deep and wants to have intimacy with people. It is not easy being that kind of person. Because most of the time people don't want that. And at my age the only real intimacy and companionship you can get is from a romantic relationship. Because even as good friends people have jobs and lives and they can't really be deeply involved with your life. It's not like school when you used to see someone every day and were in the same environment and sharing the same experiences.

So if you don't have a significant other or family nearby you're basically screwed. Maybe if my schedule were better I'd have more time to see my friends and I wouldn't feel quite so isolated, but I don't think it's just that.
I think part of it is that I feel so completely disconnected from relationships of any kind. I feel like all my close friendships have failed or fallen apart so I don't have confidence in my ability to form close friendships or in friendships in general. And I've noticed it's hard for me to open up and relate to my peers (the ones I meet at work).  In the romantic sense my experience is so limited that the idea of boyfriends and sex might as well not even exist in my world. That's how alienated I feel from romance and sex. I can't remember the last time I was attracted to someone other than you, or some other famous person or model in a magazine or video. I guess sometimes I see guys I think are cute on the street, but again, it's almost in an objective way. Like, I can appreciate that someone is good looking but flirting and dating or even liking someone seems so distant from my reality that I don't feel anything but aesthetic appreciation.

Today after work we went for an otsukare drink and it struck me again just how weird I feel when I hang out with people. I feel like I'm just different. Because of course the subject always goes back to boyfriends and sex and relationships and that's not something I really have much experience with. And I realized today that what makes me feel bad isn't that, 'oh i'm a loser because I've never had a boyfriend', not really. What gets to me is that I'm at the age I'm at and there's the chance now that it'll never happen for me. Not because there's anything wrong with me, but because it's this late in the game and I have so little experience that I don't even know what I really want in a relationship, or how to go about having one (or sex for that matter) if I were to find someone. Most people around me are married or in serious relationships and I'm like a baby in diapers when it comes to all of this. I'm so behind that I don't know if I'll ever catch up and it scares me because I think that hurts my chances a lot.

I don't want to be alone forever, Subaru.
I wonder how you feel about this.
I know you've had girlfriends before. I don't know for how long or how serious, or if you even want a long term partner or not. But how do you manage to not feel suffocated by loneliness? Is it your relationship with the members and your close friends? Taeko? Or do you feel like I do sometimes?

I'm actually really worried. I feel like I've lost my mojo again.
I'm just not feeling it in any sense. Life, friends, boys, work.....
Everything just feels heavy.
And maybe it's simply my reaction to the changes that are coming, and the stress of not knowing where I'll be in a month's time (literally since I haven't found an apartment yet) and I'll feel more positive once this is all over.

God, I hope so.
Because I hate this.

I hate feeling like I might as well disappear.

Thanks for listening.
I'm hoping you're in a better place than me right now.
This is a good year for you, isn't it? Career-wise anyway.

Have great concerts in Osaka this weekend.
I wish I could go again, but alas work calls.

Take care, Subaru.

Love you,

Aniella