Letter
Garrett,
We need to have a serious talk. Don't get scared because the reason I want to talk is to try and help us. I'm going to write some of the stuff I want to discuss in this letter first so that we have a solid picture of what we need to talk about.
I need you to listen to me. I mean really listen and understand what I'm telling you. If you do that I think alot of our problems will be fixed. I will listen to you too. We are approaching the point of possibly talking about marriage. Scary and serious. That is why I need you to really listen to me and pay attention. Remember the problems we had in London? I'm scared that if we decided to get married, we would still have those problems. So I want to work with you to fix them first to make sure we would be okay. There are four main things that bother me about you. They are fixable. And there is one fifth thing that may or may not be fixable. The first four are:
1. I want you to listen to me, intently. Understand me.
2. I don't want you to make up excuses or give me bullshit when I'm mad at you about something.
3. I want you to be a man. Be mature. Take responsibility for the things that you want.
4. I don't want you to be a leech when it comes to money and school. I think it's only fair that we each do our own school work and buy our own stuff.
The fifth one is a question of how much you love me and that is up to you. I think the most important thing is that. I sometimes think that the other four problems might be stemed in how much you care. But I'm not sure, I need to talk to you about that. If you want you can write the things about me that you don't like and tell me so we can work together. I don't know if it is only me that thinks this, but sometimes I get the feeling that we are headed downhill and it kinda hurts because I can see where the problems are. We just need to fix them. At the point where we are now I could handle staying with you. But if we were to get married things would HAVE to change otherwise I would be unhappy for a very long time and I don't want that.
I don't care if this letter looks stupid. If it takes looking stupid to help, then I think it's worth it.
In London we fought about stupid things every day and I get the feeling that's how marriage would be. I'm not sure why you were fighting with me, but I fought with you because of those four things above. I would get frustrated when you would not listen to me when I would talk to you about something. Even if it was a little thing like what I wanted to do when I got back home to the states. There were some times when a sentence I said would go right over your head and you never heard it. Even if what I had to say wasn't that important, you listening to it shows me that you love me enough to hear it and pay attention to it.
I know that you use the art of bullshitting because I've seen you do it with your mom. What you say to your mom is your business but sometimes you do it to me. I know when you are doing it, just like I know when you are thinking about something, and I'd be much happier if you would just tell me the truth instead. I'll tell you the next time you do it to me.
I want you to be mature. This goes for both number 3 and 4. I realize that you could use some help with school and that sometimes picking up dinner is convenient but alot of the time you can do these things for yourself. I think part of being mature is doing things for yourself even if sometimes they are out of your way. School is hard and reading takes time and gives you headaches. It gives me headaches too. But someday I'll be able to buy all the headache pills I'll need for the rest of my life because of it. Doing good in school is not all about being "good at it". It's not really a talent. You need to have the right attitude and then everything will fall into place. Please believe me and try it. You will be happy if you do. The attitude to have is "I can get better." The first semester you really use this attitude is not guaranteed success. You will make mistakes on taking notes and probably take the wrong ones. But you will then know which notes you should have taken. At the end you cant let yourself get depressed over the mistakes. Swallow them and use them the next semester. If you do you will do better that time. I promise you.
I think you may have already done that semester though. You took some bad notes and you bombed a test or two but thats okay. The point is that I saw you try and you learned something from the mistakes. The reason you took bad notes was because you let your mom get in the way. You need to block it out and realize that when you are in class, the priority it to pay full attention to the lecture. Thinking about your problems at home while you are at school, is not going to help you move out of your home.
The money thing is not that big of a problem, it's just a little annoying sometimes. It hasn't happened lately so I don't have much to say about it right now.
I want you to think about what I said about school. A little while back you told me you were thinking of quitting school and I think that would be a big mistake. Your mom might have told you the same thing I am telling you but that doesn't matter. What matters is that I know that what I am saying is true and that it works. It takes time but you already did some time. Anthropology was a good step and to get a C from that teacher the first time taking him is actually very good. So don't be upset about it at all. He designes his classes to be VERY notes oriented. So, yes you can take good notes. You can take better notes the next time if you believe that you can be a better student.
So those are the things I need you to work on. You told me in London that you wanted to work on whatever problems you had. I'm making it clear what they are. The absolute most important thing is that you listen and think about them before get mad at any of them. After that, if you are still mad, then that's okay and you can tell me.
We need to have a serious talk. Don't get scared because the reason I want to talk is to try and help us. I'm going to write some of the stuff I want to discuss in this letter first so that we have a solid picture of what we need to talk about.
I need you to listen to me. I mean really listen and understand what I'm telling you. If you do that I think alot of our problems will be fixed. I will listen to you too. We are approaching the point of possibly talking about marriage. Scary and serious. That is why I need you to really listen to me and pay attention. Remember the problems we had in London? I'm scared that if we decided to get married, we would still have those problems. So I want to work with you to fix them first to make sure we would be okay. There are four main things that bother me about you. They are fixable. And there is one fifth thing that may or may not be fixable. The first four are:
1. I want you to listen to me, intently. Understand me.
2. I don't want you to make up excuses or give me bullshit when I'm mad at you about something.
3. I want you to be a man. Be mature. Take responsibility for the things that you want.
4. I don't want you to be a leech when it comes to money and school. I think it's only fair that we each do our own school work and buy our own stuff.
The fifth one is a question of how much you love me and that is up to you. I think the most important thing is that. I sometimes think that the other four problems might be stemed in how much you care. But I'm not sure, I need to talk to you about that. If you want you can write the things about me that you don't like and tell me so we can work together. I don't know if it is only me that thinks this, but sometimes I get the feeling that we are headed downhill and it kinda hurts because I can see where the problems are. We just need to fix them. At the point where we are now I could handle staying with you. But if we were to get married things would HAVE to change otherwise I would be unhappy for a very long time and I don't want that.
I don't care if this letter looks stupid. If it takes looking stupid to help, then I think it's worth it.
In London we fought about stupid things every day and I get the feeling that's how marriage would be. I'm not sure why you were fighting with me, but I fought with you because of those four things above. I would get frustrated when you would not listen to me when I would talk to you about something. Even if it was a little thing like what I wanted to do when I got back home to the states. There were some times when a sentence I said would go right over your head and you never heard it. Even if what I had to say wasn't that important, you listening to it shows me that you love me enough to hear it and pay attention to it.
I know that you use the art of bullshitting because I've seen you do it with your mom. What you say to your mom is your business but sometimes you do it to me. I know when you are doing it, just like I know when you are thinking about something, and I'd be much happier if you would just tell me the truth instead. I'll tell you the next time you do it to me.
I want you to be mature. This goes for both number 3 and 4. I realize that you could use some help with school and that sometimes picking up dinner is convenient but alot of the time you can do these things for yourself. I think part of being mature is doing things for yourself even if sometimes they are out of your way. School is hard and reading takes time and gives you headaches. It gives me headaches too. But someday I'll be able to buy all the headache pills I'll need for the rest of my life because of it. Doing good in school is not all about being "good at it". It's not really a talent. You need to have the right attitude and then everything will fall into place. Please believe me and try it. You will be happy if you do. The attitude to have is "I can get better." The first semester you really use this attitude is not guaranteed success. You will make mistakes on taking notes and probably take the wrong ones. But you will then know which notes you should have taken. At the end you cant let yourself get depressed over the mistakes. Swallow them and use them the next semester. If you do you will do better that time. I promise you.
I think you may have already done that semester though. You took some bad notes and you bombed a test or two but thats okay. The point is that I saw you try and you learned something from the mistakes. The reason you took bad notes was because you let your mom get in the way. You need to block it out and realize that when you are in class, the priority it to pay full attention to the lecture. Thinking about your problems at home while you are at school, is not going to help you move out of your home.
The money thing is not that big of a problem, it's just a little annoying sometimes. It hasn't happened lately so I don't have much to say about it right now.
I want you to think about what I said about school. A little while back you told me you were thinking of quitting school and I think that would be a big mistake. Your mom might have told you the same thing I am telling you but that doesn't matter. What matters is that I know that what I am saying is true and that it works. It takes time but you already did some time. Anthropology was a good step and to get a C from that teacher the first time taking him is actually very good. So don't be upset about it at all. He designes his classes to be VERY notes oriented. So, yes you can take good notes. You can take better notes the next time if you believe that you can be a better student.
So those are the things I need you to work on. You told me in London that you wanted to work on whatever problems you had. I'm making it clear what they are. The absolute most important thing is that you listen and think about them before get mad at any of them. After that, if you are still mad, then that's okay and you can tell me.
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1:41 AM
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