September 26, 1954
Dear Lee,
I know I was wrong! I knew it from the beginning when I was sixteen and he was twenty-three. He drove a white mustang and I’d meet him in the parking lot behind the church at hours too late for good decisions to be made. And even then, in my pink Converse and white dresses, knew that it was bad even though in those brief midnight moments, it felt good.
I’m writing you, not for sympathy but because you once told me that “feelings sometimes matter more than fact” (13) and now that it is over, I need to create the facts from these feelings. You see Lee, it’s not about me- it’s about her. She doesn’t know and I can not, for the life of me decide the truth of which she should live in. The thing is over and gone now and no one really knows of it unless I were to speak it into existence. If I speak my truth will I be oppressing her rather than educating her? If what was in the past, is no longer a thing of the present, do I have the right to intrude upon her truth (her love, her life, her future)? Or if I remain quiet, bury the feelings of guilt, and speak no more of it, will the truth that he loves her still exist?
There are so many truths in this world but I really, really, really, really want to live in the right one-I really do.
Your friend (for life),
Ms. X

September 26, 1954
Dear Lee,
I know I was wrong! I knew it from the beginning when I was sixteen and he was twenty-three. He drove a white mustang and I’d meet him in the parking lot behind the church at hours too late for good decisions to be made. And even then, in my pink Converse and white dresses, knew that it was bad even though in those brief midnight moments, it felt good.
I’m writing you, not for sympathy but because you once told me that “feelings sometimes matter more than fact” (13) and now that it is over, I need to create the facts from these feelings. You see Lee, it’s not about me- it’s about her. She doesn’t know and I can not, for the life of me decide the truth of which she should live in. The thing is over and gone now and no one really knows of it unless I were to speak it into existence. If I speak my truth will I be oppressing her rather than educating her? If what was in the past, is no longer a thing of the present, do I have the right to intrude upon her truth (her love, her life, her future)? Or if I remain quiet, bury the feelings of guilt, and speak no more of it, will the truth that he loves her still exist?
There are so many truths in this world but I really, really, really, really want to live in the right one-I really do.
Your friend (for life),
Ms. X

Close