A writer’s letter to his future wife

I’m a writer. This will be a disclaimer. It will be apology letter rather than a romantic quip to pull at your heart strings but I promise it can shed light to the darker corners of my mind and heart. Cheesy as it may, please forgive me. I’m terrible at words when it comes to you. Good thing is you’re not a figment of my imagination. It’s a pity that some of my colleagues have fallen to that sort of thing. Though Ruby Sparks is probably one of the most romantic and truthfully accurate works there is out there. I can’t make you up with words. You’ve appeared before me and all I have are my words to make you realize that I am flawed but am ready to love you and irritate you with the same words that helped me reel you in.

I am sorry if I am forgetful at times. This will be the base of this whole thing.

 I have a way with words that have helped me make a small career and a couple of jobs that will keep us satisfied. As you always say, we need not much, just enough is good enough for us. What use would too much money serve? I say a lot of cars, a bigger house and a more comfortable life. You smirked. I realize that I had enough to make me happy and content. It is you that made me realize with less words. It is you who made me understand with such simplicity the thing I tried to explain my whole life with paragraph after paragraph. You are the parsimonious side of my letters. It’s a good thing you said that. 

As a writer, I can only earn as much. Though I can write you simple notes to remind you how much of a good person you are to me and how much I forget to thank you in return. I am forgetful though I remember with more words than I can imagine how distinct and vivid is the memory of your face and that look you make when I do things that make you swoon as accidental as they may be.

I am sorry if I can not put into audible sound the feelings I have for you nor show it to you in actions. It is something that I must do as part of this relationship but given the chance, I will peek out of my shell. Extend my wrinkly appendages and demonstrate a futile hug to invite you in. My shell will be cramped and you will need a longer time to get used to it but I really hope you will. You will get mad at me for my annoying habits and quirks. You may even get used to them but one day get so frickin mad that you’d want to smack me in the face. I understand that, I really do. I will not be the easiest person to be around with but I will try to be the best shellmate for you. Please accept the poorly arranged flowers, they’re on sale at the local flower shop.

Forgive me for not being able to come up with the greatest love story ever told when asked to write about our love. I can’t seem to do it. Love stories have endings and they end with a dot. It’s hard for me, at times, to work on things that I am queasy to do. It’s just that we are living that story and I couldn’t, for the life of me, find a good enough ending for you, for us. I want it to be several thousand pages long with ellipses instead of punctuation marks. You are the greater writer in this love story. That smile of yours inspires me to write a whole act in itself but I still wouldn’t want to finish it. I would want to get to the part where I’d see them mutter the simplest words that would fill me every day that we are together. Whether they be “go get the laundry” or “I want soup for dinner.” 

Olive oil. 

Across the table glances and snickers when I get flush because one of our friends had an embarrassing story that involved me having the greatest crush on you. You wrote those pages, so keep them coming. You don’t know it yet but you make novelists look like amateurs. I’m afraid I can’t keep up with the way you put words into my fingertips.

Forgive me if I take too long to propose. As a writer, I also find it difficult to end one chapter in my work just so a better chapter would open. I have many quirks that you will find annoying, this is one of them. I get anxious thinking that I couldn’t find a good enough beginning for the next act as well as the last words to finish this one I’ve been working so long on. Do you remember the time we imagined the family we’d soon have? You have great pov’s and plot ideas. How creative can you get? That’s why I’m writing you this letter. It’s also like a letter of intent. I hate corporate type letters but I’ve enjoyed this one so far. You may enjoy this too, or not. I’ll know when I see crumpled paper lying around. But I hope you would like it. It will feel like getting a book deal, only better. It’ll be something we’d have to fill in, enjoy the creative process and extend the deadline since we are our own publishers. 

No stingy editors, just you and me and our thousands of pages to fill and subchapters to extend and the characters and protagonists and framing devices along the way. I’ll teach you how to use the ellipses. You’ll teach me how to put words into better places. Did I ever say I’m sorry for being a writer, yet?