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dear mr. rose,

it has been a while since i wrote, but of course, i had another dream about you. seeing you "there" in my mind and not here has made me remember all that i try to forget, and somehow manage to do, and here i am. resuming probably the strangest correspondance you know.

we never interact much in my dreams, and you only ever pop up maybe once a year, twice if i'm lucky. this was probably the closest i have been to you yet. but we still didn't talk very much.

we were sitting next to each other. you were doing little tasks, like opening your mail, going through your bills, etc. i was trying to acheive invisibility so i could actually look at you. i had bad acne in the dream, and was sitting next to a mirror (how i could see this) and was peeling something off that looked like a face mask, or when elmer's glue dries. however it crumpled in my hand, like clear plastic.

i was trying to see your address, so i could find you. i can remember sleeping-me telling dream-me to remember the name..."beaulieu st." i guess my lucid self placed you in montreal or something. perhaps i was just trying to remind myself that you were, and will always be, my french teacher.

there was another piece of mail from blockbuster, and the address had a street name but said another address - "574-577 college st." dream-me's heart raced; that was down the street from me! i would see you all the time! maybe you had been renting movies at the same blockbuster i rented movies from! maybe i wouldn't have to just receive these "visits" once a year, but i would run into you all the time.

you tore off the address and threw it to your side, by my arm. "throw this away," you said, so i snuck it into my hand and crumpled it, along with the crumpled plastic. i *had* it, to study and know the reality of it. and then you wanted it back. i opened my hand, embarrassed, and made some excuse about why it was there, or wow, how did that get there? my obsession revealed.

the movies were all french (even if they weren't) and you had posters for them all. this is the part of the dream where you spoke to me, going over the list, asking me things about the movies. lola - that was lolita. the others i didn't know, or at least don't remember. there was a line in french, and a description (also french) saying that this was the line that everyone remembered from the movie. i was trying to translate it without being mistaken, without embarrassing myself again. it was something about being alone. the words i recognized, "seule". this is the only thing i remember.

you put on a black wool trenchcoat, and the scent of it dispersed through the air. i took it in, hungry for the sense of smell, the sense most connected to memory.

you sat back down and through the bulk of your coat, you could not feel me resting my head on your forearm, falling asleep within my dream, being so comfortable in being there. and yet uncomfortable that i would be discovered, and once again shamed. worried that i would get so incredibly comfortable that i *would* fall asleep, and drool. worse than shame, disgust.

and the sounds of the outside world woke me up suddenly. the latest i have slept in months. as i do every time, i felt a mix of joy at seeing you again, and pain at never seeing you again. the confines of my reality betrayed by the depths of my imagination.

a sense of loss was tangible to me at that moment, and i think this is why i have these dreams of you, and this mad desire to stay in contact with you, because you represent loss to me. you represent all the people i have loved and been forced to lose all through my life. you being in africa now, of all places, couldn't make this point more real to me, or your representation so ideal. next thing i know, you'll start at some school teaching french to antarctic penguins. just to stay true to that representation.

after 8th grade, i used to kick myself for the way i behaved around you, like an older sibling embarrassed by the younger sibling. i couldn't believe i had done some of those things, or where my inhibitions were. but now in my sadness, in my desert of passion, i don't look back and think "it was cute." i look back with envy at the boldness, the unabashed expression of my little heart, and think, "that really was love." i knew it wasn't a sexual love with the calm unashamed answers to queries of my confused peers. "do you want to kiss him?" they'd squeal, and i would look off somewhere and say "no. i just want him to hold me." i had had dreams of being held by someone i loved, and those were my only fantasies, so that was the only thing i knew a person, or people, in love to do. and yet it was so fierce that i lost my voice when you embarrassed me in class, so not only would i not be able to speak, in class or out, but i couldn't.

so i write to you again. to explain why you are so important to me, and will remain so. i honestly don't know you at all, but i know what you mean to me. i know the imprint you left on me, and why, the day i left jakarta, my home of 4 years and the seat of my emerging identity, i called you from the airport lounge.

and what it meant when you weren't there.

so i hope you don't mind, mr. rose, being my champion of loss. though i suppose i should just grow up and start calling you kevin, and get to know you in order to pull apart that representation of you in my mind. in order to inject a little calming reality into my fevered, frantic imagination. i would like that.

but for now,
for always,
mr.rose,

"you taught me a lot about life and love this year"

xo.