Predictably, given the time I put into yesterday’s 5 cm/s post, last night I dreamed of the girl to whom I confessed in December 2007.

I had a large group of friends over, the majority of whom were people I hadn’t seen in ages. High school friends. The exact configuration of the group kept changing. Sometimes there were five guests, sometimes eight, and who each was also fluctuated. Except for one. At one point, I got up to get drinks for my guests—we’d been sitting in a circle on the floor, in a living room that wasn’t quite mine—and on my return she stood up and walked past me, probably heading to the toilet or something of that nature.

As we passed each other, our shoulders brushed, and she reached out and dug a fingernail into my upper arm.

Holy. Shit.

That’s pretty much all there is to say about that dream. There was more, but much of it was Black Rock Shooter-inspired, and not really relevant in any way, shape, or form to my life.

===

Yesterday, a friend and I were discussing “not-quite-love letters.”

My Interlocutor: I was just thinking, like if you write a confession letter to someone
My Interlocutor: is there such a thing as a confession letter that doesn’t contain a confession, maybe
Myself: like you write a letter to someone you’re crushing on,
Myself: and you kind of want to tell them how you feel…
Myself: but you don’t actually say it, you just talk about other stuff?
My Interlocutor: or, you actually say it, but it’s somehow not a confession
Myself: ah, sort of off-handed
My Interlocutor: yea
My Interlocutor: not-quite-love letters
My Interlocutor: “I DONT LOVE YOU, yet”
Myself: would it be defeatist? or would it be accepting of possibilities?
Myself: “maybe i like you”
Myself: “i like you, but i know i have no chance”
Myself: “i like you but it’s no big deal”
Myself: “i like you but don’t think of me differently”
Myself: “i like that you don’t like me back”
My Interlocutor: probably all of those
My Interlocutor: but without the “like you”
My Interlocutor: because that’s sort of a confession

===

When I woke up this morning, I figured that the obvious next course of action was to write one of these confessions that’s not a confession. I feel like if I get back in touch with her, the girl who exists in my head will be replaced with the girl who lives on the other side of the country. Maybe I won’t need either as much, and maybe I’ll be able to move forward.

Did Takaki have thoughts like these?

For now—mada chotto—I think I’ll pass.

But I’m not precluding any possibilities. I think the qualifier for enryoshitai no is as important as the restraint itself. It’s open-minded. “For now, I think I’ll pass.” But what about the future? I don’t know about the future. The future hasn’t happened, and I’m not Takaki or Takemoto.

Maybe someday I’ll write her. Casually.

And it’ll be a second confession, but also not really a confession.

I like the gentle bite of the not-quite-love letter. It’s a nice idea, and I’d like to make it a “thing”—in part, of course, because in its very nature it embodies the same kind of restraint as that to which this blog seeks to adhere.

“For now, I’m going to hold back on saying ‘I love you.’”

There’s no better way to tear into a blank slate than to do so by discussing blank slates. Aria the Origination, episode four: Mizunashi Akari cheers on the journeymen of two rival companies by encouraging them to try and try again at accomplishing their goals.

“Every attempt is a fresh start!”

She smiles.

Is every attempt a fresh start? Do we wipe the slate clean with every redux?

If every reboot erases the system logs, Tachibana Junichi’s position seems precarious at best. He informs Morishima Haruka that he’s crushing on her again and again in the (obvious) hopes that her facade will crumble. I was there, once: I confessed my feelings to a girl. I suggested that I hoped that they were not too cumbersome, and emphasized that I didn’t want anything to change.

I was probably lying. After all, Junichi clearly has some expectations of his own, and I believe in anime as an accurate depiction of life. I’m not going to go into the minutiae of why this analogy makes no sense—they should be obvious—but I’m trying to get to a place where I can say that Junichi’s displays of perseverance are somehow meaningful.

After all, he’s getting his girl.

Blindly dashing forward and trying again and again in the face of previous failures is exactly what Akari suggests, however. The tabula rasa philosophy is fine and all for giving a bit of encouragement, but ultimately it seems unnecessary for advancement.

Akari’s rivals can become pros so long as they try; trying does not change history.

Junichi has Haruka gagged and bound in the school cafeteria, and she’s swallowing.

He only has to ask one more time, and maybe she’ll say yes.

Did I ask more than once?

No, I fucked up. Christmas came and went in 2007, and in 2008, and in 2009. Unlike Junichi, I have no particular fixation on any particular day, but I do remember the winter break my senior year of high school. Not the worst days of my life by a long shot. But not the happiest.

Aria the Origination started airing about four weeks after I confessed my feelings to a cute, witty, and productive girl whose company I had enjoyed the year before in my AP English and US History classes. Three weeks later, I was watching the above-referenced fourth episode. I loved it, but at the time I only took its message to refer to career opportunities. I applied it to school, I applied it to work.

I didn’t apply it to love.

Junichi has me beat, and he has me beat by three years.

Oh! I’m rambling. Immersing oneself in memories is a sweet luxury, yet I want to refrain for the time being.

Enryoshitai no.

Welcome to this new data interface.

We’re gonna celebrate fresh starts together—and also the stops. It’s definitely useful to refrain from dwelling too long on the past. But every so often, it’s just as good to pass on moving forward.