to Georgia
Box 61 Morris Hall
Univ. of Ga.
Athens, Georgia
30602
Georgia,
I think that you may find this a strange letter (but then, what is life for, if not strange letters?) First letters are always hard to write. I think this one is especially hard for me, because I don’t know what to write, or what I ought to write. I’m not even sure, in myself, what I honestly want to say to you.
I'm sure I could write you a short, meaningless letter about school or this or that, and it would probably be fine, would probably be all that you asked of me—or expected.
But I don’t want to do that—I want my life to be a serious thing, that I don’t run away from, or degrade into meaningless, innocent, everyday letters. I don’t want this to be a common letter, or a “sweet” letter, or a “let’s-write-about-anything-but-what’s-important-in-life” letter. I think it would be just lies—or rather, fear of living, to write like that to you. I owe you something more meaningful. (It’s like some devil’s in me, assuring that this won’t be your run-of-the-mill letter.)
So here goes:
(Probably, I’ll frighten you to death!)
(Without reason, of course.)
Anyway, here goes:
(I think I’ll start with Sunday night—yes, Sunday!)
Sunday night Charlotte thanked me for “keeping” her younger sister “company” while she was down (or up?) here at Athens, and for “giving her a good time”.
Now, I hadn’t realized that that was what I had been doing—keeping you entertained with a good time while you were here. It didn’t seem like that to me.
“Well, I enjoyed it too” I told Charlotte. (Which seemed like I was lying, because, it just wasn’t like that.—I don’t consider you my “entertainment for the week”—Saturday (and Friday) Night Live, or whatever. It’s alien to my blood, to my instincts, to feel such a way.
So anyway, I told your sister what seems to me to have been a white lie: “Well, I enjoyed it too.” Well, Georgia was my weekend toy; I enjoyed it; who will be next weekend’s toy? (Florida? Idaho?)
It was a white lie, see.
At the same time it would have been as much of a lie to have said: “I’m in love with your sister.” It wouldn’t have been true. For one thing, the thought is ridiculous—there can be no question of me possibly “being in love with” a girl I’d only just met, and couldn’t possibly really know.
No, I should have said something like:
“Georgia and I had a touch. I don’t know what it means; but I know it was important. A touch cannot but be important, and this one was important. It was life. But how important it was, I can’t know. I can’t know just what it means, or what it will come to mean, if anything. But it was a touch.”
I didn’t think of it to say (too many words!), and even if I’d thought of it, I would have chickened out. Must not let anyone think there is something, well, funny, about me! What does all this “touch” business mean, anyway?
Georgia, I don’t know.
But I take my life seriously, and I admit I’m only a beginner at living (you see I’ve never been alive before). So I don’t know what I’m doing writing this letter now—I’ve no idea, really, what it is I’m trying and stumbling so to say—perhaps I am not trying to say anything.
Still, I know my purpose. I want you to know that I don’t want to follow the normal path and degrade our touch—and our touches—into the normal jargon and phrases and classifications that most people use in order to dispense with having to handle things too seriously, with too much reverence, awe. They’d much rather turn it into “entertainment”, “a good time”, “love”, “making out”, this, that &c. All of which, to me, is just a bunch of lies—the things I do (if I’m honest with myself) just never fit such categories—or any of the other thousands of categories people have set up like bins for them to toss their experiences into, and not have to worry about them.
I touched you. You touched me, I think. So it was a touch. At least of some sort, to some extent, and in myself I know it was important. Like that street-washing machine with all its noise going by, which was of no importance in the scheme of things—in contrast to our kisses, which were.
But how important, is for us to decide.
I’m a person of instincts. It is my instincts and my sensibilities that I’m most interested in. I don’t want to deny them; I don’t want to treat them as of no account. That’s why I’m writing what I know must be an awful confusing, tentative letter.
I hope the confusion and tentativeness doesn’t frighten you off—or simply confuse you. Or lead you to standard conclusions.
I don't like standard conclusions.
I guess I’m in a strange mood tonight. I think this is a brave, unexpected (and probably weird) letter—but then I feel I owe it you! (If only I knew what it was I was saying!)
You touched me! I accuse you of that.
I touched you,—I’m willing to stand accused.
You didn’t sting me, by denying it was really touch—that’s what most girls do, and boys too; they deny (always later, by words, gestures) that it was really intimate touch, because they are afraid if they admit it was for them really touch, that they will be stung by the recoil of the other.
I’m not afraid of being stung—I know that’s the chance I take, when I choose to live by my instincts and sensibilities.—And yet, when I recognize stingers, I back away.
But after this last weekend, I know you’re not a stinger. —though this letter may frighten you, it is so strange. Just what does it mean? you must be thinking.
It doesn’t mean anything. I just thought it would be fun for you to get a strange letter, and yet one that is in some way gasping to be honest (I admit, gasping). I want the deeper things of life, the deeper knowledge. I know my sort of deep knowledge, my sort of path, may not be for you, or yours for me, but that’s what we’re to find out.—and to do it without me denying you or you denying me, of being special. No stinging. Just honesty, even if it means pain, or whatever.
I must call on Pan, and Isis, and Osiris, and Artemus, for what to do. For I'm just a beginner in life, an amateur, and they are the generations of the world.
It is mystic language, I admit; but I know what it means. How to tell you, I don’t know.
You touched me, and so my sensibilities, and instincts, and intuition, will not let me pretend it was nothing—like spirits from the underground, they come up and haunt me, when I begin to. Does that make any sense?
Oh well. . .
There is a girl named Georgia who seems to me sincere, silent, capable of sincerity and silence, and physical touch, without degrading it with her words, making something trite, or typical, of it. Yet I think you are a little afraid, which is good, for that shows you also have sensibilities, and true intelligence, that isn&’t alienated from your emotions.
Still, I think to myself, I don’t know this girl, though we’ve been intimate. I know (I think) that she is softly genuine, but I don’t know if she’s of my intrinsic sort, quite. I am very uncertain how far I should go with her—how far I could go without deceiving her, deceiving myself too, and betraying touch. I don’t want to hurt her, or be hurt by her. At the same time I know I must, must not cower in fear from touch. I don’t know this girl Georgia; she doesn’t know me; so lets don’t be afraid. Let’s give openness a try.
That is how I am thinking.
Do you think I’m a “strange one”?—I guess I am.
I don’t expect every girl to be acceptable; and I certainly don’t expect every girl to find me acceptable. So I’m a cautious thing—usually.
This letter doesn’t seem too cautious to me, though. I hope you will forgive any transgressions.
I know it puts you in unusual shoes, to have to answer such a letter as this! I wouldn’t know what to do, if I got a letter like this. (I think I would be speechless. I’d probably wonder: Was this sent to the right house?)
This letter was sent to the right house, wasn’t it?—You are Georgia reading this, aren’t you, and not some other girl? I would die!
So please don’t be afraid what you write to me. Let me know about yourself—who you are—what this summer hammock hung between the trees is like—it is up to you entirely to choose what sorts of things we shall and shall not tell each other about.
You make what rules up you want, for between us, and I’;ll make up the rules I want, for between us; and then we’ll arbitrate. How does that sound? Let’s not be afraid.
(I am a little afraid, though—Just what kind of a letter is this to write to a girl, I keep asking myself?)
No, be brave, trust. (I must tell myself.)
When we stood there (remember?) and I held my hand on your neck, I could feel how womanly a neck it was, a real, living, sincere neck, and it trusted me, with its vulnerability in my hands. And I trust you, don’t want to be afraid of you. A man puts himself in the careful trust of a woman, just as much as a woman puts herself in the careful trust of a man, don’t you think that’s true? (I’m very big on the importance of trust.) I trust you.
I think you trust me.
I’m worried this letter may seem “pushy.” I really ought to have written you some short “Hi, there!” letter, that took no chances. As I said, it would only have seemed a lie to me—because, well, we were sort of intimate with each other.
Don’t neglect to tell me your honest reaction to this letter (—if you can figure out what your honest reaction is), because I’m eager, and afraid, and curious, to know.
From Athens, May, 1977, with love.
Dwight
