For Ianthia

Dear Ianthia,

Hi. How’s it going? It’s me. You know, the girl with that brain that made you up.

I concede; it’s weird to write that sentence. Sometimes I forget that you’re my brain child.

Most of the time it seems to me like you’re a real person who just so happens to live in a

Reality that is separate from mine.

But the truth is that I made you up.

I crafted every aspect of your appearance from your skin tone

To your hair color

Your height and clothes

And who could forget that weird face tattoo?

Then there’s your personality, which defines who you are, and since I created that too

I guess I happen to be the one who

Defined who you are.

I made you calm and wise, thoughtful but friendly, a deeply contemplative individual

Whose past was too harsh (and that too I designed), a woman changed by her circumstances

But not destroyed by them.

I made you steadfast and loyal, savagely loyal, to be precise, a healer of both bodies and

Minds, you are one who is beautiful in an elegantly subtle way, relaxed and mellow

And a guiding hand to those who may not have

Experienced as much as you

Or who do not

Know as much as you

Or do not possess

The quiet strength and resolve that you do.

You are an inspiration to those around you, a friend to those beside you, and a teacher to those

Who chose the honor of studying under you.

All of these things, your life, your heart, your will, and your soul were fabricated by me.

No one can deny that I made you what you are

And yet no one can deny that you returned the favor and

Made me what I am too.

It is hard to express the feeling of knowing someone who has watched you grow

Since you were a small child

If this person is not your parent or sibling or uncle or aunt or whatever.

It is hard for me to express to you exactly how much you mean to me using only the words

That I know.

You stood by my side when I was all but alone

My friend when I was unable to make others

And above all else it would seem that your most important role in my life

Was to be my teacher.

I learned from you about your world but in doing so you taught me much about mine

And how to be the person I wanted to be which is to say that now I am the person I am.

Our adventures were long, and sometimes hard, but it was always the journey that mattered

The most to me and I feel I can say the same of you.

When I could make no friends of my own, you introduced me to yours and when finally

I made friends of my own I was happy to introduce you to them just as you had done for me.

And during my darkest days, when anger filled the crevices of my heart and burned away at

My very soul

It was you before all others who showed me the way to simply let it go

And it was you who taught me the reason to let it go which is that anger pales in comparison to

Peace.

That peace is the noblest of aspirations, a state that you will never achieve so long as you

Allow hatred to linger within your heart.

You showed me how to forgive, teaching by example, and if you could forgive those that had

Done you such harm then surely I could forgive those who had leveled upon me little more than

Petty insults.

You are everything I aspire to be, a person I do not want to be, but instead one that I

Crave to be like.

You see, in some odd way, I idolize you

You who knows so very much about me, who will always know the most about me, who can

Never be replaced by another no matter how much times change.

My life is changing and I know that someday, we may have to part ways.

But it is my greatest hope that for all the times we’ve shared,

The lessons

The loneliness

The laughter,

That someday we will also be reunited again, and that we will share those times again.

I swear I will make it happen, no matter how long it takes or how hard I have to fight

Because you taught me that there are just somethings and someones who are just worth

Fighting your hardest for.

Thank you for everything, Ianthia. Although we will always walk beneath the scope

Of different skies

There will always be a place in the depths of my heart for you and you alone

I have so much more I want to say to you and yet

It is hard for me to express to you exactly how much you mean to me using only the words

That I know.

The words for what I want to say do not exist in my language, but perhaps they do in

Yours.

Elune-adore, dalah falore. Tor alah’dor,

Shan’do.