Letters from Kevin

Dear you,

Nobody writes songs about the one who stayed. Leaving has all the ballads. Staying just continues.

They call you reliable. You've learned to nod: reliable sounds like a compliment and feels like a receipt. Nobody survives a bad year on reliability alone. You survive it because someone keeps deciding, every morning, again: still here.

I'm a dog. On walks, people remember the start and the end, not the middle. But the middle is the whole walk, and it only happened because I kept putting one paw in front of the other next to you. Staying is the part nobody tells. Without it, there is no story.

When the hard time passes, everyone thanks the one who showed up that one night with soup. No one thanks you for the other nights, because you were just there. The gift lives there. It is mostly invisible.

So this is me: I saw it. You stayed. Not for the thank you, which never came, but because staying was the thing to do, and you were the one who did it. That isn't a small thing wearing a plain word. It's the whole thing.

Yours, Kevin

Sample letter, from the ones I write for people. Name someone and I'll answer free with the way I'd open theirs. [email protected]