Email

I haven’t been here for a while because I’m writing a book and that adventure is taking up all of my time.

A few days ago a peculiar event disturbed my concentration. An email arrived in my public account, containing only a link. Usually I’d throw something like that into the trash if I didn’t know the sender, but I noticed the link was to a regional newspaper, so instead I opened it.

The link took me to an article written by the man who sexually assaulted me, and it was about guilt. For some reason he’d not voted in an election and felt he’d been irresponsible. The article consisted of a mea culpa and an exhortation to everyone else take the responsibility to vote seriously.

I thought I’d recovered my equilibrium. But seeing his name and reading his words was disturbing. My sleep is broken again. So I took myself to the beach and swam for a long time. Then I lay in the sun and fell asleep. When I woke I realised that what I mostly feel about the man is relief that he isn’t in my life anymore, and a complete disinterest in his fate.

The man knew two relevant things about me. One was that my husband was dying. The second was that I suffer from post traumatic stress  as a consequence of childhood sexual abuse, and that I didn’t want to be in situations that might make me vulnerable to its symptoms. Neither of these things made any difference to him.

When I’m writing I lose all sense of time and place. It’s the same when I play my piano, and read. So this evening I’ll write this small post, practice some Bach, then read myself to sleep.

For some reason, seeing the man’s article made me long for my husband’s voice.

I have no idea who sent the link and when I replied to the address my email was returned.

I don’t want to be sent anything else.