Here’s the reason: when it comes to you and me, I feel stuck and don’t know what to do. I love you, Lucas, but there’s so much about our relationship that I find disturbing. Some things have been bothering me for a while. Others didn’t begin to crystallize until we went to Maine.

I have to be honest with you and with myself. I know you’d want me to. As you could probably tell, I didn’t enjoy the trip very much. I liked it when we could find a quiet place to read, but I didn’t like living in the microbus. I hated not being able to shower and feeling dirty all the time. (Sponge bathing in restaurant and gas station bathrooms really doesn’t cut it.) I wasn’t comfortable sleeping on Odysseus’s thin mattress. And I hated how mean people and the police were to us simply because of our hair and clothes. Well, and because of Odysseus.

Do I sound like a bourgeois spoiled brat? I bet you think I do. And that’s also something I’m worried about. I know how you despise capitalism and middle-class values. You know how much I admire your beliefs, how you work every summer in that factory when you don’t have to and refuse to accept anything from your parents. But if that means you’ll always want to take vacations in your microbus and wash in public bathrooms and cook meals on a camp stove, I honestly wonder if I can share that lifestyle with you.

Oh, Lucas, I’m sorry if it sounds like I’m coming down hard on you. But there’s more. The drugs. You know I don’t mind smoking grass once in a while. But not all the time. Until we went to Maine, I don’t think I realized how much you smoked. Starting nearly every day before noon? And you must sense that I’m not comfortable with you using LSD. I was so anxious and worried during the drive home.

To be honest, Lucas, I think the phrase “not comfortable” describes how I’m feeling about us in general. There are many wonderful things about you. When we first started going together, I thought I could help you with some of the problems you were facing. Maybe I even imagined that I could change you.