My Name Is Prince.

Dear Prince: A Letter for you 💜 [Not an update]

A/N: I've been wrestling back and forth with whether I should post this or not, but then I decided, why not just go ahead and do it? So, I am. This is my personal letter to Prince that I'm deciding to share with all of you. I hope you all be kind in the comments 🙈💜

Dear Prince,

Hey, it's me. By now, April has come and gone so quickly it's almost as if I imagined it. I know I'm late in getting this out to you, and for that, I apologize. I've been trying to find the right words to say to let you know how much you mean to me, but so far I couldn't come up with anything. I'm still stuck in the denial phase, honestly. I can't fathom how one minute, you're here, and the next, you're...gone. It's almost like a dream I'm waiting to wake up from. It just doesn't seem real. The day I found out that you passed, I didn't shed a tear. I couldn't. I was in shock and all I could say was "No."

Later that night, as I sipped on my drink called Purple Rain and watched your movies, I still didn't cry. I guess I was still in shock and trying to process the fact that you're...gone. It wasn't until days afterward, while I was alone in my room, laying on the floor listening to all of your albums, that I let myself really feel the finality of never getting to hear your voice again, or never getting to experience one of your live shows for the first time. Yes, I said first time. I wasn't even thought of when your first album came out and by the time Lovesexy came out in 1988, I believe I was only 3 months old. The one opportunity I had to see you live when I got older passed me by because my mother thought I wouldn't have wanted to go 😔

Anyway, I thought I was done crying after listening to your music, but I was wrong.

A month or two later, I was dancing to some of your songs because I wanted to make a tribute video for YouTube. Everything was fine, until I got to I Wanna Be Your Lover. I don't know what happened, but all of a sudden, I stopped dancing and just started bawling. Once I was calm, I had this need to see your face, as if it would make everything okay, so I laid down in my bed and watched Purple Rain.

It helped a little, but it wasn't the same as still having you here.

After that, I was okay. I would laugh, smile, and yes, cry at some point during the concert videos of yours I was lucky to find on the internet if they weren't taken down, but it wasn't as much.

Until I tried choreographing a routine for your song AnotherLove.

That day, I stopped what I was doing, ran upstairs, sat on the floor and bawled. Every time I tried to pull myself together, I just couldn't stop crying. I didn't understand why, I just kept mumbling "what...what..." as if I was trying to say "what is wrong with me?" But the words wouldn't come out.

I've never taken anyone's death this hard since Aaliyah or any of my family members that have passed on.

The only thing that was able to give me comfort throughout all of this was the fact that I saw your face in the clouds one day while I was on my way to work. I took it as a sign that you were letting me know you're okay up there and I didn't need to worry. That finally brought a smile to my face although there were tears in my eyes.

I can finally relax knowing you're doing okay up there, even though things with your estate are a little crazy right now on top of you-know-who finally publishing her book, but that's another story.

For now, I'll just end this by saying what I should've said back in April: Prince, thank you for the amazing music, making me smile, laugh, and cry. I hope to see you again one day.

Love,

Ashley 💜