A Letter Across Time

My good friend Mike has tagged me for what may be the coolest meme in history.  Word has it it was created by Malach the crazy inventor of all things wondrous - up to now his creations include The 13th Universe, Croatia and the car small enough to drive around a dime. 

The rules are simple:

• Link back to the person who tagged you.
• Send a letter back in time to your 13 year old self.
• Tag 5 more people to do this meme.

And so it begins:

Dear Young, Impressionable Me:

This is you in eight years.  I know you don't believe me, so I'm going to fill you in on YOU.  Right this minute.

• The year is 1999 and you've now finished your first few months of high school.  These will soon be remembered as the best years of your life.  Honestly, you're not "in with the cool crowd" - nor are you a "skag" (you'll later learn this word also stands as a colloquialism for heroin, but that fact never becomes important to you).  In fact, you'll spend the majority of your free time in the gym playing basketball.  No, you'll never play professionally - in fact, one of your greatest regrets will be that you gave the sport up during the later years of high school.  Fortunately you'll replace this activity with Speech - something that will be of immense importance to you in your later years.
• You've just ended a "relationship" with a girl named Tiffany.  Unfortunately you just weren't that interested in her.  She would end up messing her life up - so maybe you made the right choice. 
  
• You have always been known as the smart kid - a fact that will garner you a fair amount of shit during high school.  Fortunately, just like now, you don't give a damn about anyone else's opinions.  This fact will both help and hinder you.
  
• You're on lockdown at home.  This will continue until you move out.  People tell you they're afraid you're going to rebel because of the strictness of your parents - know now that they are completely right.  You just rebel totally differently than anyone will ever anticipate.

So I've got your attention.  Let me begin by telling you that the 8 years between you and me will be the shortest years of your life.  Soon you'll be 16 and then 18 and then 21 - and it'll all be a blur.  Don't let me scare you though - while you've made a few mistakes, you've learned from them and your life is now challenging - but extremely happy and fun.

In the next eight years there will be a major terrorist attack, a war based almost entirely on "truthiness" - a word that, as of now, does not exist - and a rising and falling economy.  The world will be at the brink of war - but when hasn't it been?  However, this war will affect your family in ways that even I do not yet know - yeah, this war isn't over.

During the next few years you will become an excellent speaker and will garner a lot of respect from your teachers; unfortunately, you will become a bit egotistical and will therefore become a mediocre student.  Maybe you want to change that now, but I can't say it's ever affected you much.

This egotism of yours will be a thinly veiled mask - you're unfortunately under confident and unsure of yourself.  So you cover it by spouting off random trivia and being the consummate know-it-all.  Looking back the only thing saving you from being a TOTAL douche is the fact that you're decent looking.  Oh and hey - you'll never be as tall as you'd like to be, so get the hell over THAT now.

Nothing that happens in HS will stick out as creating a particular impression on you but trust me - your school defines you as something totally different.  You live in a small town - a small COUNTRY town at that.  Occasionally the ideas and thoughts espoused by the natives of this town will come to complete odds with what you've learned from living your entire life (up to this year, in fact) in Germany.  Fortunately all the time you spent in other countries will help you in becoming understanding and patient with the beliefs of others, no matter how wrong you think they really are.  This will serve you well in the next few years.  I suspect it will serve us both well for the rest of our lives.

An odd thing will happen to you - you will be kicked out of your house a few months after turning 18.  Fortunately you established a loan on your 18th birthday that will (by this time) be paid off - so you'll move in to your first apartment the day after being kicked out;  it will happen that your first month will be free and no deposit will be required.  Serendipitous.  Your life will be a series of serendipitous events - please learn to be thankful soon.

In the above vein - your mother will have kicked you out for no apparent reason.  She's stressed.  This move will cause much fighting between your mother and father - you are the only child and your dad lived a hard life.  He's afraid to subject you to that.  Your mom will feel guilty about kicking you out for years after - never let her feel bad about it.  I haven't.  Again, things will work out for you ridiculously well.  Learn to be thankful please.

The day after (literally) you will meet an older girl at a club.  Her ex husband (who is one hundred pounds heavier and a half foot taller) will attack you.  Fortunately he is extremely drunk.  You will whoop his ass.  Realize now that it was because he was extremely drunk - not because you're a total badass.  Well, maybe a LITTLE because you're a total badass...  but anyway.

This event will set the next three years of your life in motion.  Little do you know this woman has a child.  A beautiful little blonde princess.  You will fall in love - and you will think it's because of the woman.  Know now it's the daughter - and know that your love for her will change your life forever.

You will land an excellent job at a Fortune 500 company and make a ridiculous amount of money for your age.  You will not appreciate this.  But you will use it to take care of said woman and little girl for the next two years.  You. Will. Grow. Up.  You will continue attending college, working full time and taking care of a family and you will sincerely enjoy it.  Unfortunately, this Pax Parad0x will end and you and woman will break up - not messily, but you will break up - and you will spend the rest of your time wondering how terribly this will affect her/your daughter.  I am still trying to make the adjustment as easy for her as possible and strongly suspect she will always be a part of my life.

If there is a lesson you can learn from this experience, it is this: You can not save everyone.

The next year plus will be spent in self-discovery.  Up to now you have avoided testing your personality out - seeing who you really are.

You'll meet a friend at work who will introduce you to the party scene - and you will have your first drink at twenty.  I know, I know - you hate the idea of alcohol now.  Fortunately, you will be responsible with its use - perhaps because you did not begin experimenting with it until a "late" age.  You will meet more friends - and you will buy a motorcycle. 

You will wreck it and come close to losing your life.  Look at your left hand now.  In 8 years it won't look quite that smooth.  Freddy Krueger.  Haha - just messin'.  It's not QUITE that bad.

This motorcycle purchase will be among your greatest ever regrets.

During all this you'll gain a roommate and best friend - oddly, this roommate was at the exact opposite spectrum during your high school years;  Everyone will be surprised by your friendship.  This will lead to your realization that people's perception really IS based on first experiences.  This will haunt your roommate for a while to come.

Within a few months you will be introduced to marijuana and you will enjoy its use immensely.  It will lead you to research the plant, it's origins, its effects on the body and the dangers of its use.  You will learn that your government began using this drug as a reason to persecute illegal immigrants - and you will learn that governments with too much power will never change.  You've always been interested in politics but never so much as after your first use of Cannabis Sativa. 

Now you are selling your house and going back to school full time.  You'll graduate in about 8 months and the world after that is your oyster.  I don't know what happens next, but I do know that one can see the future by studying the past.  So far things are looking good for you, kid. 

Don't screw it up.

Your best friend,
You



Now for the final rule - I'm tagging the following to complete this meme.  If you hate memes, get over it - you'll appreciate this one.

• Counsellor in Cultivation
• Kerstin
• Sara Sue (even though you may have already been tagged)
• Mybrid
• Angry Chavez

Thanks again to Mikey