Letter from November 28, 2011

Dear Future Me. Hi. I'm gonna make this really long, cause I know how much you love reading stuff from the past. I makes you feel like you're peeking into somebody else's diary. Just for a few moments, you're visiting a world that's no longer there, and never will be there. Visiting a mind that is now obsolete. Everything looks better in the past, doesn't it? More romantic. You're 26 today. Congratulations, you're officially old! Do you have kids? God I hope not. I can't even imagine having kids. I'd have to be really responsible for that, and responsible isn't exactly a trait I'm cherishing these days. But that's beside the point. I'll give you a little overview of what's happening in my life right now. I am sixteen, today is the last day of Thanksgiving break, and it's 1:48 am. It's fun saying I'm sixteen. It's sounds more experienced than fifteen and less serious than seventeen. It's exactly the right age to be. Sweet sixteen, indeed. God, did I just say indeed? Yes, you did. Anyways, so it's almost 2 in the morning right? I've got a load of homework that I still haven't done, and despite a brief feeling of panic whenever I think about it, I don't feel very inclined to do it. I should, shouldn't I? I probably will. I'll probably stay up all night. I wonder where you are now. Are you married? Did you ever learn to roller skate? See Paris? Become a health buff? Visit a San Francisco art gallery in the middle of the night? Sing a song at the top of your lungs with the car windows down at a stop light? Hug someone you just met? I hope so. I hope so. I can't imagine you doing anything else. Not going to college, like everyone expects you to do. At least not when you're young like me. Young. Hmph. A rapidly deteriorating condition. I know young doesn't last forever, and it makes me a little anxious. Where does the time go, anyway? I'm 26. That's some crazy shit right there. In a couple years I'll be an old maid by today's standards. What the fuck is that shit (you also like swearing in 2011)? Right now you're listening to Boom Boom Ba by Matisse which you got because of the show Dead Like Me. You just finished reading Interview With the Vampire by Anne Rice. You didn't go to Apple Hill today. You decorated for Christmas yesterday and your parents argued about how to hang the golden beads around the tree. Dad wanted it to look a little messy, mom wanted it to look neat. It ended up looking like a little of both. You just won 3rd place in Varsity Oratorical Interpretation with Sarah Kay's speech If I Should Have A Daughter. You're proud of yourself. Auntee Bebe just visited. She's 90-something, and she told you that you were a woman (But you still feel like a girl. Did you ever start feeling like a woman?). You want to graduate, and then travel the world. I hope I did that. Or I hope I did something else that made me immensely happy. Don't ever stay in a situation that doesn't make you happy. But I think you know that. I think you're pretty wise by now. And you're a pretty awesome person, you know that? I think you know that too. You are a woman. Love, Kylie