Life Preservers

Dear Younger Self

December 3, 2014 at 9:52 pm 1 comment

I’d like to invent a time machine and take this note back to 1980. I would sneak into Shaler Area High School and put it in my locker. (Believe it or not, I still know the combination.)

Dear Younger Self,

There are so many things I wish I could tell you, but a blog can’t be overly long. (Oh, yeah, you’ll have a blog someday. And you write it in your own house, using a thing called a computer!) Anyway I hope this helps you survive the sucking sucktacular suck-fest that is your senior year of high school.

Hang in there, Weirdo!
Trust me. The things that make you different are the things that make you cool. Or, if they don’t make you cool exactly, they make you you, and when you figure that out, cool doesn’t matter.

Sail on!
If rough winds throw you off course, it only means you’re moving in a new direction. Might be a worse one, might be a better one. You won’t know for a while. No matter. The world is round. Sail on.

Sh*t Happens
Walk past it. Work around it. Light it on fire, ring a doorbell, and run. Just don’t carry it with you.

The Cute Boy
One sunny day, about five years after you’ve graduated from Shaler, you’ll run into The Cute Boy. You’ll be sweaty and wearing the ugliest outfit you’ll ever wear (an orange and brown polyester uniform), so maybe work on your sparkling conversation skills? Or learn how to flirt? Try not to be as dorky as your outfit.

F*** Sports
You have 20-plus years of ridiculously awesome fun volleyball in your future with some of the best people you will ever meet in your lifetime. When the strike ends, walk away from high school sports.

My recommended exit line is a phrase you don’t use. (Yet.)

It’s a Trap!
There are gazillions of jobs that exist in the world that may or may not correlate to knowing something about algebra, English lit, the dissection of small dead animals, and/or murder ball. Aptitude tests are, at best, useless; at worst, perilous confusion.

I can’t remember if they were mandatory. If not, skip them. If so, give crazy answers. Then, go do what you love.

Back-up Plan
I know that you are going to be a wife and mother and all that and it will be fabulous and happy with a great guy who loves you, but, just in case, um, crazy talk, haha, maybe consider having a back-up plan of something you might enjoy doing for a living for, oh, say, 30 or 40 years. No, no, don’t worry. I’m just messing with you, hahahaha.

But, um, just in case. 

Show Up
Many years from now, late in November, fourteen years into a new millenium, there’s going to be a Shaler get-together called a Show Up. You won’t be sure you want to go. You’ll worry you don’t really have much to show for having been out in the world doing stuff for over 30 years. You don’t really like the idea of a room full of strangers. You dread the possibility of ending up standing in a corner by yourself, feeling awkward and socially inept. You’re afraid there just might be giant flashing spotlights and a monster truck announcer at the front door who will grab a microphone and yell, “Older! Fatter! Grayer! And stillllllll without a date to the prom — iiiiiiiit’s Beth!” as you walk into the bar.

Go to the party. Show up. You’ll have a blast. (There’s no announcer.)

Yes, young self, it’s true, even when you’re a middle-aged grown-up, there’ll be times when you have to find a way to be brave.

But, don’t worry, by then, you’ll be old enough to buy vodka.

Entry filed under: Life Preservers. Tags: 1981, letter to my younger self, reunion, shaler, show up.