This is the first GenFab Blog Hop brought to us by Chloe of the Mountain, and I wanted to participate. Only, just a few weeks ago, I did a Dear Past/Future me on my regular blog, Wine-n-Chat, for BlogFEST, and I didn’t want to duplicate a post there. This is my fiction blog, so I’m going to do fictional letter based on some real stuff. I’ll let you decide how much is real and how much is not. I will never tell. Here we go!!
Dear 20 Year Old Me,
You need to pay attention!!
Where to start—let’s start with work. Nothing in God’s creation is worth the stress that place brings you. Get Out!! Get another job ASAP. You do not need that kind of stress. Before you quit? Go down the hall and talk to that financial guy—about putting back a portion of your earnings. Trust me when I say, down the road, you are going to wish you would have. Don’t be worried about what he thinks of your meager earnings. He may just hire you. Go. Do. It.
On to school. You KNEW when you graduated high school that you were not ready for college. Why did you let your family pressure you into it? Luckily you have your grades, but seriously, you know deep down you won’t graduate and you are just wasting your money. Do yourself a favor—you have enough credits for an English minor, apply for your AA. Then drop out of college and go get a real job –a job that doesn’t stress you out so bad.
On down the road you WILL go back and get your BA. You will absolutely LOVE to learn at that point in your life. You will take college seriously. It will be everything you want it to be. However, NOW is not your time. You just need to take care of you financially, because no one else will. And you need to get out of that party town before it leaves you rock bottom.
Yes, that is right. I just said it. As many fun times as you are having, you need to slow down on drinking. You are not immortal. There are health consequences from your drinking. You will alienate some of your better friends.
And seriously, YOU ARE STUPID not to hand over your keys thinking you are never going to get caught on the road under the influence. Want to know something? FEAR is what you will feel when you get pulled over while drinking. You will be shaking and almost in tears. I won’t let you know how this one turns out—because I really want you to think about it next time you decide so foolishly. Maybe, just maybe, you will do the right thing.
Love life? Ahh yes. Well first I want to tell you to forget your past two mistakes. And I want to warn you, the next man coming around the corner (if he hasn’t already), will seem like the one you’ll spend the rest of your life with. He will do all the right things—and for almost a year you will be on cloud nine. You will be officially engaged. You will believe NOTHING will split the two of you up, and he will believe it more strongly than you.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t turn out to be the case—but you need this experience to do a lot of growing up. So listen up.
A moment is coming and your fantasy bubble will pop. You will vow to drop him forever. You will not be successful. You will take him back. You will fall in love with him all over and there are going to be some very joyous and very heart breaking moments that you will endure together.
Buy stock in Kleenex is all I am saying. But you will never learn to completely trust him again during round two. You will love him, but there is a small part of you that will always be a bit scared around him. And you will decide to leave him again.
I am here to tell you the way you want to leave him is wrong. He deserves a goodbye. Disappearing on him while he is active for two weeks one summer is just wrong. You will regret this. Be a woman, give him a proper goodbye. Meeting up with him years later will be awkward and seeing him at the cemetery will be even more heartbreaking for you both and you’ll have a lot of explaining to do to your family.
Yes, you heard that part right!! You will get married to Mr. Right. And you will have a family. And you will finally have that sense of security you’ve longed for your whole life.
And even though you will tell your Mr. Right about that previous relationship and all it entails—it won’t be real to him or to your family until you run into Love #3. And it might just all be avoided if you leave Love #3 properly to begin with. I know this sounds vague, trust me. A lot of awkwardness and explaining can be avoided by just doing the right thing by #3 when you decide to leave him for good.
So yes—you will find Mr. Right. You need to learn to trust him sooner in your relationship…because this one is totally a keeper. If this means reconciling with your father before marrying him, then do so. Your mistrust of men is stemmed from your relationship with your dad. Unfortunately, what you believe now about your dad, much of it was fabricated. Wait til you are 22 and you discover the truth…all I will say is it will be a mind blowing experience.
Unfortunately, you will never again trust those that lied to you outright about your Dad. And when you do discover the truth—do what your heart tells you and don’t let fear hold you back. It is a shame when adults play games with kids and feed them lies for many years. The good news is, you won’t have to worry about this with your own kids, because your husband to be is the best thing that could have EVER happened to you and them. You just have to realize it sooner than later.
Not much more to say than that. This was long. Will you listen? I can only hope.
With Love,
Your 40-something Self.
18 comments:
Everyone's honesty in these letters is so awesome. It is a shame we have to battle through all the hard knocks to become the fabulous women we are!
There is a lot of truth to this letter... And so many truths in the ones I have read. Thank you Kat for stopping by.
You are a loving and giving woman and perhaps much of this comes from needing that kind of woman in your life. Your past was perhaps not perfect, but perfectly correct to get you here and here is a good place! Love it.
Thank Jo...I think you are right. I needed that today.
Thanks Jo...I think you are right and exactly what I needed to hear today.
I wish I had bought stock in Apple when I was in my 20s!
Isn't that the truth. I was pretty awful with money back then.
Oh the things we have to say to our younger selves! (We had inner voices saying some of these same things, didn't we? Sometimes we listen. Sometimes we don't.)
The more I read of these letters today the more I realize that we do seem to need our struggles to learn our lessons well. If only the struggles were a little less messy and painful!
Happy that you found your Good Guy later on! That's a gift!
Why do the lessons have to be so hard? Glad you found the best thing that could ever have happened for you and your kids -- guess we sometimes have to go through the bad stuff to get to the good. So happy you got there!
Lies are hard at any age! I think when we are younger we just don't see them as quickly.
Trust... something we can only learn the hard way. Looks like you've found a path that works for you!
I love the sense of mystery you left in here. So much hinted at but unsaid - it works! Sigh, it's hard getting to where we are now, isn't it?
Interesting approach. I'm curious about what's real, what's fiction. Regardless, much wisdom shared here in a great post. Thank you for sharing!
I need your first piece of advice right now in my life. I'm pretty sure the stress is NOT worth it and I'll be much happier once I GET OUT!
I want to hear more about love #3 and how love #4 dealt with the blow of finding out about Love #3. I can see why you write fiction. I'm caught up in the mystery myself now.
I'm so glad you participated!
I'll read the book! Great post.
It's interesting, I too had a hard time trusting once I had "good guy." I wasn't used to it.
Love the advice on school. I think so many of us could benefit from putting off college until we're really in a place to appreciate what can be learned there.
Fun post! I too am intrigued and want to read more of your fiction.
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