i will find, one day, the words that are correct. and i will sew them perfectly into my skin and they will sink into the past and they will stitch together a little broken girl and i will be healed altogether.
what would i say to her? 16 and shivering. i’d tell her the truth - we missed the ten year anniversary of our attempt because we were too busy and too full of life and so happy that we no longer count hours in crescents. there will be a lot of people who tell you it is worth it, that it gets better, but you will not believe them. little mouse, it is not easy. you will break down so many times you will have a fondness for rock bottom. you will become soul tethered to sisyphus, feeling yourself push the burden of your baggage up-and-up-and-up, over and over, each season like a metronome.
i would like to tell you do your homework or make more friends or try laughter instead. but we are older now, my love, and the world is different. tiny things seem silly now. instead, if there’s anything - just, while you’re there, look around. you do not have to like where you are. you do not have to squeeze juice out of the rotten core of your weeks. instead, take note of the changing of leaves. of how many clouds were worth noting. of bees and butterflies and hands that hold. one day you will miss just-being-home. one day your memories will flatten like a well-worn stone. keep a few, if you can, of the smell of baking and of loam.
people will tell you just live for right now, but you will not be able to do that, because your life is a wound and it needs to bleed. live, instead, if you can, just for me. for being 27 and loving green tea and a job worth doing and people in your phone you can call at any minute and having a dog you rescued and two tattoos and friends you can lay in bed with while all three of you read. for being in love with birds and having beaten another pokemon game and for learning your new favorite joke. we end up living only so our mother won’t be sad - and she’s doing great. she’s happy. they live up in maine now, isn’t that funny. but live, a little, just for me.
i sometimes, weakly, regret all the things that have been taken from me. i could have been a doctor! i could have a steady job! I could have gone to so many things! instead i was panicked or hungry or sobbing or so numb i could have been an ice rink.
but we never regret being here. we never regret what we gained in the bargain. you get to go to weddings (you’ll love her, i promise) and carnivals and graduations and halloween parties and you will love, wholeheartedly, all of it. one by one each emotion will come crawling back and one day you’ll realize you laugh without faking it. you just laugh. you experience movie-like joy so easily. can you believe that people call you bubbly? it’s lovely, what you’re waiting for. we have access to art supplies and good food and ice cream (it’s diary free - while you’re young, eat as much you can, just trust me).
when you’re 22, a friend will tell you - tomorrow might be the best day of my life. people’s luck changes all the time. maybe tomorrow i will make friends with bill gates. maybe tomorrow i’ll rescue a tiger from a cage. maybe today i make a small change, and by three weeks from now, i’m running the city under a new name.
the truth is that, at 27, you don’t live for tomorrow anymore. you don’t white-knuckle brace-for-it, hope-it-gets-better-somehow. you just wake up, and grab a coffee, and laugh about dumb things, and listen to your music too loudly. the world in 10 years will taste like honey.
keep living. keep going. just trust me.
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