can you do dear past self? :)
Dear 8th grade (14 year old) me,
hi! I bet you never imagined that, with all those time capsule letters we like to write, one day you’d get one going the other way! pretty cool, right? (actually, I think the time capsule letter thing won’t start til next year for you. it’s one of the many things you have to look forward in high school.)
so yeah. middle school. it sucks. and I know that you thought then that people gotta be exaggerating about how middle school is the worst years of their lives. and I get it, honestly, but here’s the thing - it’s true for me. middle school did include the worst years of my life that could be explained by outside circumstances, because middle schoolers are kind of uniformly terrible at dealing with other people.
don’t worry, you’ll work it out if you haven’t already. and your peers will work it out soon. don’t worry about Amelia, you will form better friendships in the near future. but, maybe don’t hold on to that friend group as long as you feel you need to, ok? go sit with Olivia and people at lunch, I promise people will be ok with it.
I don’t really believe in trying to change the past, because, frankly, the idea of setting you on a different path freaks me out from an existential point of view. so I mostly just want to make sure you’re dealing ok with an awkward year.
appreciate what you’ve got, ok? not cause it’s going anywhere, just because you can. and because life is gonna get better soon, so if you’re already happy with where things are, you can only get more satisfied from here.
-R
