Dear 17 year old me,

You'll fall in love with a boy this year that will bring you as much happiness as pain.
You'll fall in love with his eyes, and the dimples in his smile,
And dear girl you will cry when the loneliness of his departure makes the innermost of you empty and aching.

I would tell you to run now, that when your friend tries to give you his phone number, to turn her down.

But in this pain, five years later, five years of the highest highs and the lowest lows, as I ache from the innermost of me and feel empty, in this pain I tell you do not run.

Without him, you will not have a million poems, you will not have some of the best nights of your life. You will not sleeplessly wonder what you've done wrong, or sleepily whisper your "I love yous" into his ear.

And what is love without heartbreak?
What would I be without him?

Humor me, little past self. Fall in love with him. Write poems about his eyes, write letters to him with no end. Love him. Lose him. Fight him. Love him again.

And then come back as me, twice as strong and twice as weary.

You won't regret it.

Love, you at 21.