Hey, me, congrats! You made it to 25!
I'm glad.

Remember when you were young and full of angsty anxiety?
Yeah, great times!
I'm still living it now, though.
I'm not looking back at it, like (lucky) you.

It'll probably be funnier in retrospect,
cause right now it sure isn't.
I'm sure your chuckling to yourself,
wondering at your own dramatics.
(Had you ever been that self-centered?
Thinking what you had was really that bad?)

You may not recall,
but you used to need to write up a
mental list of why you needed to
wake up in the morning, just to
get out of bed.
And when you did get out of that bed, finally,
your limbs felt so heavy with exhaustion
that you wondered if gravity would
pull you through the earth's crust
and cradle you in its core.
You'd have been grateful for the peace.

But you've left that all behind, yeah?
You're an adult, in your prime.
You've probably got a job by now, finished university.
You might be dating, heck, even married!
Planning on having kids?

Is life running along like a well-oiled machine?
Everything going along according to plan,
tick-ticking off the boxes on your check-list.
The world's your oyster!
(Yeah, we never knew what they meant, either)

Have any advice for little ol' me,
to get through this chaotic (insignificant) mess?
Not that you'd be able to give it to me.

You're so far ahead as to almost be unattainable.
But hey, you're me, right?
If I color between the lines, on the straight and narrow, breathe,
I'll catch up to you eventually, right?

I 'm allowed to want nice things?

I can be happy?

So, Me of January 2026
25 years, eh?
Can we make it that far?

Hoping and praying,
Me of May 2018

p.s.
I'm counting on you. Meet you there.

h.f.m.