Dear 16 year old me!

Dear 16 year old me!

How are you doing?  Wait don’t answer that…I know exactly how you are because I am you!  I am older, greyer, and a lot smarter now!  I think!   All I know is that I have never once wanted to return to the age you are now.  If I did, I want to know what I know now!

Right now it is 1981 and you just got your drivers license.  A top of the line computer was just announced by IBM at a press conference in New York. This is the computer that as manufactured by IBM and in clone form becomes the de facto standard for business use for the remainder of the decade and beyond. The base model retails for $2880 and includes 64 kilobytes of RAM and a single-sided 160K 5.25" floppy drive.  You only have seen a handful of computers at school! By the time you reach 46 computers are EVERYTHING! Ronald Reagan is President and he is a good one, but you don’t pay much attention to politics.  You should because things are going to get pretty hairy on the political scene.  You are very aware that gas rose above $1 a gallon for the first time…wait till you see the prices now…they are approaching $4 a gallon!  Then there is health stuff!  All the health issues you are currently dealing with are something called autoimmune issues.  Our immune system is whacked up and it is going to get more so! Our body just decides to attack itself for no reason!  Just roll with it.  The more you fight it the angrier it makes you.  This is not something that you can control…you just manage it! 

You are going to have to learn to take care of the body!  If I could go back and change ONE THING that you are currently doing that you should stop now it would be to STOP SMOKING!  That will help all the health stuff more than anything else!   You are a driven cuss and will even be more so in the future!  Learn to use it instead of fighting it. 

Open yourself to exploring the world.  Think outside the box and don’t ever be afraid to try!  It is going to take awhile for you to wrap your head around that…but when you do you will find that life smooths out and becomes peaceable! 

Enjoy the small things and learn to listen to your heart!  Life is way to short to waste any time!

See you in the future, I think you will like who we are!