Letter to myself, in thirty years.

Hiiiiiia all. So today we had an assignment to turn in, in English class. It was a letter from ourselves, to ourselves in thirty years. This is my go --

Hello Elisabeth. Is that even still your name? Are you married? Where do you live? I have a thousand questions for you, but first I want to tell you a something about how you were thirty years ago. Right now, you have been stupid! Instead of going home right after school and writing this assignment, you went to the city, then you dyed your hair, then you watched a movie and now you are sitting in the TV room watching football. But at least you are writing your assignment. You are master of postponing! You are ambiguous. You want to be very hard working, always turning your assignments in, working hard, get good grades while you want to be relaxed, a bit rebellious and lazy. Even though this is happening right now, you are still wise enough to see that all this is a fight to figure out your true identity.

You are 16 years old, you go to Sorø Akademis Skole in Denmark, you live there at boarding school and you have just started the first of three years in the Danish high school. Are you happy with the choices you have made?

Now for some questions for the older you... Me? It is hard to know. Are we any different from each other, or are we still the same. Will you shake your head and crumple up this piece of paper, do you even bother to finish reading it? Are you really that distant from me?

Well, what do you do? Are you a psychologist, a politician, a writer or have none of the dreams you dreamt come true? Or did you get some entirely different dreams?

Right now I see my future like this. I want to be a psychologist, I want to be alot of other different things as well, but being a psychologist is what I am aiming for. Right now I am also a freelance book reviewer, I read a lot of books and I write some short stories myself and I really see it going somewhere! I really do hope that you pursued the literal path that I am trying to direct you on to.

Maybe everything has gone wrong, maybe you are alone and unsuccessful, maybe you’ve got diabetes and you no longer talk to your friends and family. Maybe you’ve gone completely off track? Maybe you’ve killed yourself.

In conclusion, asking you what is going to happen is silly, because I know very well that you can’t answer. I can only tell you what I want you to keep in mind. I want you to remember yourself! I want you to know who you are! It is so difficult to tell you the exact parts of yourself that I want you to keep, only the young me knows. I am so excited to read this letter in thirty years, does this mean that I’ll still be myself then? That is probably my biggest fear, to have lost myself, please don’t let me down. If you still are ambiguous when you read this letter in thirty years and you still fight to figure out your true identity then listen. Your identity must be exploring all the different perspectives of yourself and the world. Keep curious, because you have always been. You were impossible for your mother to breastfeed because you wanted to see the world. Remember this and smile. Goodbye Elisabeth, see you again in thirty years, I hope you will be well and I love you.

xo Elk