love letters to the future and the past
I spend so much time in my head, thinking things that never manage to escape the confines of my inner monologue. It may not be that these thoughts, ephemeral as they are, have any intrinsic worth—or even that they can survive out here in the air.
But they’re my mental landscape, they’re where I live, they make up what is my life… and if I hope to remember my life, I should hope to remember what colored my days.
Twice now, since starting this intense week of book-writing, I’ve stumbled across my old writing here on my laptop. And then I was overwhelmed by the urge to dig out my paper journals, the source of much of the writing, but holding yet more stuff that I have not transcribed. It’s like being dropped into a pit and being forced to eat your way out—eat your way out by devouring your own words, re-digesting your past as the only path to escape.
Some of it’s really good. Some of it I’ve read and thought, “Holy crap, Ames. You nailed it. You really nailed it. I didn’t remember that you had it in you.” And that has made me very proud, in a melancholy kind of way.
And some of it has made me cringe—cringing that I sometimes even predicted when I wrote the original piece, leaving a little note to my future self saying, “Yeah… it really is bad, I know.” Despite the bad writing (or unpleasant memories), even that tiny bit of prescience makes me feel a little bit more appreciation for the cleverness and bravery of the person I was a year ago, two years ago, three…
But it’s so easy to forget. The past three years have been the most dramatic rollercoaster ride in the entire rest of my life and yet paradoxically the happiest, too. My overall trend graph is positive, if a bit jaggy and unsure.
It seems important to remember this. Over these past few years, I’ve learned so much about myself, life, and humanity—my past and pain and love and failure, compassion and triumph, heartbreak and strength. And by recognizing and accepting—even loving—the person I was, I feel like I’m giving the person I am a better shot at life.
It doesn’t matter whether the old writing was sublime or horrendous, the memories pleasant or painful, the act of re-reading them and remembering makes me feel more… myself. More of a complete human being, like I have context, a place in the world. It makes me feel more real.
But it is all so goddamn easy to forget.
So I am determined to leave a trace. It’s my legacy to myself, love letters to my own future. It’s cementing my life in the past so I can know where I’ve been, and which way I’m going.
And I will probably slack off, over time, as the sense of having a mission fades. But that doesn’t mean that when I come back and re-read this very letter to myself, I won’t smile and cheer myself on through the fog of years. I’m quite sure that I will… and you will, too.
