Whatever You Do Don't Write it Down

CW{Strong Language, Sarcasm}

Dear Kevin,

It's me Kevin, your actual future self. I remember the summer you are in well. Your air conditioning was not working because the electric company turned you off due to not paying. You were admitted to the hospital due to a bizarre host of episodes that culminated in a weekend in jail and a trip in front of a judge. It doesn't seem like it now, but everything is going to be alright. Being diagnosed with schizophrenia is not a death sentence. Which brings me to the issue at hand. During counseling the nice lady with the bright red lipstick suggested you get a notebook and write as a form of therapy. I reread the story you wrote that summer. Which brings me to the point I need to make.

I want you to break your pencils in half and burn your journal one page at a time. Taking that much time to destroy what you created will give you the time to ponder the things I'm going to tell you in this letter. I know you want to be a writer and you think you have a story to tell. Unfortunately for you in your twenty something hubris, you don't realize that nobody cares about your story. In fact the sad truth is nobody even really cares about you. The little kid you mentor from down the street doesn't count. He loves anyone that will pay attention to him because he is a latch key kid and a third child at that.

It hurts to hear the truth, but with a narcissistic step mother and a emotionally distanced father you never really had a chance at pair bonding. Your first relationship in High School doesn't really count as such. You were just horny kids bending to Mother Nature's plan. Rekindling your grade school flame into a second relationship to get you through college, that was a manipulation masterpiece. And look where it got you. You are alone, crying into a pillow every night. Which makes you get up and scribble stuff in a notebook. Which brings me to my point.

You are about to waste the next precious years of your life crafting a first person hero tale. I would suggest you not buy a computer with a word processor and spend that money on tattoos. I know you draw and write music, but honestly if you want to fit into the world of the future you need ink. It doesn't have to be unique, a bird or fish will do. Since you are a bit of an instigator, maybe avoid the Koi and put a cigar in the fish's mouth and a baseball bat in his fins. With the bird, I would make it a swallow (insert crude masculine humor here) and put a blowgun dart through its eyeballs. Don't stop there, if you have money leftover from the first tattoo, get a few more. It seems like everyone in the future needs some vague geometric designs on their arms to imply their interest in casual group sex, Viking folklore or methamphetamine. Anyway, just get some tats so you fit in.

Let's move on to the time you will invest crafting this novel. I suggest you stop writing and take up knitting. Socks, scarves, dish cloths, anything to take your mind off the the fact that your penis is the problem. It's not a terrible problem now, cause you are taking care of it by dating Rosey Palmer. That only lasts until a vagina enters the scenario. I'm not sure why it's a problem these days because to me a penis and vagina are like butter and bread, socks and feet, sausage and eggs. For that matter don't you put ketchup on your hot dog? I'm sorry I know I go too far sometimes but let me be specific; leave the writing to the experts and editors.

I've never met an editor, but I've emailed them and you would have better luck getting steamy phone sex out of an Internal Revenue Service government agent than getting a response from an editor. Honestly when they read the part about the hero tale in the query letter, they are going to take your manuscript with them to their desk and use it as a coaster. All your hard work is going to have the illustrious career of preventing coffee stains on overpriced wood veneer. Your ideas at this point are so naive they don't even make for a good punchline at the Starbuck's drive-up. You don't know it yet, but that 99 cent cup of joe is on the way out. In the future people will pay an hours worth of your current wages for a single cup of coffee. They also pay a thousand dollars for a telephone and a hundred thousand dollars for a truck. Which is why you need to quit wasting your time with ideas and just get a good paying job.

About the job thing; there is a saying in business that everything is sales. It's true. If you aren't selling stuff, you are selling your self. As a child you were sold a bad bill of goods that included the gem about hard work and success. Not sure if changing the past will help me here in the future but, do you remember when you painted apartments one summer? You made enough money to not starve. It was really hard work. Do you see my point? All that hard work did not lead to success. It builds character they say. Just stick with it. Don't quit. I'm sure all these sayings are well meaning, but I'm going to let you in on a secret. There is another pearl of wisdom you never heard, work smarter, not harder. We blue collar mules don't hear that, because the world needs us so others don't have to get dirty. If you like the hard work, fine, but you will find out when you hit forty years old there are limits to what the human body can endure.

It seems I'm getting off topic. I wrote this letter to save you a lot of time and frustration. You don't know it but that free subscription to Compuserve through Radio Shack with your first computer is going to grow and morph into a world changing behemoth called the internet. I could write a few books about how this network is going to change the world, but I don't want to freak you out. That effort you put into getting a college degree and all the reading and research you've done doesn't amount to a hill of beans. In the future a twelve year old with a device to access the internet will make you look like a blubbering idiot. A high school kid with a computer and some fancy software will be able to write without knowing how to spell words or even having a grasp of basic grammar. In the future you don't even need arms to write. If you can talk or even just move your eyeballs you can write a book. Go grab a copy of A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking and after you read it turn your notebook into a flip cartoon book of the Earth crashing into the Sun.

I'm going to make one final suggestion. Instead of wasting your time trying to write the next great world changing novel, take up sewing. I know you just laughed out load at that, but hear me out. In the future everything is disposable, even clothes. If you learn how to sew you can make outfits for your dog. Since women in your future will see marriage as an antiquated form of enslavement and for most people kids are too much trouble, you will have to save your love for a four legged descendant of wolves. And if you know how to sew you can make costumes for your fuzzy companion and post pictures of it on the aforementioned internet and all the adoring fans of your dog will fill the giant hole in your heart with money. If you don't listen to me on this, someone is going to suggest you sodomize yourself with your storybook. I'm not sure why anyone would suggest this, using it as a coaster for your drink seems so much more utilitarian.

A wrinkle in time allowed me to do this for you. I'm not trying to dash your dreams, just save you some heartache. I will leave you with a final thought. Times are dark in your life right now but, don't lose hope. One day you will meet someone very special and the true purpose of your place on this big messy planet will be revealed. Until then stay strong.

Your Future Self