A Ten Year Span

Five Years by Corbett Barr
There will be an agreement in whatever variety of actions, so they be each honest and natural in their hour. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

What would you say to the person you were five years ago? What will you say to the person you’ll be in five years?
(Author: Corbett Barr)

At the end of my senior year of high school, one of my teachers gave us the most intriguing assignment of the year: Write a letter to yourself in five years.  The twist: in five years she would mail these letters to us.  I remember thinking how important that letter would be and how it might hold secrets and prophecies that would blow my five-years-older mind.  In June of 2007 my Dad called me to say I'd gotten a letter at his house addressed to me in my own handwriting.  I eagerly anticipated getting my hands on the envelope and the contents inside.

In the intervening years I'd forgotten what was in the letter.  As I read through the two pages of neat handwriting (where did that come from?) I smiled warmly at five-years-younger me.  My concerns were so much different then, my world so much smaller.  Most of my letter consisted of questions: Are you still at Camp?  Did you major in Psychology after all?  It's no surprise that I wrote of uncertainty at a time when so much was up in the air: Would friends disappear as we went off to college?  Would my serious relationship last through the summer and into the new year at two different schools?  Looking back these questions were born of graduation and of something bigger:  September 11th was 8 months old at that point.  There were so many questions then and so few answers.  Teachers and my parents kept saying we would never forget that day just as they never forgot JFK's assassination or the Challenger explosion.  I remember thinking they were probably right then but now, almost ten years later, I see how right they were.

So, to five-years-younger me, here is what I have to say:

1)  Be REALLY good to that girl you're dating.  Don't ask me why.
2)  Cherish the next few years at Camp.  Again, don't ask why.
3)  Make a few extra trips to the mountains to see your grandmother.
4)  Keep up the good work. You're doing really well.

To five-years-older me:

1)  How's the little one?
2)  When's the next writing project going to be finished?
3)  How was the trip to Oregon?
4)  Keep up the good work.  You're doing really well.

Ryan