BPJ Inc: Voice to the past

When I was 15 my English teacher told us to write a letter to our 25 year old selves. Nothing I wrote about then has come to pass and I'm both glad and disappointed. Yesterday, I was shown some amazing letters from guys to their younger selves, and I decided to write one of my own.


Dear Johanna,

Right now you're 15 years old and you're still wondering if you'll ever get out of the small town you're living in. No, living isn't really the right word. You're floating along, going through the motions of breakfast-school-homework-TV-sleep repeat.

Your dreams are huge, looking to the horizon, towards the drama institutes of Stockholm and Gothenburg. You have carried the dream of acting for eight years now, and you are still bitter that you chose a science major instead of embracing the fact that you got accepted to the drama major for high school. You are drawing dragons in your notebooks, littering the pages with quotes about death, life, strength, loneliness, and friendship. The flickering light fixtures in the class room are just a backdrop, as are the dish soap smelling desks and the teacher you stopped listening to about five minutes into the class. 

Life will not turn out the way you imagine.

You dreamed about playing on the grand stages of the world, making a living from acting and singing., mediocre singing voice be damned.
You longed to run away, to disappear, and to see what the rest of the world has to offer.
You longed to snuggle up next to someone, to belong to someone, and to feel safe. You craved connection with others, but felt too stupid, too different, and too jaded to bother.

Being 15 years old, you listen to the people in your class talk about hot guys and hot girls. You have just sat through the fourth sex ed class in as many years, and you are just as confused about why people bother with it as always.

But you know what? Life gets so much better.
Sure, in seven months you'll start dating your first boyfriend. You'll get engaged to him, even though he is an abusive ass, and it will be through the help of others you get free.
Ex-boyfriend number two will be another moron.
You will fall in love with people all across the gender spectrum, and you'll be even more confused.

But! When you are 20 years old, you'll meet Boy. He will help you find your bearing. Your friend/sibling Jackson will help you find out more about your sexuality. Your friend/sister Sakuya will teach you how to trust again.

As I write this letter to you, my younger self, I am sitting in my bed, looking at the small park outside my window, in an area of Dublin called Swords. I married Boy in Sep 2014 after 8.5 years of dating.

I am not an actress. I am a writer.

I got away from the pain and the longing and the loneliness. I found my footing, and while my feet hurt from landing on them so many times, and my knees ache from getting up, I survived. We survived, and life is pretty damn amazing.

Yours sincerely,
                          Johey