If you could say one thing to your past self, (you get to choose when) what would it be?
Mine is:
(Age 10)
“Keep going, kiddo. It will get worse but then it will get better, I promise. We make friends that really care for us and we actually learn to crochet which is pretty cool, we even do a Christmas fair and make a lot of money.
One last thing before I go, say hi to Jake for me. We don’t see him anymore after this year so at least tell him how you feel. Remember kiddo, life has highs and lows that are out of your control. But what you can control is how you respond”
I had a childhood friend and he liked me and I liked him (he didn’t know I liked him but he made his side PRETTY obvious. We fell out of contact after I moved so we don’t talk anymore. Being with him was some of my time best spent.
To myself (10 years) and others who are this age.
Keep on fighting you lose friends, family, pets and so much more. School will become harder but keep on fighting cause you will find that one friend that you can’t miss in your life. Where you can be yourself and don’t need to pretend that you like her. Cause she is not like all the other people. Your parent will be mad at you for no reason but don’t take it serious cause they just want to protect you from things.
Take care and keep on fighting
Age 16 (2020, lol)
Girl, don’t waste your tears on him. If he cares so little as to abandon you know, then he never truly was your best friend, now was he? You’ve seen this coming for a few years now, you just tried to deny it. You tried to be his friend, but he never really tried to be yours.
And yeah, you’re gonna have major trust issues from this. But you can’t hide from people and sequester yourself for three years (I did) just to try and keep from getting hurt. You will just break yourself into even smaller pieces doing that, until you fade away.
So don’t spend a year crying and wondering what you did wrong. This year has sucked enough. You need to take your life back and have fun before you become a stupid adult and can’t anymore.
To myself 1-2 yrs ago:
Keep going. You make some really close friends. Like the typa friends you can tell anything, absolutely ANYTHING. And inpsiration to keep crocheting: You will turn a $50 gift card to a yarn shop into $1400 in LESS THAN A YEAR!
And don’t be so scared. Of everything. Keep thinking. Keep laughing. Keep having those great conversations wiht your uncle.
And be more self-confident. Body-shaming never gets you anywhere.
My family moved almost yearly, it seemed, until I was 8, then we stayed in Auburn Alabama for about 3.5 years. I started 5th grade there, went to Illinois to stay with our grandparents while came to Washington state for 3 months to train for wildlife management. Then we moved from Illinois to Pullman WA, the home of WSU Cougars. Three states and 3 schools all in one grade! Boy did that year suck! It was our only interrupted year. We were pretty good at changing schools though. When dad had gone to Auburn University for his second degree, he took a speed reading class and took us kids with him. So my older brother and I learned speed reading as we were expanding our vocabularies. We read well beyond our age group so yet another reason we didn’t really fit in.
As for what I would tell my younger self, at 10 I would say “Valori look at grandma Verlee’s hands and remember how furiously she’s left handed! Either use your left hand or figure that out in your head now so you don’t miss out on years of crocheting!” Haha! This really happened. I did start crocheting in my teens, but didn’t even realize about the left handedness until some time in my 30s! Crazy, right? Well, since 3/4 of my family are left handed I just didn’t notice.
Hugs, Valori​
