Prompt #21 is to write a letter to the 10-year-old me. I've decided to try to minimize the autobiography on this blog, but I really can't avoid it here.
Dear Timmy,
People are going to stop calling you that in a few years. You'll get a job at Wendy's, they're going to be in a hurry to make your name badge, it'll say "TIM", and you'll start going by that. (As an aside, one of these days you're going to look at the badge in a mirror and see that it says "MIT". You'll think it's an omen of your future college. It's not.)
So, here's the thing. Things are going to get worse. You really don't know how bad it's going to get. I think it might be good for you to be ready for that.
Things are also going to get better. And they'll get worse, and they'll get better. And sometimes, they'll be worse at some things, and better at others. (Actually, that last thing is most of the time.)
You know, most of the time, I think people who want to go back in time want to go back to when they were ten. Politicians who look to the "good old days" are usually talking about the time they were ten.
But that's not how God made the world. There's no perfect time in the past when everything was great. Each year brings sunshine and rain, but God is at work in the world. You're going to be part of that, not because you're all that special, but because God is.
Keep your eyes open. There's a story about a famous violinist who played a concert in a subway station to see if people would notice. Very few did. Be one of those few.
There are at least a million ways to laugh. Learn as many of them as you can.
Talk only after you listen. Supply and demand works here. The world has a lot more talkers than listeners.
Forgive before you forget.
And most importantly: you're stronger than you think.
Peace.
Tim
PS: Give Mom and Dad and Pardner and Nana a hug. You'll want to do that as often as you can.
Copyright 2012. Timothy H. Ruppel. All rights reserved.
This work by Timothy H. Ruppel is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
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