Time Keeps on Slippin’

Dear self,

You are going to do many great things and possibly more embarrassing things. Unfortunately, like many others, the things you choose not to do will lead to the greatest regret.

I could tell you how to avoid looking foolish, narcissistic or arrogant in various instances, but I don't have much time, so I'll leave you with one bit of advice.

Spend more time with the people you value, before they are gone. You will not get that time back. Other career opportunities will arise, days of leisure time to bask in the sun and get a new high score will come again, but they will not. Specifically your late future father-in-law and your grandmother. I can confirm you will get his blessing to take your future wife's hand in marriage, but for choices somewhat your own, you never got to know him or spend the time with him you should have before that bulbous beast in his head took his mental function and his life shortly after. Now I must live my life day in and out wondering how much closer we could have been before he was prematurely taken from his daughters, his family, and myself.

Same goes for your grandmother. No, she isn't gone yet, but a pandemic has come up in recent times making seeing her...complicated. She only lives an hour away and after losing your grandfather to alzheimers', she could use someone other than your dimwitted uncle or your cynical mother to spend time with. If you don't head this warning, you'll have gone a year without seeing her in person, wondering if she is as well as she claims to be on the phone, when she can actually hear the ringtone going off.

Other than that, don't fall out of your love for cartooning, music and writing. It will save you from episodes of depression and anxiety as you sit in front of the T.V. hoping to muster the emotional energy tomorrow to get back into your passions. Also, stop itching your nose so much as a tick...That's all I have time for now. Don't just think about the things I've told you, act on them.