Dear Future: Remember to Be Awesome

This post isn't written to Eoin, it's written to me, Serp, in the future when I look back over my blog, with someone else or alone. Hi, Serp.

I've been doing pretty sweet, despite a long stretch of repeatedly very little sleep. Today, I found myself listening to a very cheerful song I like on repeat, and went a surprising length of time without getting sick of it. Instead, I built a happy fantasy around the song. And like last week, I decided that instead of chiding myself for my fantasy and the expression of something I cared about but might never achieve... I would see where I could follow it. In this case, I followed it into the big empty football field near my house where I could expect other people not to hear me talking to myself, imagining something delicious, and deliciously plausible, if not necessarily likely.

I paced, and thought, and recited, arranging the words of a speech. And then I turned back to the song and practiced singing it, until I got through the whole song once or twice, along with the short speech. I came back home, and wrote the speech down.

Serp, I don't know whether you made it back to Athlone or wound up somewhere else. I don't know whether Eoin is with you, or whether he ever will be. But no matter where you are, or who you're near, remember how delicious that idea was. Go back and reread it, if it helps. You have the capacity to dream beautiful dreams. And I know that someday, if you keep trying, you will be able to make some of them a reality.

Maybe the plot I schemed up today doesn't work for you where you are now. Maybe you've seen a flaw in it that I don't see. If this particular one never happens, that's alright. You can think up something else. Something better. Just... remember that it's not a waste of time to dream beautiful dreams. It's not. It gives you ideas about how to get to them. You just have to be willing to look at them in the right way. You need a little hope for a brighter day. A little love to find the way.

And remember the vlogbrothers. Remember ToadyOne. Remember Elon Musk and Eliezer's Harry and Dave Moreland and all the other people who have inspired you. Remember that you don't need to be afraid of them. Follow their lead. Don't Forget To Be Awesome.