The Return

“It’s a funny thing about coming home. Looks the same, smells the same, feels the same. You realize what has changed is you.” - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

A Letter To My Younger Self (On My Birthday):

I’ve often wondered what exactly I would say to you if, and when, we finally spoke. I have lived most of my days with a pit in my stomach, imagining how ashamed you would be of me, knowing I still haven’t figured out how to fulfill the promise we made on those steps that day, when we were 10, and the chaos raged around us again. I have felt like I failed you every time our future didn’t turn out as we hoped, in moments when the only hope we were allowed was a sliver at best. Or every time that my authentic expression ended up being everything that we swore we would never be. And most of all, just as we promised, I feel like I fail you every day that a ring doesn’t sit on my finger, proving that I, and we, are finally not the only thing we have ever truly known: alone.

This was until recently, when I saw a video on Instagram. Instagram, a place I ironically spend an embarrassing amount of time on, yet don’t feel the need to even explain to you because it doesn’t matter enough.

But in short, the video was a guy about my age (we’ll get into that later) who spoke with his younger self and found that all the shame he carried was quickly lifted in the context of the fact that he got to explain how cars drive themself now and how he had his own apartment.

Back to the cars, they don’t fly yet, but they do drive themselves. And there are robots. Soon there will be many, many more robots. It’s weird. Well, everything is weird, and also, like Instagram, none of it really matters when it comes to us.

Because most days, it feels like the world around us is increasingly strange, to help us remember that the only thing that matters is us and what little we can control.

I took a trip back home recently, or at least to all the places that you have, and will, call home. I drove my car all the way up from where I/we live in Texas. Which is the first of my apologies I don’t technically owe you, but I will still share: yes, we live in Texas. I know. I promise we’re okay. And no, it’s not forever. We've grown to really hate the feeling of sweat slowly dripping down our backs.

Anyways, I visited all of the places we lived. I even drove up Arnold Road. Do you know that when you get to the top of the street, all the houses have views of the entire valley behind them? You can see for miles. And we lived just down the road from those views every day.

I couldn’t believe it.

It was one of the many examples that reminded me that we never took the time to look up. Because we never felt safe enough to do so, but someday you will, and all that you see will make the journey worth it.

I promise.

I went to the Elementary School where you and Dad used to shoot hoops and stared out at the field that used to feel endless. I loved that place; I still do. It was one of the few places that we felt safe. I shot hoops for hours by myself, remembering the times Dad would stand on top of his Sedan to replace the net with a broom. He always said it was to make sure the kids who played there had a good net, but we both knew it was so his swishes could make the perfect sound. The first one always came with a signature prideful look in our direction.

As I wandered the playground, I remembered all the ways you used to play, like how your first-grade soccer team was silver and dominated every other team, even though you didn’t keep score. Well, you dominated everyone except Magenta. Don’t worry, we still hate that color because of that one game that no one kept score of and the result didn’t even matter. We will until we die. It makes sense to us, and that’s all that matters.

I also remembered the one year you became a double agent for the fifth grade team while sabotaging the 6th grade team from the inside out during the big annual Field Day Kickball Game. Their kindness in letting a fourth grader play with them quickly became their downfall.

We try not to use that skill as much anymore, gaining people’s trust and then backstabbing them when they least expect it, but I often sense you when I smile, knowing that I still could if I wanted to.

I’ve learned that half of being a grown-up is not reacting the way we used to, and then privately playing out in our minds what the “old version” of us would have done while thinking to ourselves, “they are lucky they didn’t know me back then.”

I can’t explain it. It just happens, and then you start saying phrases like that and meaning them with every fiber of your being. I think it makes us feel like we have control in a world that feels increasingly out of it. But I digress…

As I packed my car and drove away from our Elementary School, I realized what I am finally ready to tell you and why I waited this long to finally have this conversation.

I would do it all again.

I would choose my life, our life, and our family, exactly as it has been, over again.

100% of the time.

Not because I forget pieces of what you/we went through, but because, for the first time, I feel like I finally remember.

And yes, I know that sounds insane. Especially since at almost any age that I talk to you, you are surrounded by chaos, feel terror running through your body at all times, and question whether or not it’s worth it to even try to make it another day.

That was what struck me most coming home: it wasn’t that I would choose it again, but how fucking hard it was back then. And no one around us could get out of their own pain enough to see ours. It was isolating, maddening, and exhausting in a way we still don’t properly have words for.

There were so many beautiful moments, but it was also incredibly hard. The existence of one doesn’t outweigh or disqualify the other. And the older I get, the more I have no idea how you did it. How you survived it. And if I am honest, it adds to the pressure I feel each day to prove to you that it was worth it.

Even after all of the violence, we had something in us that wouldn’t allow us to not stand in the truth of who we were. And instead of relief, we walked on eggshells each day, because even those that were like us couldn’t allow themselves to be.

I never realized how much of us was chipped away every time others accepted us while being unable to accept the exact same thing in themselves.
I wish I could say that gets easier, but choosing an authentic life in a world that is built for performance will always be a hard road. You will question yourself at every turn and wonder if you’re doing it all wrong.

Just wait until you start looking back at previous versions of yourself that felt authentic, only to realize you were playing a character without even noticing. Which, in turn, means the version of yourself you are now will someday be seen that way, too.

Life is wild, my friend. You get kind of used to being the last to know things: even when it comes to your own self.

Especially when it comes to yourself.

The other thing that will never really change, at least not yet, is feeling like you don’t have a specific place that you belong.

It’s true.

You don’t.

And my friend, you won’t.

You will constantly feel like you can adapt to anywhere but never really fully fit anywhere. And that is because you learn along the way that there is more to you than just one aspect.

You are more than the narrow way the world around you sees and defines you.
You are so much more than the even narrower way you see and define yourself.

You will find home in places that aren’t physical structures but in a feeling inside that you come back to every time you swim in the ocean, play sports, dance freely, stand on stage telling funny stories, write in the most truthful way that you know how to, or out on the open road leaving the life you knew behind because you realized at a point that the life you had built didn’t really feel like living.

So here is the truth. Today is our birthday. We are 39 years old.

Our birthday is a day whose meaning has changed for us over the years. At times we were excited to be celebrated, and other years we felt just lucky to have survived to see a new year. We have used our birthday as an excuse to see the people we love most, turn the page in our own personal evolution, and give ourselves a little extra permission each year.

Now, no matter how great the day is, our birthday comes with a deep sadness for the people you have lost and the “I love you’s” you won’t hear.

You come to realize that our birthday was never about the parties or the gifts; it was the one day a year that it felt okay to let people love you. And when those people are gone, you miss their love most. Each one felt specific and unique. Like it was made just for you, because, in a sense, it was.

So instead of trying to fix our sadness, we just try to let ourselves feel it, because it is the only way to say “I love you” back.

Right now, we are standing on stage reading this letter I wrote to you in front of a bunch of people. Most of whom are strangers who feel simultaneously familiar in a way that is settling to us. People who look at the world with an openness and curiosity that somehow has become rare in the future. They make art. They share dreams. And they let us do the one thing we finally give ourselves permission to do: be ourselves, just as we are.

Plus, they laugh at our silly comments and listen when we boss them around.

Adulthood rocks.

We will also be sending this out to our newsletter subscribers. The future is all about having followers or subscribers, and following others. It’s like an endless game of “Follow the Leader,” but no one ever really leads. And each day it feels like the people that are supposed to be leading know even less than the rest of us.

Like I said, the future is weird.

Back to our newsletter, we have over 100 subscribers. Which, for a time, was a dream to have that many, and then once it happened, it suddenly didn’t feel like a lot compared to everyone else.

We even have a few who have paid us monthly to write to them, even though we haven’t done so since before our last birthday. Because every time we felt like writing, we felt bad about how much time had passed since we last wrote something, and it made us stop again.

And still, those people have paid us without judgment or shame, because those are the kinds of people that surround us these days.

I could tell you more about the people in our lives, but I don’t want to spoil anything ahead, so I will simply tell you that the feeling of being ourselves freely and safely becomes our guiding light. You will notice it whenever you are in the presence of someone who accepts you exactly as you are and doesn’t carry expectations or “precious outcomes” for who they need you to be.

It is how we judge friendships, intimate relationships, and places, because it is no longer a figment of our imagination but an experience we get to live every single day. But only if we let ourselves.

Letting other people love you is oddly not easy, even still, but what it feels like to be loved feels less complicated than the way you know it to be now, and that is one of the greatest gifts of our life.

At some point in our journey, I became a man. The very thing we never thought we would live long enough to see. And if I am honest, it just kind of happened before I even realized it. Even though the bald head (sorry) and the fact that my body no longer has visible abs (double sorry) do point to the fact that we are of a certain age.

And as a man, after having repeated dreams that left me questioning everything in my life, I drove home to get you. To collect the pieces of you I left behind. The ones I couldn’t hold without feeling the weight of all they carried. Because somewhere along the way, the scarier view wasn’t the one directly in front of me; it became the one I saw when I looked back.

But now we no longer have to look back, at least if we don’t want to. We get to carry the memories and the stories we choose, and only those. Our past, and your present, no longer mark who we are as a person or what we are capable of. They just are. And instead of pressuring myself to fulfill promises we made while trying desperately to survive a present that was filled with anything but safety, I intend to do the one thing it never really felt like we would get to do: Live.

And what exactly that means is something I think we are going to find out together. Judging by the fact that this is the second birthday post I have written in my newsletter alone promising to “live”, it feels like the theme of actually living our lives is something we will circle around for a long time.

To the point where I wonder if my autobiography should actually be called, “Wait, Guys, Am I Living Yet?”

So before I go, let me make sure to include a few more things that I know I have never said.

I carry you with me always, and not just to shame myself for all that I haven’t become yet.
When I am scared, I look to you because you are the strongest person I know.
When I am brave, I look to you because you gave me the foundations of my courage.
And when I feel peace, I look to you because you, and we, have earned the right to no longer have to be strong.

The future may be weird, but the best blessing it contains is that we get to just be us, exactly as we are meant to.

And in case you needed a reminder: you were and will never be alone.

Even when the world takes away those you love most. Even when your heart is broken after finally feeling what love actually feels like. Even when you tremble in the dark and whisper prayers to a God you aren’t even sure if you believe in.

I hear those prayers. I remember them. And I intend to honor them for as long as I have breath in my lungs.

Today, and every day.

Happy Birthday.
I love you.
And thank you.