Note to Self

[Notes to Myself - To be Received at Age 21, April 2005]

That pamphlet on the PeaceCorps you have sitting on your desk? It doesn't go away. You'll lose it or toss it or hand it off to somebody else but it never actually goes away. You can fill a binder with AmeriCorps paperwork and it still doesn't go away. The LLBean employee you stopped to inquire about backpacking with a petite frame? Don't feel guilty for taking up her time. You'll think of her advice for years and years and wonder if perhaps that dream would be a reality already if you actually purchased that backpack. The unearthed plan doesn't go away either. In fact, it takes flight in your body, zipping from your heart to your head to your lungs. You'll take the deepest breaths when it is what pumps your lungs in and out. The midnight sprint you made across campus to catch him, to tell him you love him, the bodies you ran past without caring about their faces or your face, damp with tears of both yes and no, and maybe you've never felt this certain and this unsure in your entire life? That is what every real, true yes in your entire life feels like. Every other yes will become a no over time. The sustaining, the life sustaining, yeses move you. They physically move you. Across campus, down to your knees, up the city avenues - quickly and forcefully and urgently and without the need for thought. Without the need for thought. The others become others - bodies not to crash into. They can't stop you, they can't encourage you, because you don't see them, you don't see their thoughts on their faces, you don't hear their opinions, all you feel is forward movement, almost not fast enough. When certainty and uncertainty mix together, cursing through your veins, you think it might kill you on the spot. As though battery acid has replaced blood and you might actually be a Kerouac star - "burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars." And in those moments there is nothing better than exploding like a spider across the night sky.

These true yeses don't go away.  Other true yeses arrive.  They cannot be ignored.  They feed your lungs, your heart, your soul.   Always.
Plan accordingly. They always arrive. They always arrive on time. Make room for them. Wait for them. Build your life on them. Trust them.