A letter from your daughter

Do you remember how it felt to be young? When every experience was new and there were impressions to take in where ever you went. You felt like you could do anything in the world but at the same time you were terrified what the future would bring. You thought you were grown-up but there was nothing else you wanted, when you were sad, than to get a long and loving hug from your mother. I bet you can’t recall those feelings because once you get older you close that chapter in your life and decides to put that book away, all the way behind the books you’ve read before, in that dusty, old bookshelf you have decided to call past. It might seem like the past to you but it is what made you into the person you are today.

You might think, who am I to tell. I am just a girl with no life experience at all. Just someone that thinks she knows what she is talking about and you know what, you might be right but at least I remember how it feels like being young. If you think it is as amazing as you wish to recall your youth, you’re wrong. I am not saying that your youth wasn’t great but when you’re settled down and know what the future looks like there is no point for you to remember all those sleepless nights. The nights when your brain was filled with thoughts about how the next day will be and every minute passing it gets fuller and fuller until your head feels like it will explode in to 1000 pieces. It won’t explode, I know that but I still wonder when the bomb in my head will activate and explode. The same way as a child knows that santa and the tooth fairy don’t exist but she still chooses to believe in them.

For me it’s not about believing that it actually won’t happen, it’s the fact that I have to lie there in the dark, with no one to talk to that will understand what I’m feeling right now. I know I have parents and friends that are there for me but they can’t understand the fear I have in my head. There are many words in my vocabulary but not even all of them put together will explain the thoughts running through my head. They fill up every corner of me and, as much as you think you understand, my brain speaks a language you didn’t teach me. It’s a language not even I can understand and that is what terrifies me even more. While I am lying sleepless in a grey, dark room without no light to see, my brain is making plans that I hope are bright and clear but I won’t know until I get to the future.

But when you’re growing up it’s not just your brain that decides what the future brings, maybe that is why worrying is a waste of time, but also the things around you. There are things I can’t control. When I finish school, university and maybe even try to get a job, who is deciding if there will be a place for me? How come I can work really hard to get to the point I think I want to reach but during the way I might change my mind and want something else. It feels like I’ve been running a marathon but when I come to the finish line I realise I am in the wrong city. It doesn’t matter how quickly you ran the race or that I even got to the end because it was all wrong from the beginning but no one was there to tell me. Sometimes I wonder why we all have to try things to figure out that it is wrong, why can’t the answers just be there like the key to the maths questions where in the back of the book in primary school.

As an adult, you won’t remember these fears. You have passed it already and me worrying about the future is unnecessary according to you. Being young for you means being alive, having all the chances in the world. The world is like an open book and I am writing the chapters. But can you tell me, if the world is like an open book, why have you closed yours a started a new one? Aren’t you suppose to write more than one chapter? I am not saying I want you to live in the past but sometimes maybe you should try to blow the dust away and try to recall the feelings you had when you were my age. I am not worried about that I won’t have a future but I am scared that it might not look the way I think it will or even terrified that I don’t even have an idea how it will look like.

You can be supportive and tell me that everything will be alright. It might comfort me at the moment but what tomorrow looks like is new to me and no one can tell me what will happen. Tomorrow will bring the answers but for me those answers are too far away right now. I have my whole future infront of me at the same time as I am carrying my past with me whilst you have your presence you live, a future ahead and a past you chose to hide from me. A past you put away so you can deactivate the bomb in your head and sleep at night. A lock to make sure no one breaks in and brings out the worries you had when you where my age, when you were young. Will you let me read your book? Can you imagine all my new experiences? Can you be young again, just once more, just for me?

My love

Your daughter