Dear Five-Year-Old Me

Dear five-year-old me,

you are in kindergarten right now.

You are going to meet your absolute best friend in just a little while -

or maybe you already have.

Either way, remember to be kind to her.

She is different from you, so much different, but you click with her like a perfectly made puzzle piece. She will lead to one of your future best friends,

and keep you steady throughout elementary school.

Next year, just barely past this friend's birthday,

COVID-19 will start.

A worldwide pandemic, sweeping terror and sickness across the globe,

forcing schools to close, people to lock their doors, and cloth masks to appear on every single face.

You will be scared and lonely,

not understanding why your school is shuttered and locked

nor why you're not allowed to see your friends

anywhere except tiny boxes on a computer screen.

But during the times

lying on the floor of your room

bored out of your mind,

you will discover something that will change your life forever.

You don't know this yet,

but you are a writer.

Born from stardust, your veins running with the ink of long-dead writer's quills and your imagination stretching to the farthest reaches of the universe.

See how you devour books? How you write faster and better than all of your classmates? How they look at you askance, like you're some sort of alien?

Don't believe them. You're just a writer.

So, five-year-old me,

when you get to be ten-year-old me,

I will be fifteen

and probably writing you another letter.