Care Package to a Fifteen-Year-Old Me

If you could send a care package including one book, one CD and one DVD to yourself at age fifteen, what would it contain? My friend Ned posed this question on his blog, where for the past few weeks he’s been running various “projects.” While I had fun completing his albums and singles projects, I wasn’t sure if I was going to participate in this week’s topic.

Fifteen is tough for almost everyone. For me, it was hellish. First my best friend moved away and then my dad died unexpectedly. Within three months, my entire emotional well-being collapsed. Whenever I think back to myself at fifteen, I just think, “You poor thing.” Life was rough.

With that past, I didn’t know if writing a letter to myself at fifteen would be the best idea. Then I thought, why not? And sat down to compose the letter. Guess what? It was fun! It wasn’t the same “fun” as I’d had compiling my favorite music but it was fun. In fact, I’d recommend that you give it a try.

I’d apologize for this blog entry being a little navel-gazing but aren’t most blogs navel-gazing? Isn’t that why we read them?

If you are just here for the recipes, don’t worry, I’ll be back to posting recipes on Monday. For now, a letter to my fifteen year old self.

Book
Easy Gluten-Free Baking by Elizabeth Barbone

I’ve spent a great deal of time thinking about which book I want to send to you. Right now, you are mired in pain and grief and loss. Trust me when I tell you that you will find the right words. The books that you need will find you and they will mark you. Your love affair with language will save you a thousand times over.

The book in this care package is different. There are no words in it to assuage your tender soul. Pull it out. See that cover? It has your name on it. That’s right: you wrote it.  Remember those kids who used to make fun of you because of your allergies? Well, you’ll spend your career making the lives of other kids with food issues easier. It’s pretty cool.

Soon you will find Anna Quindlan—and you will love her. You’ll read these words that Anna wrote, “Seeing my name in black and white at the top of a good story, suddenly it wasn’t an ugly dog [name] anymore.” And, let me tell you, those words are true! However, you didn’t write your book to feed your ego. Trust me on this. You wrote your book because you believed right down to your toes that people on a restricted diet (like you!) deserve food that tastes great. Turns out, you are really good at developing recipes without gluten.

The journey you’ll embark on while writing your first book will change the way you see the world and yourself. (Did you catch that? Your first book. There will be more than one but I can’t tell you too much.) At first, people will not “get” what you are trying to do. You and the book will face LOTS of rejection. A few agents and publishers will turn you down. One will say, “I just don’t think that many people are interested in eating gluten-free.” She will be wrong. You will believe in yourself and your work. At first you will self-publish your book. This will disappoint you. Don’t let it. Your self-published book will do so well that you will sell it to a publisher who is amazing. (By the way, the first time you go to NYC to have a meeting with your publisher bring boots. Trust me on this.)

Easy Gluten-Free Baking is filled with recipes and words that you created. Not only will these words shape your life, they will affect the lives of strangers. This will never, ever stop amazing you.

You have a long journey from where you are now to where you are going. I have good news and I have bad news. The good news? Look at that book again. That’s the good news. The bad news? Life will get harder. It will hurt in ways you can’t even begin to imagine. Dad’s death? That’s just the beginning. Before you are twenty you will know, intimately, pain and betrayal and hurt that would curl the hair of most adults. But you will get through it.

By the way, writing a book isn’t the end. It’s a beginning. But I can’t tell you too much. Why spoil all the fun?

CD
Jim Gaffigan Beyond the Pale

Included in this care package was to be a book, a CD and a DVD. I’m sure I was supposed to include a music CD. Oh, well. I don’t care. (One of the great things about growing up is that you care very, very little about “rules” that don’t really matter. If that isn’t freedom, I don’t know what is.)

I tried really hard to remember the music you listened to at fifteen and, honestly, I couldn’t. The only thing I remembered about your music was how you’d listen to a walkman on the bus ride to school with your face pressed up to the cold glass of the window. I hadn’t thought about that in years. And then, then, I remembered that most of the time you’d be crying. That’s okay. I know there are lots of people trying to tell you what grieving should look like. The picture of grief they hand you is “be seen and not heard.”  Do you know why they are doing this? They’re uncomfortable. I know now that people have a tough time being present to the emotional pain of others.  That’s why they all neglect to mention that it is okay to be sad; it’s okay to cry. In fact, one idiot is going to tell you to “keep your chin up and don’t cry.” Trust me, that is one of the dumbest pieces of advice you will get.  Ever.

You have music and you have tears. What you don’t have much of is laughter. If anyone needs a laugh, it’s you. Jim Gaffigan isn’t the edgiest comedian that you’ll eventually come to enjoy.  Nope.  He’s just funny. He jokes about cake and silly holiday traditions and, of all things, hot pockets. The reason I’m including Beyond the Pale is to remind you that the very act of living is sort of funny. It might not feel that way now, but it’s true.  And if you can’t laugh at cake, what can you laugh at?

Movie
About A Boy

This movie squeezes my heart each time I watch it. I hope you’ll like it. I don’t know what you’ll see in this movie at fifteen. I think I was thirty when I first watched it. By thirty, the character of Will grabbed me. He’s bought into a way of living he calls “Island Living.” Since, even at fifteen, you are sort of a loner, I am sure you will get the appeal of “Island Living.”

The reason I’m sending you this is because of the movie’s ending. Pay close attention to it. (It differs from the book. By the way, read the book, okay?)  Both Will and Marcus have forged a community of friends. When you feel yourself retreating in solitude just remember that it’s okay to be an island. Yet as Will says at the end, some islands are connected under the surface by chains. By my age you’ve done a good job at creating “island chains” of friends but, perhaps, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to start a little earlier.