Serendipitwaddle - Tania Katherine

There was a Lifehacker article a little while back asking the following question: 

“What Advice Would You Give To Your 18-Year Old Self?” 

And I’ve been thinking about this for a good amount of time. I’d primarily probably tell myself to not make enemies. My sophomore/junior year of college, I made a lot of enemies in two batches: first semester & second semester. In the first semester, I alienated my two roommates in a whole huge, too-many-people situation that each and every one of us let get out of control. I should have been talking to the people involved more, not everyone else. They should have been doing the same. The whole lot of us took something very personal and made it about as public as possible. And I have no idea why.  We all let he-said, she-said explode and become paramount to the point no one could trust anyone. 

Second semester…well, I’m not entirely sure what happened but I lost at least three friends and I’m sure more. One of them was still a remnant of first semester and I should have used more foresight in that. Another, I’m not quite sure what I did but apparently it was significant enough to never talk to me again. The third…well, I’m still somewhat sad in retrospect about that one. I’m not sure what happened but I’m pretty sure it was related to a boy that I really couldn’t have cared less about but had fun pretending I did. In all three situations, a little honesty and just blunt communication on all our parts might have been able to avoid something.

I look back sometimes and wonder how those people are. I know that two of the five are married and really, I’m pretty happy for them. I hope at some point when they have kids (if they haven’t already), that they’re as awesome parents as I think they will be.  I hope one the third found her place - somewhere. I hope the forth and fifth found happiness. I hope both found great men or careers or passions greater than they ever thought they deserved. I especially hope the last found everything she never thought she deserved because she really did. Ever step of the way. And never gave herself any thought to that. I think of all the bridges I helped burn, I miss that one the most. 

So, after all these paragraphs…I would tell me 18-year-old-self to slow down. Talk. Not to whoever I feel like but to who the situation required conversation with. I felt so mature then but never had the balls to talk to people as needed. Stop drinking because that caused a lot of not talking and even more lying. I just said what I wanted whenever I wanted and more often than not it wasn’t the truth. I’d tell my 18-year-old-self to breathe, it’ll be okay. All those demons in the middle of the night die - or at least stop talking. 

And I’d tell her to try and save those friendships. Because she’ll think about them sometimes and really, really, really wish she was an adult back then.