Sincerely, Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

Just remembered this. Thanksgiving 2008. Remind mom to make mashed potatoes. Somehow she forgets, much to the dismay of all. But mostly you. Also, even more pumpkin pie.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

For the past year or so I’ve had an interesting relationship with spiders. Mostly related to their webs. And running into them. The few people who hang out with me almost certainly heard complaints over the course of at least 3 months, that I was running into a spider web every day. This isn’t an exaggeration. Every day. At least once. In my neighborhood. Near my old office. Sometimes I’d have gotten through almost an entire day, then walking from my car to my apartment at 10pm… bam. Spider web. So frequent was it, that I contemplated keeping a journal to record the time and place of each webby encounter and whatever vengeful thoughts might cross my mind. (I abandoned this idea. So far as I’m willing to admit anyway.)

But the strangest place by far that I’ve repeatedly run into spider webs has been in my car. That’s right. IN my car. Now thinking about it, I can’t remember a time when there hasn’t been some presence of a spider in my car. Ever since I got the car in high school there have been times when I’d be driving and the sun would catch the windshield just right, revealing what looked like tiny scratches. Reaching forward to touch them would reveal they were actually thin strands of web. Now, I’m no spider expert. I dare say I actually know quite little about them, other than that they eat flies and hobbits, and occassionally bite people and give them awesome super powers. But I’d be willing to guess that spiders don’t have a very long natural lifespan. Assuming this is true, I’d also then have to assume that if I’ve been getting spiderwebs in my car for the past 6ish years, they probably did not all come from the same spider. Meaning either that the 1998 red Honda CRV is a prime target for frequent spider attack, or there is a nest somewhere in my car. If there is a nest, first that is kind of awesome in a “hey I didn’t know that was possible” kind of way. But, it is also very gross in a “wait you mean I’ve been blowing hot dead spider air on my face during the winter time?” kind of way.

So beware the spiders, Past Scott. I’ll do the best I can about generations of spider offspring on my end, but if you could wipe out the first car spider (spider prime, as I’ve come to call him), that’d be huge. Your future face would owe you a huge, web free debt.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

I’m better than you in pretty much every way.  I’m smarter, stronger, faster, taller, slightly less caffeine dependent, and generally more well respected than you’ll ever be.  Until you are me.  Which eventually, you will be.  So you’ve got that to look forward to.

But there is one thing that you do have on me, which I’ve had occasion recently to discover and miss.  You, my friend, can stay up until 2, 3, even 4am no sweat.  Heck, you do it by accident.  You’re all like, “What?  It’s 4am?  Shoot.  I did it again.  I guess I’ll go to bed… after I find a save point… in the next level.”  But me, I’m all like, “Dude… it’s midnight?  I’m spent.  Zzz.”  Most of the time I’m okay with that.  Get to bed early, wake up au naturale at 7 or 8am.  Brew a fresh cup of coffee and look forward to having the whole day ahead.  I never thought I’d be a morning person, but it’s happened, I’ve accepted it, and I’m getting to be pretty happy about it.  I think the morning person has always been inside me somewhere.  Probably inside you too, but you’re too busy staying up all night to admit it.

Over the past few days, this whole midnight sleepy/morning wakey deal has been kind of a pain in the nards.  I’ve recently found employment at a totally awesome company, which for fear of my corporate overlords, shall remain nameless.  At said company I was asked to work a night shift.  Twice.  Consecutively.  Back to back.  In a row.  I did it, and it was kind of fun, but also kind of terrible, but I also had a pretty good time, but also lost a little bit of sanity, possibly for good.

The real trouble began however, when I set out to prep myself for this double overnight event.  The goal was to begin adjusting my internal clock on the night BEFORE the first overnight, so that when I actually had to work I’d have a much easier time with it.  The plan was simple, all I had to do was stay up until around 4am, and then sleep until around noon.  I know, I know.  You are probably scoffing at this.  “Stay up until 4am?  Please!  I could do that in my sleep.”  And I thought I could too.  So I eagerly jumped back into the old bad habits that I could never kick through high school and college.  I ate junk food.  I watched TV.  I played video games.  I watched TV on my computer instead of on the TV.  Then I thought in Olde English, “What beeth the time?  Surely the target hour approacheth.  I feeleth so tiredeth!”  But alas, twas only 12:45.  Fail.

I’m sorry, Past Scott.  I guess this letter offers no real insight or advice.  Only a story of slight to moderate frustration.  But perhaps you may view this experience as a puzzle to solve.  Perhaps you may be able to figure out how to become the totally kickass dude that you read before you, but still retain the ability to rock and roll through the wee hours of the night without passing out in night-owl failure.  Or maybe you’ll just stay up all night partying after you read this and go get some scar that I’ll have to live with forever, just to spite me.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

It’s come to my attention that I really love writing, but at the same time I really hate writing.  As a writer, the coexistence of these two facts is pretty maddening.  Being incapable of accepting responsibility for myself or my actions, I’m going to do the next best thing.  I’m going to blame you.  It’s the perfect solution.  I get to shift the blame, but keep the self-loathing.  Don’t think that’s fair?  Well tough.  If it’s not fair then that’s your fault too.

But don’t fret.  I’m being me so that you don’t have to be.  So, let’s try a little experiment.  It’s a bit of simple classical conditioning.  Don’t know what that is yet?  Make sure you pay attention in GPSYC 101 then.  The guy who teaches that class is gonna seem like a crazy person, but he’s not.  He almost chopped off his own leg with an axe by accident one time!  How not-crazy is that?

Classical conditioning is your basic pavlov’s dog-type stuff.  Ring the bell, get a treat.  So as it relates to you, when you sit down to write, eat a piece of candy.  Work up an outline – eat a piece of candy.  Finish a paragraph or a page of dialogue – eat a piece of candy.  Time to do some editing?  Sounds like it’s also time to eat a piece of candy.  This way you’ll condition yourself to think writing is delicious, and by the time you are me, every time you sit down to write you’ll be filled with good, sugary, candy-like vibes.  I’m pretty sure that’s how it’ll work anyway.  Worst case scenario, you’ll never be able to write another word without a piece of candy in your mouth.  But frankly, that’s a risk I’m willing to take.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

I’ve recently made an enormous life-changing discovery, but I fear I may be too late.  That is, too late to tell anyone about it, because anyone who cares probably already knows.  But for you there is hope.  For you, there may still be time.

The discovery is like a string that runs through all the internet and grabs a free sample of nearly any webpage.  In fact, that is why it is called RSS – Rockin’ Sampler String.  The string wraps itself around pieces of news, or “News-Its” from only the places you tell it to, and completely replaces the need to check a whole slew of sites around the web to get the latest information you want.  Instead you only need to look at Google Reader (I know what you’re thinking.  ‘Google?  Isn’t that the searching dealy?’  Yes, but after annihilating all competition in the Search Engine Wars, Google slowly begins taking over the world.  In a good way though.  It’s complicated.  But you might as well stop using Web Crawler now, as that one’s going down like the squishy spider it is).  Google Reader is like a magic, customizable newspaper that is always updating itself, only has the front page, comics and sports sections, and never makes you deal with those annoying “MONKEYS cont’d on page B12” messages.  RSS comes in what are called “feeds”, because the Google Reader needs to constantly be feeding on the News-Its.  Too few and it will command you in terrifying bold typeface, “ADD MORE FEEDS.”  But be careful, too many and you’ll get stuck in New Item Hell.

Now go.  Use this knowledge for good and spread it wide to all who will listen.  I can’t stress how important it is that people know that this information came from you.  Because if they do, then they’ll think you are really super cool.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

I have a variation on “the grass is always greener” that goes a little more like “you know, I’m pretty sure the grass used to be greener here” or “hey… where’d all the green grass go?”  It’s very easy to remember things in the past as having been better than they actually were.  This is especially inconvenient for a regret-filled nostalgist like myself, because as of this moment in science there is just no way to go back and re-experience something exactly the way it was (though I assure you, we have top men working on it right now.  TOP MEN).  The best we can attempt is a reminder using places, people and objects of sappy sentimental value.  But while we remembered the past being happy, once we get the reminder it usually triggers a sort of “that was a nice place to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there… again” or “oh yeah, now I remember why we only talk once a year via obligatory birthday facebook wall post” or “my god this old t-shirt smells bad.  Did I used to smell this bad when I wore it?”

So in light of this problem, I’d like you to do something for me.  I’d like you to keep a log of everything that ever happens to you.  It doesn’t have to be detailed.  In fact, it shouldn’t be.  One sentence per day, and a numerical value assigned to each on a scale of 1-10.  10 being the day you brought home the first family puppy (I’m pourin’ one out for my homegirl, Cookie.  Hope there are lots of faces for you to lick up in doggie heaven), and 1 being the day at student government sleep-away camp you ended up running in the mock city election and losing at every single position.  I don’t want to look back and wonder how green the grass really was.  I want to know that the good days were really good.

Also – I want to know that the bad days were good.  Which is why at the end of each month I need you to go back to every day that scored less than a 5 and add 3-5 points.  That way when I’m old and dying of the inevitable super disease soon to be created by overuse of anti-bacterial hand sanitizers, I can look back at my life log and see how awesome it was.  Then rub it in the faces of my kids.  See you whiney brats?  Nothing below a 6 before you came along.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

Recently a friend said to me, “Wait, so you quit your job in the worst economic recession in the past 60 years? And that’s why you threw a party?  I only came because I thought it was your birthday.” The answer was yes, and even his negative (though in retrospect possibly sarcastic) attitude couldn’t bring me down.  At least not until the next day when I was lying face down on the couch in my very spinning living room and thinking that probably every decision I’d ever made which lead me to that point was a bad one.

When people see you making what they view to be a bad choice, they tend to want to give you advice.  I’ve been getting a lot of advice lately.  From the concerned (“Well how are you going to eat?”), to the blunt (“You are insane and wrong.  Don’t do it.”), to the disingenously over-supportive (“Well isn’t that neat!  Good for you!”), to the motherly (“You could move back to the east coast and be close to your family maybe?”).  It’s not that there isn’t good advice and genuine support out there.  Some of it can be quite helpful.  For instance, all the people who keep telling me I need a better health insurance plan than simply chanting “Yes We Can!  Yes We Can!” over and over.  That’s probably pretty solid.  But you also need to trust yourself to come up with a plan and make it work (or since I’m basically a wiser version of you, trusting me and my advice is acceptable as well).

Change can be hard, and I know you haven’t always taken it well (yes, I still remember when we were 8 and started crying because our parents re-arranged the living room furniture).  But change can also be good, and sometimes the only way to make change happen is by taking a big leap.  You should live your life with no regrets.  Because these letters should give you everything you need to fix anything worth regretting.  The system is flawless.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,

In the Fall of ’09 you’ll be leaving a job that you’ve held down for two years.  During those two years there will be a number of times where you’d like to leave earlier, but let the people around you talk you out of it.  That’s okay.  The timing at the two-year mark is pretty good.  What I’m saying is big picture wise – you’re solid.  Little picture?  You’re kind of a dope.  See, as you leave the job you’re not going to be able to jump immediately into something new and will have a brief period of unemployment.  This means no new money, which means saving what little money you already have at this point is going to be crucial.  And there will be a pretty significant opportunity missed.  Every week at this job you’ll have to make two weekly runs to the accountant’s office.  Here’s some simple math for you.  The accountant’s office is two miles away (a trip which I’m happy to report you’ll become crazy good at making on back roads and will be able to do in an impressively short amount of time).  Two miles away, there and back, twice a week is 8 miles per week.  In the year 2009, the state of California’s standard gas mileage reimbursement rate is 55 cents per mile.  I think you see where this one is going so I’ll wait a second for you to go and get your calculator watch.

Got it?  Let’s continue.  8 miles per week at 55 cents per mile = $4.40 per week.  Not a huge amount, but… most of a Five-Dollar Footlong?  (Brief explanation here.  Once the economy tanks, certain companies start promotional, recession friendly deals to entice people into their stores.  One of the most successful and delicious of these is Subway’s $5 Footlong campaign.  There was even a catchy jingle.  Oh yeah… the economy tanks.  So uh, good luck with that).  Here’s the thing – for a while you are pretty good about keeping track of your mileage and filling out the paperwork to get reimbursed.  But once 2009 rolls around you just sort of get lazy with it/plum forget.  That’s roughly 40 weeks.  Which is roughly $176.  Which is 35 and a half sandwiches.  Laziness is one thing.  But being too lazy to have someone give you money that they technically owe you anyway?  I’ve seen what your bank account ends up looking like (which may be the most depressing fact of all), and that $176 is nothing to scoff at.  Keep track of the miles.  Get reimbursed.  Stick with ham or chicken, toasted, no onions.

Sincerely,

Future Scott

Dear Past Scott,
When you come across a cafe called “Mel & Rose” and you order the tuna salad, only eat half of it. I know you’ll think you’re hungry enough to eat the whole thing at once, but you’ll be wrong. It’s bigger than it looks. It’s over-priced too, so why not squeeze two meals out of it? C’mon. Have a little self control.
Sincerely,
Future Scott