Dear Future Self,
There are a lot of things I wish I could tell my younger self. I wish I could hug her tight and tell her to keep fighting for the dreams she believes in – they did turn true after all. I wish I could cheer her on as she refused to believe that she had to speak softly to be lady-like.
I wish I could tell her I was proud that she had begun calling out the society for its patriarchy even before she first heard the term feminism. But I can’t. But there’s something I’d like to remind you ten years later. Excuse the second-person tone, but I’m not the same person I was a year ago, heck, I don’t know what I’ll be ten years later.
Thank the internet, I won’t have to depend on keeping this note safe inside your copy of The Fountainhead. I know you’ll protect your books like living beings, heck I give books more regard anyways. I’m at a crossroad now, I think you might be on one as you read this.
Over the course, I’ve realised they never do actually end. One crossroad eventually leads to another plethora of choices. But I hope you’ve learnt to enjoy the process now. I hope that you no longer check your work and erase the controversial segments because you would do anything to run away from confrontations.
I hope you deal with them head-on now. I wish you still find yourself a bit more in poetry each time – that poetry is still your refuge – your safe space. I’ll bet you my diary knows me better than I. Because all that I hide from the world and from myself too often lies are on the pages of my poetry, and I hope you haven’t learnt to deceive the art yet.
I hope you’ve lived all your wild, crazy ideas, those fairy tales that just you and best friends are aware of – I hope you’ve turned each one of them true. I hope that your poetry gives off a happy vibe of a soul that’s soaring and singing to the harmony of life.
And I hope you give back to the world. I hope you’re the same crazy person who’ll experiment with a bold shade of lipstick before an event and flaunt her legs unwaxed. Who’ll say yes to impromptu plans to leave for another city the next hour.
And most importantly, I hope you’re doing what you love. I know even now that maturity comes at a price that makes you value the monetary price of your dream and weigh whether it will be worth it, and I hope you decided it is. I hope you’re still the fierce feminist – fighting the fight for equal rights for all genders.
The fight is tough even now, I can’t imagine what it will be a decade later. But I hope you create a ripple – the change will follow suit. And wherever you are, as you’re reading this, I hope you smile looking back upon the 19-year-old perched on the sofa with drooping eyes but even stronger dreams and take a moment and shine that smile brighter on the world.
And know that I love you forever, no matter how long that’s going to be. And yes, Damon Salvatore is still your favourite character. There shall be no negotiation on that.
P.S. Say hi to the forty-year-old me.
Yours lovingly (do they even use the same format now),
Malvika Dangwal
A twenty year old ready to rock the world.