FUTARE

Dear FutureMe, So, I did this five years ago, completely forgot about it, and woke up this morning to have an absolutely phenomenal message sitting in my inbox. It was a complete and utter mindfuck to say the least. So, I've decided to make a tradition out of it. Of course, chances are that I will not forget about this, and will simply be counting down the days until I get this e-mail. I hope that's not the case, as receiving the e-mail this morning was one of the more surreal experiences of my life. The previous message was written by someone who was full of uncertainty--the end of college, careers, and marriage were all hanging out somewhere in the ether. The interesting thing, however, is that e-mail truly shed light on something that I don't think I could have realized at the time; the building blocks were *mostly* in place. I knew I wasn't going to be an Anthropologist. I knew I was going to marry Amanda. I just don't think I had the ability to see it. Undoubtedly, there are things in my life today that I am blind to, but that the 31 year-old Austin will see and understand clearly. I can't wait to find out. Unless it's bad. In which case, fuck that shit: ignorance is bliss. As I'm writing this, I'm sitting on the second story of our condo/townhouse on Longwood Ct. It's 11:49 in the morning and I just came back home after having brunch at La Madeleine's with my parents. I had an omelet. It was not particularly tasty. I enjoyed seeing my parents as always. One thing that has definitely changed over the last five years has been my relationship with them. Moving out of the house for good really changed my perception of them and who they are. Also, I'm slowly realizing how similar to them I am. I have my mother's cynicism (this is a good thing) but my father's goofiness (also, a good thing). They're good folks and I hope they stick around for a while. They've had a rough few years, and I sincerely hope that things calm down for them and they settle in. Back to setting the scene: I have a puppet on the desk that Roy got me, an enormous Darth Vader PEZ dispenser that Jon gave me, and various other odds and ends on the table. Amanda is still sleeping. This is not surprising. We had her work X-mas party last night and she got completely destroyed. I believe she had 7 or 8 gin and tonics. This was most entertaining for myself. She left the bar, took her shoes off and was smacking them together the whole time on our way back to the car. Funny. We're supposed to clean house today, but I really don't feel like it .Hopefully her hangover will prevent that from happening. The cats are running around as usual. I spent the morning prior to breakfast laying down and playing Fallout: New Vegas on the 360. I bet in five years they'll have new systems out that do amazingly fantastic, magical things. That should be fun. God I hope they're not all motion controlled though. Do I even play videogames in the future? I sense myself falling out of that. They're not as fun now as they were five years ago, so I can maybe see that going away. The big event on the horizon is my fast-approaching marriage. It is now 13 days until we get married. This is exciting. Although life will not change one iota, it'll be good to stop being perma-engaged. The cats will cease to be illegitimate children and we'll file joint tax returns. Other than that, life won't change much. It will be nice to have all of my friends together again: Matt, Josh, Keith, Greg, Aaron, Ben, Kelly, Luke, Louby, and Joe will all be there. This make me very happy. I have an absolutely phenomenal group of friends, and it's comforting to know that they'll all be around in the future. Even if we somehow lose touch, they're really all just a phone call away. Thanks to the interwebs, it's incredibly simple to keep in touch, and I can only assume that in five years there will be new, more effective ways to stay in touch. I really wish Matt would get on Facebook. That would make things easier. Are you and Ben doing better? Things have been a little rough. I suspect he's jealous/sad at the fact that we're in such vastly different places in our lives. If you've grown far apart, please call him. He's like your brother. Speaking of relationships, one that has certainly changed is the one with Andrew. He's such a good brother and I'm so proud he's mine. He's a good person, and I hope he's happy. He and I are so much closer now than we've ever been, and I hope that being in Shreveport will facilitate that. Beyond the marriage, we have the honeymoon in Disney. That should be a lot of fun, though I suspect we'll be seeing a disproportionately greater amount of shows than we will be riding rides. Boy, that sentence sucks, but I don't care to fix it. It's okay, future self, you wrote better than that and you knew it. Anyway, Disney should be awesome. I enjoy vacations with Amanda, and this one should be awesome. The Collinsworths are amazing for giving us that as our honeymoon present. On the career side of things, the last five years have been rather fruitful. I got into law school and did pretty damned well. It's one of the few things career-wise that I'm really proud of. I don't think that 21 year-old Austin would have ever imagined the amount of success these past few years have brought. On that note, I have a job lined up at Cook Yancey in Shreveport. The job market totally blows right now, and we're just so fortunate to have gotten such a good job. Not too sure about the city. I really hope we grow to love it and stay there. If not, once Amanda finishes nursing school we'll reevaluate. How'd that turn out? Ideally, I'd like to get to New Orleans, but I'm not so sure that'll ever happen. I'm not that torn up about it though. Amanda and I will be happy anywhere. We're pals. Speaking of Amanda, the last five years with her have been great. She's my partner in crime, my best friend, and the person I love more than anything in the world. I cannot imagine a life without her. We've laid the foundation for the rest of our lives together, and I can't wait to see how the story plays out. From here on, it's OUR story. That's the "arc" of my life: it's her. Without Amanda, there is no Austin. I suspect the inverse of that is true as well. Whatever happens, it will be our adventure, together. That's the most beautiful thing I can possibly think of. There's no stronger emotion that I can think of than the way I feel about her and the way I feel when I'm with her. After nearly seven years that feeling has only grown stronger, and although our time together is necessarily limited (and, geologically, very short), I am so fortunate to experience it. Billions of years will pass and we will be gone, but to have experienced it just in this fleeting moment--OUR moment--is a greater gift than I could ever deserve. Well, that was heavy. So, kids? Is there a little Darby running around? Not too sure -- interruption. Sarge is taking a piss. Just thought you'd like to know. Anyway, I'm not too sure about kids. Like, I like the idea of them, but they also seem like they'll be a lot of work and very expensive. Plus, I can see myself screwing that up and raising some douchebag that I hate ala Bill Murray's character in Rushmore. That would suck. In truth, I know I'm going to have children and I know I'm really going to love them. Being a dad will probably be fun. Except for the diapers. I don't want my shit on my hands, let alone another person's. Oh well. I don't really have any say in that. My old self can rest easily: I'm not a neo-con Christian. Still don't believe in god. I'm far less militant of an atheist/agnostic/whatever than I was at 21: people can believe whatever the hell they want as long as they're not dicks about it. Just don't try to convince me of anything and I'll do likewise. That's pretty easy. I can't really think of much else to write. You still haven't kicked tobacco. What a stupid idea that was. You're not nearly as much of a heavy user as you were at 21, but you still enjoy cigarettes/snus on occasion. Currently addicted to the latter. An improvement, no doubt, but not a full cold-turkey quit. That will probably change soon though. We'll see. If Amanda can quit, then I'll be fine. I should probably lead by example, but I've failed at that. Too goddamned weak. Who knows, they've probably cured death by the time you're reading this anyway. OH--what happened with Kayla? Did she find her way? I hope so. She's a great kid, even though she shoots herself in the foot a lot. Biology is not going to work out for her, so I hope she doesn't get discouraged and keep working at Carter's. She's far too fucking smart for that. It would kill Guy, too. Speaking of Guy: is he still single? He's seeing Reena or whatever. I've yet to meet her. Must be serious though; he's bringing her to the wedding/rehearsal dinner. Also, what about Jon? I hope you've remained in touch with him. He's such a good person and really smart. I hope he finds success--he deserves it. Josh? Did Josh find happiness? I hope he made it to New York and I hope he finds success, whatever form it takes. My greatest fear is that his family will continue to hinder his growth. Well, I've been writing this for half an hour, and I think that's pretty sufficient. I hope the next five years are just as awesome as the last five have been. This has been an amazing period in my life, and I'm looking forward to starting the next part. I'm ready for it. Stability is going to be great. Also, income will be nice. Paying back student loans won't be. One bit of advice, however: don't get caught up in the money. You don't want to work forever. Save as much as you can so that you can retire early. Also, after reading this, do you feel like you're still the same person but in a different place? I think that was the most shocking thing about reading the last e-mail: so much has changed, but so little is different. I'm still very much the same person, but with a much different perspective. I was not expecting that. Perhaps the next five years will surprise me, and I will have changed? I doubt it. I like who I am, and I suspect that I'll also like who I am in five years as well. We'll see. It's been a great five years. Here's to the next: let's go exploring. PS: the captcha at the bottom of the page is 666. That's humorous.