Another letter from your dearest *Benjamin*

To my dearest Isabelle (again), You'll NEVER guess who this letter might be from. On this glorious day (December 29th, 2021), I was right about to go to sleep (at 6:30 am, obviously) when I discovered a very strange email that popped in my inbox: a letter I had written to you a year ago today that for some reason was sent to me as well. While reading through what I had written to you a year ago, I realized a very harsh and unwelcome truth: nothing THAT much has really changed in the past year. We're still in a global pandemic (which is worsening...again), we're still both college students, we both still have heaping amounts of existential dread for the very uncertain future. The only thing major that's really changed is you getting back together with your ex-boyfriend (which I STILL think was a bad move bestie). And to make matters worse, I'm pretty sure I mentioned to you a couple of days ago that you should be on the lookout for a letter from the past in your inbox as well. In my humble opinion, part of the fun of these letters is that you're not supposed to know when a letter from the past is supposed to show up in your email, it just does. So, to be completely certain that I won't remember to remind you about this letter being sent to you, I'm going to be setting the arrival date of this letter a little farther in the future than a year. I'm setting the date for your 25th birthday all the way to 2026. From my perspective in the here and now (your past), 2026 sounds like a crazy futuristic year, like a time period a cyberpunk television series would be set in or something. I have to remind myself that 2026 ultimately really isn't that far off; it's only about four years away. Also Happy Birthday! It feels weird to be typing that because from my perspective your birthday won't be for another four and a half months, but by now you'll be halfway through your twenties. God, that's just so daunting to be thinking about. I just know that the time will really fly by before we're both 40 years old and living actual adult lives somewhere out there. That's just so scary to think about. But even now, as a 25-year-old you still have a LOT of life to live, so don't start feeling old reading this (25's nothing bestie). I hope that you have some sick plans for the day/night (and of course that I'm invited to said plans). I also want to quickly address some of the stuff that I talked about in that letter that I sent to you from "the cursed year of 2020". You've settled into your biology major, which you seem to be enjoying. You DID end up quitting two of those four jobs you were working in 2020 (which I applaud you for doing because working long hours isn't a great way to heal from trauma). Though, your job at the Lumina is still kind of in limbo because of the pandemic which has naturally caused a lot of movie theatres to be temporarily shut down. The pandemic, by the way, is NOT over yet, which was something that I was hoping for in my last letter. We just got hit with the Omicron variant, which is really tearing through the world right about now. My friend Hannah just tested positive for the Omicron variant, and my manager at Yankee Candle is at home sick right now (hopefully not with the variant because that would suck). At this point, I'm wondering if the pandemic will EVER end. I keep hearing that the virus is practically endemic and everyone's gonna have COVID at some point or another, which I really hope isn't the case. Hopefully, everyone will get their boosters and the pandemic will slowly die down from there. I'm just hoping that the pandemic will be long over by the time you get this letter. At the time I'm writing this letter, we're both technically working adults and because of this, we're seeing each other less and less. This makes me kinda scared for the future since these jobs we're working right now aren't for the long term, and we haven't begun our official careers yet. I just hope that in the future we can somehow make time to see each other and hang out, even if we have bigger and more important jobs on our plates. By now we're well over the drinking age, and we can both get into bars and nightclubs pretty easily, which definitely opens up a bunch of potential hang-out spots for us. Speaking of that boyfriend of yours (whose sketchy name I just can't seem to remember) that I mentioned earlier, I'm genuinely curious to see how you guys are both doing in the present year of 2026. I know I've joked a bunch about you guys getting married, and me of course giving a man of honor speech about how you should have ended up with TJ instead (I'm joking...I swear). I do think that by now, Charlotte and Jose could very well be married. But honestly, the very real possibility that you could be either engaged or even married by now is hurting my brain. Even though you think I don't like your boyfriend (which is not true!) I really do hope that if you guys aren't together anymore that you guys are on good terms. No, really! I also mentioned in my past letter how awkward it would be if we stopped being friends between now and when you get this letter. I really hope that's not the case because my life without you being a close friend of mine would really suck, and I can honestly say that you're such a bright light in my life. It would be equally awkward if I died sometime between now and 2026 as well...wow that would be kinda ****** up. That would be some Hannah Baker **** right there (is that reference topical at all? I mean honestly it's barely topical right now). I have to ask if we ever made our way to the Czech Republic to follow our dreams of living out our #MainCharacterLifestyles. If not, then I will be an extremely pouty Benjamin. God, I can only imagine how cool it would be if we both lived in Prague together. You could finally live close to the Zizkov Television Tower (that tower with the baby statues climbing on it). I mean...I could settle for living our lifestyles in Paris or Berlin as well, as long as it's in Europe. Above all, I hope that wherever you are right now that you're happy and you're thriving. Whether it be in a picturesque flat with moi in Prague sipping Mimosas for breakfast, or an apartment in Raleigh with Jordan or Hannah, or even if you're still in Chapel Hill working at Squid's. If you're happy and you feel like you're content, then that's all that matters. In the wise words of that letter you wrote yourself on the senior retreat back in 2018, "be the goals". Please tell me you've cleaned your windshield where I wrote that in dirt by now. I mentioned that in my last letter to you and I know for a fact that it's still there. And of course, when you get this letter, immediately call or leave me a voice note so we can talk about it and laugh at how stupid we used to be. Your best friend in the whole ******* world, Benjamin Oh, and one more thing: I've written you another letter that's going to be sent out to you in the far, FAR future. Only this time I'm not going to tell you when I'm sending it to. You're just going to have to live in suspense until you receive it. Oh well. I can definitely promise it won't be nearly as long as this one was, because who knows if the world will still be here by then.