A Letter To My One Year Ago Self

Hey there old chum,

This is yourself speaking. From the future. #Technology and all.

I know you're having a great time, soaking up all that senior year has to offer, which was a lot as I recall. This weekend was homecoming – the first time you can really call it that – and I thought you'd want to know how it went. Bittersweet, my friend. Heavy on the sweet because let me tell ya, recent alumni tailgates are where it's at. They really like to butter you up with an open bar, free food everywhere, and shiny beads. Stanford knows perfectly well those are the things that'll bring in the donation money one day - the shiny beads, especially.

But no, the real sweetness came from seeing favorite people, and hearing all about everyone's new normal. It is strange, being fully immersed in this fleeting weekend of old normal, bookended on either side with a completely different lifestyle. Walking with Lauren to our old stomping grounds - Starbucks - was particularly brutal, but man was I grateful to have that once more.

Your new normal's not terrible at all, in case you were wondering. You're at a job you love. Startups... startups are THE LIFE. Somehow, you got so incredibly lucky and found the one place that combines all of your biggest passions in one colorful office space occupied by brilliant people and a serious Maltese of a security pup. The decisions you're making now are about weird acronyms like MQLs and SQLs and tricky little things like 401Ks (which, by the way, pro tip... perhaps you want to consider skipping one or two fewer classes of Financial Literacy. I know going to Philz with your friends sounds like the better idea, but you just found out this week that your favorite drink there is TWELVE HUNDRED CALORIES. Oh your sad, sad arteries. So, go to class. It'll be better in the long run on multiple fronts).

You are probably having nervous breakdowns during this whole overwhelming recruiting process, but girl. It all works out in the end. More so than you could've ever imagined.

(Except the commute takes up about 30% of your life but we all have problems, now don't we.)

So you know Hanna? And how you guys are just now starting to hang out more often? You live with her in a year, and it couldn't be any more fantastic. You call this wonderful apartment in San Francisco home (which you found within a week of beginning the apartment hunt, MAN did we sprinkle lucky fairy dust all over that situation). The real world's exhausting, but not too shabby a place at all.

I couldn't be more thankful that you trusted your gut and made the decision to spend the summer after graduating traveling through Europe with Cassandra. It is an adventure you'll never forget, and a last hurrah as a student. One final time, you get to do nothing but learn and absorb knowledge, this time in a hotel classroom next to the Adriatic Sea where you'll learn about the history of former Yugoslavia as you practice broken Serbo-Croatian.

This is an experience that'll change you at the core, just a little bit, but enough.

Your sister's getting married this weekend! It's surreal, really, but wildly anticipated. I have a feeling that you – well I, I guess – will ugly-cry the night away because that sister of ours... well, she's going to make the most radiant, beautiful beaming bride, isn't she?

Cherish this time in your life of living with swell people (and um, having the best in-house chef of all time because just so you know, you and Hanna live off of rice and kimchi now), learning from the best of the best, and being concerned about nothing but when you should take your nap of the day and whether three Taco Bell runs in one week is overkill.
Bidding farewell once again to the old normal at the end of this weekend was difficult, but strangely enough, returning to this new normal of buying rugs at IKEA and preparing for Monday's meetings has become enjoyable in its own right too.
Now go find your friends and hop in a car to get some Cheesy Gordita Crunches.