Letter To My Five-Year-Old Self

By Mia Remience

Dear Five-Year-Old Self,

I still have an image of you painted in my mind. I know that you wish for long, luscious locks like a Disney princess, yet your hair remains in a tragically non-royal bob. Your rounded face carries apples for cheeks, eyes that widen at the very thought of how much world there is to see, and a gap-toothed smile whose little black windows are filled by an innocence only a five-year-old can carry. Behind this face lies a mind only beginning to wrap itself around what is around you. A mind with faith in the morals you learned from Aesop’s fables: that goodness will be rewarded and evil will be punished. A mind fed by any book on a reachable shelf, thriving on the wonder spelled out on every page. A mind that fears talking to the other five-year-olds in your classroom — simply because you are afraid that they will say no to you.

Although your best friends are currently books, dear Five-year-old self, over the next couple of years, you will begin to muster up the courage to approach a few of the nicer girls in your class and ask them to play with you at recess. You will begin to make friends of your own accord. Your moments in the classroom will feel more alive, because it will no longer be just you and your books, but rather, it will be you, your books, and your friends. However, before long, these friendships will fade away. You will have your first fights. You will storm off — or, perhaps, they will storm off. Or perhaps one day, all of a sudden, you will lock eyes with them and realize that you are no longer friends.

Do not fret, dear Five-year-old self, because as the doors to friendships close, new ones will open. The puppy-doodle-covered notes that you pass during class will bloom into friendships with roots deeper than the ones you had before — friendships that cannot be pulled out of the ground because of one little spat. As first conversations turn into first sleepovers, you will run to your mother, announcing that this is the best year ever, because of the friends you have made. However, this year will quickly become the worst year ever. Your parents will receive an email stating that because of a new and rapidly-spreading virus, the schools will be closed for two weeks. Those two weeks will turn into three, which will turn into a month, which will turn into the remainder of third grade.

I warn you that you will make more mistakes in those few months than you have made in your life so far. You will be forced into a digital world that no one ever taught you how to navigate, and you will get lost time and time again. You will be hurt and you will cause hurt. Misunderstandings through emojis and angry text messages will threaten the friendships that only a couple of months ago seemed shatterproof. But do not worry, dear Five-year-old self. This worldwide storm will, cloud by cloud, subside. You will reunite with your third-grade comrades and, knot by knot, untwist your texting miscommunications. You will forgive them, and they will forgive you. Yet when you finally take off your mask after a strange two years of holding your breath behind a piece of cloth, you will find that the face under it is no longer that of a child, but of an adolescent. You will suddenly begin a struggle unknown to you before. A struggle with self-worth. A struggle with identity. A struggle with worries that can no longer be cured with an ice-cream cone.

Before you know it, you will depart from elementary school. You will dread the first day of middle school because the books you had read painted middle school as the worst experience of any girl’s life. You will be relieved when you see that there is no mean girl with blonde hair extensions, but you will be hit in the face with a different kind of pecking order. The girls with Starbucks drinks in their perfectly-manicured hands and bottomless wallets in the pockets of their Lululemon leggings will be given the prestigious title of “the popular girls.” For a moment, you will regret not being “popular” like them. But you will open your eyes and learn a valuable lesson: it is better to be “not popular” and truly loved than put on a pedestal and despised.

As I write you this letter, dear Five-year-old self, my hair has grown out, I am an inch taller than my mother, and I am in my freshman year of high school. Your genuine desire to learn has faded, having been replaced by an obsession with maintaining perfect grades. Your belief in Aesop’s words has disappeared, as I watch the worst of people rise and the best of people fall time and time again. The only part of you that still lingers is your fear of talking to the other kids. Now, I have grown to recognize your worry that they will say no to you as a fear of being shunned. A fear of my classmates’ judgmental stares and silent rejection.

I wish that I were as pretty, mature, kindhearted, intelligent, and successful as you would like to imagine me to be. I regret to inform you that I am not. But allow us to make a promise to each other. I promise that I will always strive to grow and become better, as long as you promise to do the same. I am cheering for you, dear Five-year-old self, through your every success, small accomplishment, and redemption, and it is my wish that you are doing the same for me.

With love,

Your Fifteen-Year-Old Self

Mia Remience is a teenage writer whose work ranges from sharp to reflective. Her writing has been recognized by Scholastic, Write the World, the New York Times, and the National Council of Teachers of English, and her poetry was featured at the JFK Library Foundation Earthshot Gala.