A few weeks ago, my computer was doing an update. This prevented me from working on my projects, & I wanted to spend family time, so I didn’t use the computer in my bedroom. Bored & without anything better to do while I waited, I decided to go down a rabbit hole of looking up my childhood friends & see what they were up to now.
& it ended up being a very warm, heartwarming experience.
One is an environmental engineer. One came out as nonbinary & queer & became a doula. One who as a kid, I falsely judged to be least likely to be successful, became a successful engineer as well. Another works as a computer programmer. The mom of two childhood friends of mine who helped watch me as a kid is now a website designer.
Then I looked up some of my Dad’s childhood & high school friends. All of the ones I looked up were still alive & doing well. One is a successful lawyer with a nice house & car. One, a drummer who might have played in a band with my dad is still a drummer & now works at the Johnny Cash Museum in Nashville. One guy who worked as a server alongside my dad now owns his own restaurant. One is still a successful investor & stock broker.
And to see so many people either of us knew when we were younger? To see them thriving in more ways than I ever would have suspected? To see that legitimately every one of them was doing something I’d consider cool & they all seemed to be living uncommon & interesting lives?
It genuinely brought me so much joy & was almost a bit transcendent in a way. They had their place in each of our lives, & now they’ve moved on & are out in the world doing things & seemingly living good lives.
And it also put things in perspective that as much as I may feel like I haven’t done enough or that I’m a failure sometimes, it occurred to me that should they ever look me up, & see that I’m an actor & artist & writer & whatnot? That they’d probably feel the same way about me. I may doubt myself often, but people probably think what I do is cool too even when I don’t feel that way about myself.
It gives me hope that things do go right, & people can become what they want to, & that even people who we’ve outgrown but still wish well can thrive ♥
