Some lovely responses to the question, “what would you say to your 17-year-old self?”

Including:

• “(You haven't started watching Buffy yet, but log onto alta vista and search for "Spike on Buffy.")”

• “they knew that life was too short but they don’t know that — they think there is a scorecard”

• “We try to contain things in order to express them ourselves because we think we have the language for it.”

I have a vivid memory of 17-year-old me, newly moved to France, standing in a store and trying to remember the word for “socks”, because I hadn’t packed the right ones, because I had never experienced autumn before and didn’t know what the right ones would be. Later, thanks to the wisdom and largesse of my cousin Cathy, I’d have the right boots and the right jacket and a hot water bottle and a dressing gown. I’d be ready, not necessarily for everything, but at least for winter.

Attribution

Come,
Let us roam the night together
Singing.

I love you.

Across
The Harlem roof-tops
Moon is shining
Night sky is blue.
Stars are great drops
Of golden dew.
In the cabaret
The jazz-band’s playing.

I love you.

Come,
Let us roam the night together
Singing.

— Harlem Night Song by Langston Hughes