What I Would Like to Tell Gabbie Crying Alone at the Bolton Long Tables:

You were right! All your worst fears came true girl!!!  Things are uncomfortable and hard and you should probably change your pillow case because of how many nights in a row you’ve blown your nose into it (mold in the Creswell walls or sobs of despair?) 

(Probably both)

I wish you knew all the things I do now.  And maybe since shit like the Metaverse exists these days we’re not too far off from time travel after all.  If it ever does happen, I’d come sit with you at the long table upstairs (mostly so you don’t look like such a raging dumbass sitting there crying into your salad with no dressing… also bitch guess what - you’re not scared of vinegarette anymore) 

But I would sit there and probably let you cry but roll my eyes a few times because Me now knows you’ll look back on this in 3 years and KIND OF HATE YOURSELF FOR HOW MANY TIMES YOU CRIED IN PUBLIC. But I’d probably let you in on a few little tips to make things seem slightly less… utterly hopeless.  Life doesn’t really get any less uncomfortable or hard, sadly.  But it does become really beautiful in a way that is so overwhelming that even the sound of your roommates whisking their matcha makes your eyes full with tears on random Tuesday mornings.  

I’ll start with the things you would beg future me to answer first.  You care a lot about things right now that don't even cross your mind anymore.  But since I know how your mind works (you anxious little shit) I’ll give you that at least.  Maybe rapid fire is our best option here for these.  It’s not even worth our time to get into the details so don’t ask.  

Trust me.  Don’t.  

You’re not dating him anymore (BITCH DON’T FREAK OUT IT’S THE BEST THING TO EVER HAPPEN TO YOU) Again, maybe just don’t ask. Just know it was more painful than you could’ve ever even imagined and it DID in fact severely fuck you up but still… best thing to ever happen to you.    

You lost the weight and shop in stores that don’t cause your heart rate to skyrocket when you walk through the door because what if they don’t have my size and the sales girl thinks I’m so stupid for even thinking someone as HUGE as me could try and fit into clothes in a store like this and should probably just go to Torrid and suck it up and wear the damn peplum tops and paperbag shorts like every other plus size girl does with a smILE ON THEIR FACE.  

Also, you did it the healthy way.  Eating salads with dressing and everything. Apparently,  starving yourself WASN’T THE BEST OPTION AFTER ALL. You already know this though but you still choose to let your life revolve around how many calories you eat a day and how many you burn and it lowkey ruins so much of your life but hey!  It doesn’t stay like that forever.

While we’re on this topic (you shallow bitch) losing weight is WEIRD.  Girls don’t know what to say and boys say too much and boys that didn’t know your name this year suddenly are very aware of your existence when you lose 60 pounds.  Fitting into a size medium for the first time will mindfuck you a little because sometimes when you look in the mirror you still see the 19 year old Gabbie who was afraid of bagels. 

But you feel really good. And you love your body now.  Not necessarily because it’s smaller, but because you learned how to really take care of it. And life is just generally more fun when you don’t have panic attacks over restaurants not having calories listed on their menu.   

Your hair is brown now.  L’oreal box dye from Target did more for you than a lifetime of inhaling bleach for $350 each time ever could.  Plus, you have things you like to spend your time on more now than sitting for 4 hours in a salon chair just to be blonde.  Like going on walks without headphones or anything. Yeah you heard me! YOU’RE NOT AFRAID OF YOUR OWN THOUGHTS ANYMORE!!!!!!!!! 

At this point, you’ve definitely thought about dropping out.  For a very different reason than why you actually end up doing it.  But right now everything sucks and art school is terrifying and your grade simply depends on comparing yourself to the people sitting on either side of you (who all for some reason happen to be child prodigies who make all their own clothes from recycled water bottles and shit and have eyebrow piercings) 

(You don’t stand a chance)

But you do ACTUALLY drop out of college.  Not because it’s hard or because your drawing professor implies that your art is bad because you don’t have anything unique to add to the conversation… it’s because one day you're going to be sitting on that horrendously uncomfortable futon in the middle of the day on a random Wednesday afternoon and God is going to tell you to do it.

Like, that’s exactly what happens.  

And it scares the shit out of you.  

Unfortunately, a Loud Booming Voice From Above doesn’t say the words outright.  But peace unlike anything you’ve ever felt will consume room 743 of Creswell and it will all make sense.  God will ask you to give him everything.  And you release the sweaty-palmed death grip you have on life and hand it over.  

And everything changed after that.  Pretty damn quickly too.

I don’t want to spoil all the details.  The utter shock of it all is the most wonderful part.  But getting to the end of yourself was the best thing that could've happened.  You got cracked wide open and emptied of everything you loved.  Don’t worry though.  God was just making more room for all the things you didn’t know you would love yet.

People, for example.  

You don’t even know what’s about to happen.  And that’s the best part.  I can’t really bring myself to spoil it for you.  Me Now doesn’t really even have the emotional capacity to really, truly get into it.  Because I will burst into tears. And I’m genuinely dehydrated from the amount of crying I’ve done in the past 2 weeks. But there are about to be people that change everything for you.  

Like… to THINK you haven’t even met Cappie May yet!!!!

You really can’t prepare yourself for the way things are about to change.  But one day you’ll get in a car and drive 45 minutes to a barn with 6 strangers in the car and 3 years later you’ll drive home in a tshirt soaked in confetti and tears with 9 people who really are your family now. And it will make no sense to you how it all happened. You’ve never had friends like this before. You get excited to wake up at 6 am to be in the car for an hour and a half because it just means you get to be with them. And most of the time those 6 am car rides are completely silent because everyone is annoyed at each other and it’s so DAMN early.  But just being together is always enough with them.  Blue cowboy boots, chili, and He Chose Me.  Things that mean nothing to you now but will make your chest ache one day.  

Another day later, you’ll wake up on a Sunday morning in October and cringe when your feet hit the freezing cold dusty floorboards and wish you could remember where you put your slippers.  You’ll walk down the stairs while avoiding looking at the absolutely repulsive crevices of dust between each step. But you look up just in time to see the heart shaped shadows shift across the wall in the hallway.  

You never used to care either way if you woke up to clouds or the sun.  

But the sun makes heart shaped shadows on the wall and that means Carlee is probably on the porch writing down her feelings and drinking the San Antonio blend coffee in a butterfly mug.

So you care a little more now.  

You’ll live in this house that has two doors and six little, lovely women inside. They’re always making pasta and buying flowers like it’s their job to make sure no vase or stomach is ever left empty. It’s the most wonderful thing imaginable.  

Life is a really important thing to celebrate in this home.  You end up doing that through lots of cheese and those tiny chocolate chip cookies from Trader Joe’s and silent discos on Hall Street and 13 minute walks to get sprinkle lattes (by the way your life goal of starting a trend kind of happens - check your ego now though because it’s like actually humiliating to be the sprinkle latte girl)

There will be days you cry when the first ginkgo leaf hits the street corner down the road in September because another passing season means another day closer to this dreaded one (Move Out Day). Days when your shirt sticks to your back when you all walk together up that DAMN HILL after getting polar pops and you’d rather linger on the porch for another hour together with the bugs than go inside to shower. Days when boys make you cry in each other's arms. Days where you learn other ways to say I Love You (“I got you a kombucha”)  Lots of days that remind you of what Heaven must be like.  Full of a type of wonder and joy that words written in your hometown Starbucks the day after you move out will never be able to touch.  But you will know what I mean. It will be impossible to miss the glimpses of eternity that seep through the cracks of your literally deteriorating walls.  

And there will be a day you realize you know God’s love because you know your roommates. (I think He would also offer to make me chamomile tea every night before bed even when most of the time I say no because I don’t know how to accept love in that way very well. But that doesn’t stop Maya from asking every night. I think that will always remind me of God)

It’s a really cool thing to create a home.  And you do that with 5 of your best friends.  Your home will be for everybody.  And you’ll never experience any joy like someone saying they felt safe in Two Door.  Or that they laughed so hard they peed in Two Door.  Or they cried for the first time in three months in Two Door. Or they talked about really hard, scary things and were met with an overwhelming abundance of gentleness in that moment of vulnerability in Two Door.

Because you know what that feels like.

And you’re so thankful so many others got to feel that too. 

You never really are able to pinpoint where everything changes.  And don’t get me wrong, it’s not all disco balls and butterflies and polar pops and sunset drives on Hog Mountain Road.  There will be DTRs and diagnoses and grief and horrible lapses in judgement aaaaand some ugly crying in front of boys that will still replay in your mind sometimes right before you’re about to go to sleep (awesome).  But things really are different now.  Life is so abundant it makes you nauseous sometimes. It makes absolutely no sense how you are here and you are living and living in a type of fullness that you still can’t fathom most days. You really actually believe that you must be God’s favorite for this all to have happened. 

But to Depressed and Utterly Hopeless Gabbie Sitting at the Bolton Long Table Alone and Crying into Her Yogurt Bowl: hold on girl!!!! 

Because you’ll meet Cappie May.  

You’ll dance to Cash Shit on the street on your 21st with all your best friends. 

Your roommates will eat warm sourdough that you made with butter and vanilla bean honey from the farmers market. 

You’ll cry in church every time they sing Great is Your Faithfulness To Me.

You will kiss some boys and it will be a terribly bad idea every time but SO FUN in the moment. 

You’ll hear Yannick’s laugh.  

You'll walk to a fancy dinner while drinking white wine out of plastic red cups with your best friends.

You’ll see a lot of sunrises on the way to hand out donuts on Monday mornings in Moco.  

You’ll flirt with the men who work at Rook and Pawn with Julia on your lunch break. 

You’ll have a porch with lights and people to sit on it with.  

You’ll have feelings for someone again even after everything you went through. 

You’ll eat a PB&J after a swim in a lake in the middle of the Tetons. 

And you’ll know Jesus even deeper than you ever thought possible because of it all.

Things will be so beyond more than just okay.  

Things will be good.

And so, so beautiful. 

Now please do yourself a favor and just eat the bagel and break up with him already for the LOVE OF GOD.