Dear future Aliza Abidi, 

On your first day of high school, you had planned to write a letter to yourself to open when you became a senior. At the time it seemed futile and humorous, so you procrastinated. Stuck in the slow stills of life, the thought of looking back four years later was foreign and seemingly unimaginable. 

Now, I wish you had written that letter so that after these years, I could smile sentimentally at the growth you experienced through the laughter and tears of high school. Now a senior, I am writing to you for the first time, as you look back at this letter with a mixture of nostalgia and forgotten youth after graduating college.

In truth, I had never really imagined life after high school. Amidst the hammering academic and social pressures, college and its admissions seemed like a finish line. Past it was a new world that I had not stepped foot in, and did not bother worrying about. 

I am at the edge of this unimagined world now. At the last stretch of the track, my breath has become uneven and my legs feel numb from hammering the gravel for what feels like infinity. I attempt to peer into the many more miles and races I will have to sprint, but as of now, the future is limited to foreign tracks to foreign destinations. 

I hold on to the belief that you will carve out a path through my incomprehension of the future, and meet the goals and dreams that seem unreachable. We share a drive, a yearning towards stability in the form of change, to know and to be known. I know you have dug a path and molded yourself to be unafraid, to delve into the unknown, and exemplify the future of a leader, a thought that currently brings sweat to my palms. 

I wonder what relationships you have found comfort in and what achievements have lit up your face as you navigate independence and adulthood. Although my breath hitches out of fear of an unfamiliar reflection of a future mirror, my heart racing at the vision of being a corporate employee, I rest assured that your thirst for knowledge and persistence has guided you to a position of ease. 

I think of you and become more confident in closing this chapter of my life. I know our capabilities and I hope to continue finding positives in stressful situations and be molded by both the light and darkness of our growing experiences. I also hold faith that an undefined future will not derive from our aspirations.

As you start yet another chapter of your life, I hope you look back with appreciation to each word and every meaning between the lines of your book. Although I am unsure of how to envision you, I know that regardless of what track you are on, you will race through the finish line, just as I do now. I say both hello and goodbye, to you who is a future that I will exceed limits to create.

See you soon,  

Aliza Abidi

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