If I could communicate with 16-year-old Jen, these are the things I would possibly tell her:
- You will be tempted to go get sushi in a dim pan-Asian restaurant in the strip district of Pittsburgh, next to an abandoned artist studio with a murky fish tank and a waitress who forgets to refill your tea. Don’t do this.
- Don’t count on that book deal you are expecting on a postmodern biography of Erik Satie and his collection of velvet suits.
- You won’t watch Paris, Texas or Kicking and Screaming until you are 20. This is a mistake.
- When you are 28, you will fall in love with a Spanish conquistador who will lick your eyelids to make you laugh. He will do many things for you, including introduce you to that guy who plays the piano on the CD you’re listening to in your car right now. You know, the one with that song about a girl named Kate that you harmonize to when no one is listening? You will meet Ben in his dressing room. You will ask for a picture, and he will apologize about being sweaty and make a joke about just having played a basketball game that you won’t quite hear because you are trying not to pee your pants. You will rub his back inappropriately. But this is okay, because you know that 16-year-old Jen would actually pee her pants and if bladder control is one of the only things you’ve mastered in 12 years, at least that’s something.
