I have never been terribly good at punctuality. I’m generally late for just about everything.  Granted, I was born early but that may, in fact, be the very last time I was even remotely on time. Thus it is perfectly fitting that I am only now writing the column - months after the fact - marking the occasion of the 20^th anniversary of my entrance into adulthood. 

 In truth, I think I may be having a mid-life crisis – sans the sports car and the comb-over. I have spent much time lately dwelling on the past. Where did twenty years go? How is it that I’ve been a “grown up” longer than I was a child? When did the soundtrack of my life end up on the classic oldies station?  

What would I do over?  

Everything?  

Nothing?  

Some things.  

Tell. The funny thing is that as corny country song as it is, what I wish more than anything is that I could go back for just one day, face my 18 year old self, and tell her all the things I wish I had known back then.  

Such as, 

That the harder you work the luckier you are. For pretty much everything you do in life, you get out exactly what you put in.  

That life isn’t fair. It really isn’t. Not “he got a bigger cookie ” unfair, but rather “people can die in the blink of an eye” unfair.  Prepare for that.

That no matter how kind and polite and thoughtful you try to be, there may just be someone who doesn’t like you or what you stand for, so stop trying to please everyone. If you plan to become a writer - this will be doubly true. 

That a size nine isn’t “fat.” 

That you will never, ever need advanced algebra. 

That you will need sunscreen.

That you really should “save for a rainy day.” Yes, I know the Firebird and the Guess jeans are a lot more enticing, but they are absolutely useless when it finally “rains.” And trust me, it will rain. So save a little money from every paycheck, even if it’s only ten dollars. 
That under no circumstances should you accept all those credit card offers you are going to get within minutes of turning eighteen. Really. Trust me on this.  

That you will never, ever, look good in either short hair or a spiral perm. I really can’t stress this enough.

That if you act stupid to attract boys, you will attract stupid boys. I spent a lot of time in high school “dumbing down” because I thought that’s what guys liked. It turns out only dumb guys like that. You are not going to marry a dumb guy. I promise. 

If you do, however, date a dumb boy you will not “change” him. Your love will not “save” him and no, he won’t be nicer/different/better when you are married (and/or pregnant).  

That you should cherish your hometown. You will not live there “your whole life” (or much longer) and you will miss it dearly later on. 

That God is real and you should listen to him. Always.

That you should realize how smart the adults in your life really are. Hush up. Take notes if necessary. You will wish you had listened more. I know this will come as a shock but having a complete set of Led Zeppelin cassettes and a car payment does not make you wise. You really don’t know everything. 

That you are no longer a child and in virtually every important aspect of your life there will be no “do-overs.” Think carefully before you burn bridges. Getting the last word may seem like a pleasant victory – but you can win the argument and still lose it all. Really. 

Finally, I would tell my eighteen year old self that if you learn nothing else you should pay attention to that very small voice from within – even when it gives you that uncomfortable feeling that questions certain life choices. Especially then.Try and listen to it because that voice will – more than once – try mightily to direct you down the right path.  

And if that voice should happen to sound a lot like a pushy, know-it-all, twenty years older (and thus totally ancient) you – listen to her.  

Definitely.

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There is a certain comfort to be taken in the knowledge that some things are probably never going to change.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence; the earth will continue to rotate around the sun, and I will not get even one iota smarter this summer over last.

Learned lesson. After three plus decades on this earth you would think that by now I would have learned just a little bit about sunscreen. You would be wrong. I have, however, recently learned quite a bit about aloe.

I sum it up thusly, on the first day God made the sun so the devil had no choice but to counter with sunburn.

For the record, I am much better at parenting then I am self-preservation.

Stupid mistake. Despite remembering to coat both children with a thick layer of sunblock, I still managed to believe it a fine idea to stand IN THE WATER under a blazing hot sun for more than four hours with nothing between me and the sun but my own stupidity. I know, just typing it I’m embarrassed all over again.

I honestly don’t know which hurt worse — the peeling or my pride.

What I really suffer from is a case of rampant optimism.

A little sun. Despite years of cause and effect training which would have trained even a gerbil to recognize “sun minus sunscreen = burn,” I continue to operate under the delusion that I, the whitest white girl in America — can get “just a little sun.” This is akin to believing you can get “just a little pregnant” or “just a little nuclear radiation exposure.”

I persist in this belief because in my teens I could — and did — tan.

Tanning goal. That was really my whole life goal back then. Study? Maybe. College? Yeah, whatever.

A nice golden copper toned glow — I’ll work on it day after day until I achieved my goal with only a backyard lawn chair, a couple hundred gallons of baby oil, and my ability to lie completely prostrate for hours at a time to guide me.

Brown baby. They also tell me I used to get “brown as a berry” as a baby. Apparently, I am supposed to take great solace in the fact that I was a real babe when I was FOUR.

Meanwhile back at the pool, well meaning friends tried to warn me. By late afternoon my back was starting to feel a wee bit warm and I thought about sunscreen for a nano-second, but my children blissfully sliding time and again down a waterslide and my need to be waiting at the bottom because, after all, how could I trust the no less than THREE lifeguards on duty, seemed the more pressing matter.

By the time we left the pool, my upper body was the approximate color of a ruby red grape. I radiated enough heat to toast a marshmallow and people just passing by clucked in sympathy and then, I don’t doubt, laughed uproariously when out of my earshot at how stupid some people can be.

Phase two. Now, a few days later, I am currently in phase two of the sunburn process, phase one being the getting burnt part.

Phase two is the back-slapping phase. In this phase people who have never shown even the slightest iota of interest in you previously, people who don’t even KNOW you, will suddenly be seized by the need to slap you on the back.

It’s as if there is a primordial siren call of seared skin. Seemingly unbidden they are moved to “slap!” you on the back with a hearty hail fellow well met even if they know not why.

As you cringe and slither to the floor in a heap of blinding red hot pain, they are left to state the obvious to soothe you, “little burnt huh?” “Little burnt huh?” is obviously code for “I hate you enormously and I wish to see you dead!,” that is the only possible explanation for this.

The only possible defense to back slapping is to make the universally recognized sunburn warning noise whereby you grit your teeth, pull back your lips, inhale briskly and spasm your body inward in the standing equivalent of the fetal position.

Sure, they’ll STILL slap you on the back, but with these motions you are slightly less likely to want to punch them. As if you could really lift your arms to take a swing anyway.

As the days have passed I have regained near normal movement in my upper limbs.

Shedding skin. I have also started to shed skin like a snake, lending whole new meaning to the phrase “You scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours!” My husband, lucky man that he is, gets to witness it all.

All I can say is that when it comes to reliving the sheer stupidity of the moment when I chose to eschew the necessity of sunscreen for the certainty of a not-so-slow burn, all I can say, is boy, was my face red.

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