A Note to My Future Self—With Daydreams & Latte Foam

Dear Me in 2025,​
I’m sitting in that tiny café on 5th Street—you know the one, with the chipped blue mugs and the barista who remembers we take our latte with extra foam. Outside, it’s pouring rain, and my iPhone 6 (the one with the cracked screen you swore you’d replace “next month” for six months straight) is dying, so I’m scribbling this on the back of a receipt before the battery dies.​
Ten years from now—can you even believe that? Right now, I’m 22, working a part-time job at the bookstore and staying up till 2 a.m. writing stories no one’s read yet. I still call Mom every Sunday, forget to water my succulent (again), and have a drawer full of old concert tickets I can’t bear to throw away. I wonder: Do you still do any of that?​
But let’s be real—I’m not just here to ask about succulents. I’m here to daydream, the wild kind, the kind that feels like stargazing on a clear night. Do we have pets that aren’t just cats or dogs anymore? Last night, I dreamed of a creature half-cat, half-AI—does it purr in binary, or still knead your lap like a real one? And what about the streets? Do we walk on paths that glow like bioluminescent rivers above the cars, or have we finally figured out how to make traffic disappear?​
I hope by 2025, we have “memory jars”—small glass jars that hold the smell of rainy afternoons in 2015, or the sound of Lila’s laugh when we got lost in Tokyo last summer. I worry I’ll forget those little things, the ones that feel so big right now. Do you still have that old notebook? The one with coffee stains on page 17, where I wrote down the idea for a book about people who can talk to plants? Has that book been written? Or did life get too busy, too “adult,” to sit and daydream about talking daisies?​
And hey—are we happy? Not the “I have a good job” happy, but the “I still stop to watch sunsets” happy. Do you still call Mom every Sunday? Is Lila still your best friend, even if she lives in another country? Do you ever look back at 2015 and smile, or do you cringe at how messy and hopeful I was?​
I’ve been putting $5 in a jar every month—labeled “Future Me’s Adventure Fund.” I hope you used it for something silly and wonderful, like a trip to a sky farm (yes, I’m imagining farms in the clouds now) or a ticket to a concert where the music plays in your head instead of through speakers. Don’t save it for “someday”—someday is now for you.​
If you’re reading this and things aren’t perfect, that’s okay. I know I’m messy, and I know life doesn’t always go like a daydream. But please—don’t lose the part of me that believes in talking plants and glowing paths and memory jars. Don’t stop staying up late to write, even if no one reads it. Don’t forget to water the succulent (seriously, it’s not that hard).​
Oh, and one more thing: Today’s my birthday. When your birthday comes around, buy yourself that chocolate cake you love— the one with the raspberry filling. Eat the whole slice. No guilt. You deserve it.​
I’ll be here, in 2015, saving up for your adventure and crossing my fingers that your world is even more magical than the one I’m imagining.​
See you in ten years,​
Your 2015 Self​