August Theme: The Creative Life
Big Question: How do we build a creative life that works for us?
Week 4: Preparing for What Comes Next
What I wrote below is based on the following creative writing prompt included in Saturday’s Writing Prompts for What Comes Next in Your Creative Life post.
Prompt: A Meeting Across Time
Write a scene where your present self and your future self meet. Imagine that you meet yourself in person five, ten, or twenty years from now, or even one year from now. Where do you meet? What does your future self know that your present self doesn’t? And most importantly, what questions do you ask each other and what does this meeting reveal?
Why did I choose it?
I chose this prompt because I have a complicated relationship with my imagined future, as many of us do, I’m sure. Especially those of us who grew up in broken homes or had to endure setbacks, uncertainty, and tragedy at a young age. So, I’m wondering if working on it might help me sort through that complicated relationship in some way shape or form, and maybe even allow me to dream a little.
To be honest, I don’t think I’ve allowed myself to envision my life beyond the next handful of years in front of me… maybe ever. I’ve never seen the future horizon of my life beyond getting myself through school and getting a job and settling down and now continuing to build my writing career, which certainly has taken on a life of its own. And I’m not sure how much of that is due to my past.
The draft that follows might be something I end up keeping in a private folder or toss eventually. But I’ll leave it here for a little while, to see what happens and how I feel about it in a few days.
Let me know if you end up completing this prompt too, or any of the others from yesterday’s post. I’d love to chat about it!
My Response
“Did we ever…?”
I sip my coffee as the dregs of the question linger in the aromatic air between us, waiting for her to inhale the vapors of its emotional weight. But without intentional energy behind it, it evaporates soon after it crosses over my lips instead.
“Did we ever…?”
The half-smirk and twinkling eyes that accompany her mimicry are mischievous refusals. She’s obviously not going to let me get away with not asking what I need to ask, what I came here to ask. Which is downright obnoxious because she is me. Well, me in what… fifteen years probably? So I know that she knows exactly what I’m asking… or what I want to ask but refuse to articulate clearly and boldly aloud in a public space.
This is so unlike me. As an innate philosopher, writer, and reader, I am never at a loss for words. And I certainly never shy away from asking questions! Asking questions is my core M.O. Even when it’s to my own detriment and turns people against me. And should certainly remain my M.O. when the questions I’m expected to ask are related to the trajectory and purpose of my life. Questions that only she can answer… or so it seems.
Just ask those closest to me. Those who see me every day. My oldest friends. Ask anyone. Ask her. I’m filled with nothing but questions— about the meaning of life, the meaning of my life, the meaning of my work, the meaning of my relationships, the meaning of the universe’s grand design, the meaning of everything.
So why am I unable to ask her what I really want to know right now? Now that I have the opportunities to get real answers about whether I’m on the right path with my work, my family, my hopes, dreams, and aspirations…
“Will I ever see you again?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” she responds.
I nod, as if this is a sufficient answer.
“Are you a ghost? Am I hallucinating?”
She laughs, taps the saucer underneath her espresso cup then bends sideways, leaning toward the table next to ours.
“Excuse me, can I grab one of those extra napkins you have?”
The man she’s speaking to hands her a napkin from the modest pile next to his computer without taking his eyes off his screen.
“Thank you,” she says, turning to face me again, an amused look on her face.
I nod in understanding again, though I’m not ready to lay down my defenses completely just yet.
“So, you’re a real-life doppelgänger here to antagonize me then?”
She sniggers, then gives me a pointed look when she realizes I’m mostly serious.
“You’re the one who invited me to get coffee, remember?”
“True,” I admit. “But that was only after you literally ran into me at the park across the street and I was forced to replace the coffee that was spilled as a result.”
She smirks again.
“So, you’re saying I orchestrated that?”
I shrug in response.
“To what end?” She leans in closer, intrigued. Or potentially bracing herself for the story she thinks I’m about to make up. It’s hard to tell.
I shrug again, then involuntarily look over at the man who gave her the napkin, as he is now making a real racket pounding away at his keyboard, completely absorbed in his work and unaware of our conversation.
“Stop stalling already and just ask me what you really want to ask me.”
She folds her hands loosely, then places them on the edge of the table and casually surveys the room.
I’m boring her.
I take another sip of my coffee, trying to hide how annoyed I am… even though I am actually stalling, if I’m being honest.
Am I always this frustrating to talk to, I wonder. Or will this happen as I age? Or am I just frustrated that she knows all my evasive maneuvers, and that even if she doesn’t know verbatim what I’m going to say next, she’ll still know the gist of it before I utter a word?
“You never told me you were me from the future, so how did I know?”
She looks directly at me, leans back and opens her arms and hands, gesturing toward her body and face, which are obvious replicas of mine, though tinged with age.
“How did you get here then?”
“I was always here.”
I’m not sure what to do with that tidbit of information just yet, so I don’t say anything.
“Besides,” she adds, “how do you know that you aren’t the one traveling into the future?”
I glare at her even though I can tell she’s being sincere, like she genuinely wants to solve the mystery of our encounter together.
“Sorry,” I say, meaning it.
“That’s okay,” she says, quickly following up with, “But why aren’t you asking me what you really want to ask me? Because on some level, you already know all the answers to the questions you’re asking me.”
“I don’t know.”
“Yes you do,” she deadpans.
“Well, it’s usually better to ask questions you already know the answers to, isn’t it?”
She laughs. Loudly. Three people in line and two crossing the threshold of the side door stare for a beat before carrying on with their coffee-shop-related business. But the man with the napkins does not even flinch.
“That is one of the most ridiculous things you have ever said. And I know for a fact you don’t believe it and never will.”
She’s smiling, unashamed of the mirth covering her face. Her strikingly familiar yet unfamiliar face.
And she’s right. I don’t believe it. Not for a second.
“So…?” She probes.
I take another sip of my coffee, noticing its rich, smooth flavor for the first time since we sat down.
“The truth is—” I start, but she cuts me off.
“—you don’t really actually want to know what happens, or the choices I made that I can’t undo but you presumably could. Not really. Because once you do know, you know you can’t go back to not knowing. And also know that you’ll make different choices than I did anyway because you have to do things on your own terms, regardless, especially if something is being presented to you as guaranteed, and especially if those guarantees are coming from your future self, who could also be some evil doppelgänger ghost. Because how could you ever really know I’m not?”
She downs her espresso in one gulp, winks, then dabs her lips with the napkin she was gifted.
“Besides,” she continues, “even though I appear to be doing alright, and present as your exact clone just older, you’ll still want to explore different options than I did if you know the exact path I took because there are too many possibilities worth exploring despite what I know and decide to share with you. And you’ll always wonder if I lied or skewed events. Not because you think I’m some evil entity coming to wreck your life. No, nothing like that. But because you know I’ll want to protect you from egregious errors, even if I know you still need to make them.”
I am so caught up in what she’s saying that I barely register that there’s no coffee left in my cup when I try to take another sip.
Without skipping a beat, she slides over her second full espresso cup toward me, as if she had anticipated my needs all along.
“Not to mention, you like the unknown. In fact, you thrive in the unknown. It’s what makes you resourceful, which is just another form of creativity. More so than when you have a plan with an assumed straight line. Probably due to some unresolved childhood traumas and the like, but that’s a discussion for another time, if we’re so granted.”
I slam the espresso, relying on it to make me feel as awake as possible, so later there is no way I can try to convince myself this is all a dream.
“Plus,” she goes on, “there is also the potential that appearances are deceiving and I’m not actually doing alright, even if it is only temporary, so you’d rather just never know. Because why? What would me telling you about the path I took do for you right now? Other than make you feel overwhelmed or paranoid? And who needs that? Not to mention, if fate is a real thing, who’s to say I wasn’t you now, with future me, or us, telling me what path they took back when I was your age?”
She sighs, as if relieved to finally let all of that out. As if she had been holding all of it in for decades.
A few moments of contented silence pass between us before I speak again.
“You were here, in the position I’m in now, weren’t you?”
She grins.
“She ran into me, literally, in the Taj Mahal. Then we had tea.” She smiles at the memory.
My eyes widen.
“I go to India?”
“ I don’t know, do you?” she asks, challenging me, while also indicating that she’ll support whatever my answer ends up being.
My Reflection and an Invitation
Writing this piece was cathartic for me, as it allowed me to appreciate my pragmatism in a new way. At first, I thought my future self would tell my present self specific details about the future, or offer advice of some sort, even if it was cryptic. But the more I wrote, the more I realized how wrong that felt, to me anyway, as it seemed dishonest and a bit clichéd. I also realized how much I really don’t want to know precisely what happens, even if I was ever offered the opportunity to know the future. No, truly, all I could think about is how crippling such information could be to my psyche and creative spirit.
However, I did discover what I did want when envisioning my future self during this writing exercise. Mainly, all I wanted, needed even, was a simple reminder that the rest of my life story is still there for me to write in whatever way I see fit. And whether that story is preordained by some cosmic source outside of my control or purview or not is currently none of my business. So, I will just keep writing for now, then see what path opens up in front of me as a result.
How about you? What did this prompt or creative writing piece surface for you?
Leave a comment or join this month’s Drafters Workshop chat so we can discuss your writing related to Writing Prompts for What Comes Next in Your Creative Life, or anything else you’re currently working on.
Whether you join the chat to share your responses to this week’s prompts, ask questions, workshop an excerpt of something else you’ve written, or simply want to encourage others, we’d love to see you there as we explore what it means to build the creative lives we truly want throughout August.
Continue Exploring August’s Theme, The Creative Life
This Week: Preparing for What Comes Next
Writing Prompts for What Comes Next in Your Creative Life
Popular Posts from Week 3: The Messy Middle
Writing Prompts for Navigating ‘The Messy Middle’
Reading Notes: The Cemetery of Untold Stories
Popular Posts from Week 2: Creative Habits
Immersive Storytelling Mode and the ArXiv
Reading Notes: The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
The Habits That Help Me and My Creative Life Most
Popular Posts from Week 1: Making Space
A Day Alive in the Lakeside Library
How to Make Space and Time for Your Creative Life
The Creative Life as Play and Work
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