dear @Diane_Keaton...

As I finished the last pages of “Let’s Just Say It Wasn’t Pretty” and sat down to write this I poured coffee into one of my old standby mugs.  It’s white and simple and has the Thoreau quote “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you’ve imagined.” printed in big black letters.

A quote that also appears on my wall and on a notebook I just received as a present on my 32nd birthday.  A quote that at some point became a mantra when I wasn’t paying attention.

I never imagined I’d have a streak of white hair threatening to turn my life into a cosplay of an X-Men character at 32.  Or that I would break my toe on a vacuum cleaner at 30, and my wrist falling out of bed at 26.  

I certainly never imagined that I would go confidently in the direction of being a photographer, quitting my stable job and flying into my dream just before the industry imploded.  Or that I would start over as a writer.

But here I am.

Last week as a deadline to submit my work approached I was tied in nervous knots.  I mused aloud “do successful people have those same fears?”  Then I hit submit and picked up your book, which I had been trying to find the time to read as part of The Social’s “Social Chapter” book club selection.

I laughed, I cried, I checked my hair for thinning.  I googled “patrician nose” wondering how mine compared.  And then I sat down to write you a letter, only to remember that despite the overwhelming feeling of knowing you for 192 pages, I don’t actually know you.

So please accept this open thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for being you.  And for being brave enough to share yourself with me and everyone else.  So that I could be a little happier about being me.

~Katherine