To my dearest sister (age 11),

As you begin to gracefully enter your teen years, I will be leaving mine behind. I’m sure that you have heard many a time that your years as a teenager will be the best of your life. I can’t help but agree. As a sixth grader this year I’m sure that you are already beginning to realize this. I hope that the rest of my letter will provide you with a look at what is in store for you, as well as offer my advice.

In my eyes being a teen girl is much more fun than a teen boy. As a member of the female species, your body will magically morph from that of a little princess to a wonderfully awkward potato. I can’t describe it any other way. Some days you’ll rejoice because what’s better than being the base of French fries and potato chips? Other days you’ll realize how strange you actually look, but don’t worry it’ll pass rather painlessly. In addition, there’s no doubt your face will become distorted and you’ll have a 2 year streak of bad hair days, but that builds character right?

Who cares what you look like anyways? If you do turn into the type of person who looks in the mirror at least once a day, you’ll discover some fantastic goop known as “beauty products”. You’ll be able to transform your potato self into a beautiful goop covered potato. But never fear, with some hard work, you can even make it look “natural”. Most of your “friends” will also become interested in what you’re wearing. Now, clothing is tough because if you wear what everyone else does you’ll get busted for copying, but if you wear something different you’ll be sentenced to the “loser table” for being weird.

Being sent to anywhere but the popular table is social suicide. Having a clique of girlfriends is an integral part of surviving your teen years. What teen experience would be complete without a group of girls who eat lunch together every day and have Saturday night slumber parties and wear pink? Now beautiful adolescent sister, these girls will probably seem like the most important people in your life, so you should probably go and introduce yourself now, right?
Another one of my favorite parts of being a teen is when your potato self falls head over heels for some equally awkward boy. Of course you won’t see him as awkward; he’ll be the most beautiful thing to ever grace the face of the earth. No matter what he says or does, he’ll always be perfect. Always. Now at this point, you’ll probably go gossip to all of your pink wearing friends about this magnificent creature and they will do one of two things. The first (and more desirable) is tear him apart, crushing all of your hopes and dreams. The second is that they will inform you that they saw him first, and is therefore off limits. Regardless, that one will end quickly and you’ll emerge without any wounds.

Of course, all of those fun things happen in middle school. High school is the real adventure. High school is where memories are made, dreams come true, you’ll fall in love with the star football player and promptly get married. You’ll be interested to know that people change a lot between middle and high school. Your little clique? Here’s my guess- one will get hooked on drugs, one will be the good girl, another a two faced…witch, someone’s gonna get pregnant, one of you will be that girl no one likes and one will be the resident wild child. Which one are you gonna be? My point is that middle school clique is gonna fall apart you you’ll get to make new friends. Isn’t that fun?

On top of all of your friends, you’ll have school work that matters now! I don’t know about you but nothing screams fun like the weight of your entire future riding on each and every test you take. As early as your freshman year you’ll get to learn all about college and how awesome it’s going to be. Since I know you’re just as smart as me, you’ll most likely get roped into some sort of academic society. Don’t worry, it’ll be fun (and it’s much more than another line on your resume).

Around September of your junior year, you and all of your “friends” will become obsessed with the word “prom”. Believe me; I still get chills thinking about it. Prom is the be all and end all event of your high school existence. They say it’s even more important than getting married. Anyways you’ll spend all year looking at dresses and gossiping about prom dates. Because you’re going to go to the same school as I did, I trust you’ll have plenty of options. From the boy who keeps breaking your heart to that gorgeous senior to that kid you liked back in middle school, you’ll find someone. I’m sure you’ll have fun getting all dolled up, but the actual dance is the best. Since the school is so small you’ll practically have the whole dance floor to yourself, how romantic!

Somehow darling, you will find yourself half way through your senior year. You will be sitting on your bed like I am now, probably researching colleges. Or feeding your baby, or popping pills…depending on which person you chose to be. Anyways, at this point you’ll probably only have one or two friends left, the rest are too busy for you with their boyfriends and other petty things. I bet those pesky boys have stopped tugging on your heart strings (don’t worry; you can still probably steal a dance at their weddings!) I hope at this point you realize that you are a much better person than you feel like. And on the off chance that you’ve had a mental breakdown recently, congrats on surviving. Wasn’t that fun? Your teen years will be the ones you look back on and smile about, so make it worth it!

Your favorite sister,
Holly