Hey Alan,
I hope sophomore year is treating you well. I know my sophomore year of high school was the eye of a hurricane. It felt a little bit like a calm, trial period of being a pseudo-adult before you get hit by junior year lock-in and college applications. Sophomore year was also about when mom started giving me what would become her favorite lecture.
“Don’t miss the train,” she would always chide me. “Get on the train now and your life will be easy. All you have to do is ride. If you miss the train now, you’ll spend the rest of your life running after it.” Somehow, no matter how many times I heard them, the words always seemed to sharpen themselves into acupuncture needles on their airborne journey to my heart. Even hearing them for the hundredth time in the midst of college applications, her advice kept a certain rawness simply because it came from her. After all, mom really has spent her whole life thinking she missed the train…