Honors Language Arts 10
11-16-2014

My favorite part of the day is the first ten seconds I am awake. The alarm wakes me in it’s harsh demeanor and for that brief moment, I don’t know who I am. I don’t have to face the burden that has come along with my life long trend of mediocrity. But my blissful ignorance is crushed all too soon by return of my sad reality. I am a thirty four year old man, living in the basement of my mother’s two story home for fifty dollars a month. I drive my nineteen ninety six Toyota Corolla to my minimum wage job at the local video rental store. I come home, eat, sleep, and repeat.

This day started off just like any other average Tuesday would. The alarm placed on my bedside table woke me up at nine. I rolled out of my bed in it’s racecar frame, the usual gray walls had changed to the wood paneling that had been up the day we moved in back when I was 8. I heard some muffled voices and footsteps upstairs, far too loud to be my one hundred and thirteen pound mother. I pulled on clothes that I strewn across the floor the day before and crept along the staircase leading upstairs to investigate.

The stairs creaked under the weight of my feet as I approached the basement door. Luckily the door was cracked open so I could peek through the sliver of light. When I looked through the opening my brain couldn’t comprehend what I was seeing. It couldn't be true. I saw a boy, about 8 years old, wearing the same jacket I always wore, struggling with the same yellow yoyo that I had always struggled to master but inevitably failed, like most everything else I ever did.
“Matthew come over here” I heard my mother call, only it wasn’t the shrill old call my mother has nowadays, it was the sound of a much younger relaxed version of my mother. I jumped where I stood because I thought she was talking to me but then the little boy who bore a striking resemblance to me moved from where he stood and walked over to his mother, to my mother. There was no getting around it, by some stroke of fate I had been sent back to the days of my childhood, I could see a moving van parked curbside next to the house. In this odd turn of events I decided it was a blessing, I could change my past to brighten my future, now all I needed to do was get my past self alone for a few minutes to talk to him.

Peering my head through the door I could see that the entry way was clear. My mother was out on the lawn dictating to the movers the destination of a few boxes and I heard the pitter patter of little footsteps above me. Now was my chance, I sprung from my hiding place and went through the kitchen which had a calendar hanging from the refrigerator- 1989 the calendar read. This was more than enough to affirm my suspicions that I was in fact in my past and was about to speak with the eight year old version of myself..
I slowed my pace once I reached the stairs and crouched down as I climbed them as stealthily as my thirty four year old body would allow me to. I came to the top and turned right, I saw an open door at the end of the hall and walked to it, remembering it was the location of my old bedroom. Inside I saw myself sitting on the end of my old bed. I opened the door a little further so I could walk through and he turned his head around to see who had bothered to disturb him.
“Who the heck are you?” he exclaimed, startled.
“Okay man, this is gonna sound crazy but I’m you, just from the future, It’s like in those  Back To The Future movies you love so much, and I need you to listen to me very carefully” I responded
“Prove it”
“ Okay, well I know that you always keep the stone you found on the last camping trip your dad took you on before he passed, and I know that you’ve never had a dog, you play the piano but not well, and the only time you feel at peace is when you’re alone”
“Dang I guess you are me. I didn’t think I would be that ugly, how old are you anyway?”
“Thirty four, but that’s besides the point, listen to me Matthew, my life-our life in the future, its no good. I’m still living at home working a crap job. I have nothing going for me”
“So you came back in time to tell me how depressing your life is? Thanks”
“You don’t get it do you?”I asked him “You grow up to become me, we’re the same person. So I came to warn you, to tell you that the decisions you now have a huge impact on your life. You have to give one hundred percent in everything you do. Study hard and do all the things I was too stupid or chicken to try. You’ve got to seize every moment you are given.”
“Okay, okay”
“That moment ten minutes ago when I first saw you, thats gone forever. You only get one shot at life, don’t blow it like I did, it isn’t worth it. Promise to me you won’t make the same mistakes I did”
“I promise...” his words were cut short by the buzzing of my alarm clock, I slowly faded out of that reality and back into my own.
My eyes opened and I leaned up and looked around, I was no longer in my mom’s basement. I was in an unfamiliar large bedroom, I looked next to me and saw a pretty woman with a large wedding ring on her finger. I got out of bed and walked out the door into a hallway which had a mirror hanging on it, I stared into it and I saw myself, only it was a much better version of me, clean shaven, fitter, and overall better looking. Walking around my spacious house I saw a family photo of what must be my wife and two children, as well as a trophy for entrepreneur of the year.
“Nice”