Dear Friend,

The air feels like fall today.

The leaves are whispering.

I am trying to be patient. I wonder if waiting for the leaves to change color will be like watching water boil. Or will I just wake up and the parade of color will just be there.

Acorns are everywhere. The squirrels are working overtime. My friend invited me to her class on how to eat acorns. I'm not sure about it yet. If I taught the class here is how it would go:

Step 1: eat acorn

Step 2: there is no step 2

I know that there must be more to eating acorns. I asked my friend Harper via text:

Me: Trying to decide if I should go to a how-to-eat-acorns-class.
Harper: Please. Go.
Me: It's $15.
Harper: YOLO.*

There is so much to learn in this life.

I am not afraid...I was born to do this.

-Joan of Arc

We were all born to do this. We were chosen. To be born. A miracle in itself.

Ashley

P.S. If you've received this letter secondhand, you can leave your email address here to receive my weekly letters.

*Footnote for my mom: YOLO means You Only Live Once.

_I know what my assignment is: To wander. And read. And write. And create. Lather, lather, rinse, repeat. The more I do this, the less I think about what might have been or should have been. I find my own voice. I let myself watch movies and read and just sit in solitude for a while. I meet new people and actually hold conversations with them. These things are not lucrative…they will not put me on the cover of Fast Company or get me promoted….but they are food for my soul. I cannot have it all, but I don’t want it all. This is the ultimate promotion....._

I took the world into me, rearranged it, and sent it back out as a question: “Do you like me? -Jonathan Safran Foer