Left: Mary Schmich, post-treatment
Back in 1997, the world was enamored by a graduation speech delivered at MIT by Chicago Tribune columnist Mary Schmich. The speech was then published as an article titled "Advice, like youth, probably just wasted on the young" in the Chicago Tribune. It went on to become one of the most emailed and quoted articles on the internet in the last ten years, and was even made into a song called "Wear Sunscreen" by Baz Luhrmann.
Nearly 15 years have passed, and while many are familiar with the now famous "Wear Sunscreen" speech, few people realize that prior to having written that version of the speech, and around the time she was going through a particularly difficult divorce, Mary Schmich was suffering from a severe bout of depression with symptoms that included acute paranoia and, from what we gather, agoraphobia. When the earliest draft of her speech surfaced recently among the pages of a diary that was discovered by a rummaging hobo in a discarded shoebox with Schmich's name on it along with miscellaneous objects that included a voodoo doll, crucifix (possibly upside down, we can't be sure), seven tarot cards, a ouija board (missing the letter "R"), and a necklace made from perforated Prozac pills with the word "pain" etched in tiny letters on every pill, the world was confronted with a very different version of those feel-good words of advice that have been forwarded from inbox to inbox by peppy overachievers all over the globe.
Below is the original (and somewhat darker) version of this celebrated modern ode to youth:
"Inside every hollow shell of a human being lurks a spiteful harpy dying to smite the cold heartless world with bloodied talons of vengeance; some world-weary hag eager to binge on ice-cream, tequila and morphine capsules while young people live out their beautiful lives, rollerblading and snowboarding. Most of us, alas, will never be loved or recognized for who we really are because you never really appreciated me father, never, but there's no reason we can't entertain ourselves by composing a Guide To Life For Precious Young People With the World Handed To Them On A Silver Plate And Everything To Still Live For.
I encourage anyone over 26 not currently undergoing electroshock treatment to try this, and thank you for acting like you're not freaked out by my bandaged wrists. Ladies and gentlemen of the class of '97:
Don't go out in the sun.
If I could offer you only one tip for the future, staying out of sunlight would be it. The long-term benefits of staying the fuck away from direct exposure to a giant flaming hydrogen-fueled astroball of nuclear fusion that force-feeds barbecued melanomas to your face has been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable--or frightening--than my own futile and pointless existence. I will dispense this advice now, because when I speak, the voices in my head, mercifully, don't.
Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. By "power" and "beauty" I actually mean "anxiety" and "despair". So yeah, go ahead and enjoy that. Oh, never mind. You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth until you realize you never actually had any power and beauty... although you did have halitosis. But trust me, in 20 years you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now how terrible your clothes were, how many zits you had on your disproportioned mug, and how clumsy and awkward you really looked with your big potato nose and hideous hairdo.
You are not as fat as you imagine, but you're definitely as fat as other people think you are.
Don't worry about the future... unless you're already in your mid-20s, in which case you should definitely start worrying about the future, especially the likelihood that if you don't get your shit together right now you will never amount to anything in life and most likely die poor and alone. The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind until it's too late, like that tumor in your head that will eventually blind you at 4pm on some idle Tuesday.
Do one thing every day that scares children.
Fret.
Don't be reckless with other people's hearts if you're not even going to get any sex out of it. If people are reckless with yours then make sure you still at least get some sex out of it.
Bicker.
Don't waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you're a winner, sometimes you're a loser. The trick is to stop being such a loser. The race is long and, in the end, it's mostly between you and your former classmates whose success makes you depressed about what a loser you are.
Forget compliments, because that's what you'll receive from opportunistic flatterers who want to pamper your vanity in return for annoying favors. Remember insults, because you have no choice, since they will HAUNT YOU FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE
Keep your old love letters. Also keep your old bank statements until the divorce comes through in case you need to prove what a life-draining leech your spouse was and how they don't deserve any alimony.
Drink.
Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life, or about how disappointed your parents are because of your ungrateful egotism and laziness. The most indecisive people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives. Some of the most clinically-depressed suicidal 40-year-olds I know still don't.
Get plenty of calcium along with all the other essential minerals and vitamins, without which you'll die. Be kind to your knees. You'll miss them when they're gone. That's not a threat, it's just a friendly warning about what might accidentally happen to you if you were to claim custody of the kids, Richard.
Maybe you'll marry, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll have children, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll rub vaseline around the rim of your anus with your pinky finger before inserting a butt plug while masturbating in the toilet when your ex-wife's not home Richard, you sick pervert, maybe you won't. Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either. In fact, try and avoid talking to yourself in public altogether because I think it's starting to creep everybody out.
Enjoy your body, but don't enjoy it too much because then you'll go blind, and probably even start considering whether at some point you wouldn't mind experimenting with butt plugs, right Richard?
Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but in someone else's living room as you swill vodka and painkillers before vomiting in the kitchen sink, assaulting one of the other party guests, defecating on the bathroom floor, and eventually passing out in the bathtub with the door locked as you hear muffled voices calling for an ambulance.
Read the directions... unless you're autistic, in which case, memorize the directions.
Don't read beauty magazines unless you need some tips on how to be less ugly.
Get to know who your parents are, you bastard sons of whores. But don't get to know them in the biblical sense, because that's just wrong. Be nice to your siblings. They're the only ones you can comfortably fart around without having to close your legs or leave the room or wonder why your parents always loved them more than they love you.
Understand that friends come and go... although in your case they mostly just go, because let's face it, you're a bit of a douche. Work hard to bridge the gaps in language and intelligence, because the older you get, the more you need people who can understand what the fuck you're talking about.
Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you anything like any character in any reality show or sit-com based in New York City. Live in Northern California once, but leave before you realize you're a man and you shouldn't be eating tofu and getting cinnamon enemas and just generally being really completely totally gay - unless of course you are gay, in which case, why the fuck would you leave Northern California in the first place if you were never even going to commit to this marriage, Richard?
Act shocked.
Accept certain inalienable truths: The first 15 minutes of a romantic comedy is the only part of the film worth watching - much like your life. E=mc2. You, too, will get old. And when you do, you'll fantasize that when you were young, romantic comedies and your life were actually fun, that the theory of the measurement of inertial frames of reference means that there is no absolute and well-defined state of rest because all uniform motion is relative and life is meaningless anyway so what's the point, and that children then were just as bored as they are now by old failures like you going on and on about their childhood.
Respect your elders, even if they don't respect you back as they go on and on about how today's youth is no good and how everything was soooo much better back in their day and how they already had children when they were your age; but respect them anyway, just don't listen to the senile passive-aggressive fuckers.
My bed is my fortress, my bed is my fortress, my bed is my fortress, my bed is my fortress.
Don't expect anyone to support you besides your dad and your husband (until the faggot leaves you because he thinks you're self-destructive). Maybe you have a trust fund? Maybe you'll have a wealthy husband? But you never know when your dad or your wealthy husband might tragically pass away after accidentally tripping and falling down the stairs with no eye witnesses and a watertight alibi, thereby leaving all that money to you... for example.
Don't mess too much with your hair or by the time you're 40 it will look really really messy. And grey. And lonely.
Be distrustful whose advice you buy, and be argumentative with those who supply it. Advice is a form of bullshit, which is exactly what you've been listening to for the last ten minutes. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it's worth, then throwing it away again when you're done with it, unless someone asks you for advice once more, in which case you can fish it back out, wipe it down all over again, paint over the ugly parts, and recycle it for more than it's worth, although maybe not as much as the first time around. How's that for a pithy, razor-sharp metaphor Mr. Hard-to-Please Shitkick Tribune editor?
But trust me on the sun. Stay in your house, shut the blinds, disconnect the phone, don't answer the door.
The sun wants to kill us all."
