Becoming

“For me, becoming isn’t about arriving somewhere or achieving a certain aim. I see it instead as forward motion, a means of evolving, a way to reach continuously toward a better self. The journey doesn’t end.”

Michelle Obama

December 18, 2018

On the day tickets went on sale for the Dallas stop for former First Lady Michelle Obama’s cross-country book tour for her best-selling memoir, Becoming, I logged into the Ticketmaster website at 6:30 a.m. to try to secure tickets. Luck was on my side that day! The seats weren’t good, but it didn’t matter. I was going to be in the same place at the same time as Michelle Obama!

I am one of millions of women in this country starving for thoughtful intelligence from a national leader. I bought Becoming on the day it was released and read it in 3 days. The Dallas book tour event did not disappoint! Watching Michelle Obama interact with her friend, Valerie Jarrett (an added bonus to the event) was exactly what I needed!

Recently, Mrs. Obama shared with CBS a letter she penned to her college freshman self. Unsurprising, the letter went viral. The letter got me to thinking. What would I say to my 18 year-old self? When I think back to my high school graduation, I see my fear hidden behind hopeful optimism as I delivered the valedictory speech. Only hours before the ceremony, the tears had started to flow when I opened my graduation gift from my parents – a Pentax SLR camera – the gift of my dreams. I had started to read the card and the words my mother had written, but had stopped on the first line. I didn’t think I could get through my speech if I finished reading my mother’s note. Later, after the commencement and in the privacy of my bedroom, I finished reading the card and sobbed. Yes, I was excited about college and the future, but I was also scared.

Looking back with 40+ years of wisdom, what would I tell the person that sat on my bed that night and cried? Perhaps, I would say this.

Dear Shelli,

For the most part, you’re going to live a privileged life, although it will not be the one you imagine tonight. You will go to Oklahoma State University with your friends, but you’ll transfer to the University of Oklahoma in a couple of years when you fall in love with a basketball coach who lives closer to Norman, Oklahoma than Stillwater. You’ll graduate and eventually, you’ll even earn a Master’s degree. Your college tuition will be a financial burden for your parents, but you will be oblivious because you will be having too much fun. It’s only after you graduate that you will thank them for the sacrifices they made for your education.

You will pretty much skate through life with minimal hardships for the next 20 years. You’ll marry the basketball coach, fall into a meaningful career that you love, have a smart, beautiful daughter, whose smile dances in her eyes, and squeeze in some travel between basketball games and your daughter’s activities.

After your college graduation, you’ll get a job at the Oklahoma State Department of Health because Leslea Bennett-Webb will see something in the energetic, yet immature young woman and take a chance on you. That job will be fun because you will be surrounded by a group a people who will broaden your narrow view of the world. You will meet Nancy, who will become another life-long friend.

You are not an athlete by any stretch of the imagination, but you will fall in love with snow skiing in your 20s, and will spend many memorable times on the slopes in Colorado, Utah and New Mexico. You’ll even ski the Alps on a European trip with your friend, JoAnn. In fact, you will spend your 60th birthday snow skiing with friends in Breckenridge, Colorado, which will become one of your favorite places on Earth.

You will get lucky many times in your life, including in 1987 when Nancy invites Sue Mallonee along on a ski trip with you, Nancy and JoAnn. Sue will become a lifelong friend and will change the trajectory of your career.

Your career will afford you many opportunities to travel across the country and meet interesting, smart, and compassionate people. Those people will become your closest friends.

You won’t hit your first real roadblock until you receive a call from your sister on July 16, 1998 telling you that your father had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer at 65 years of age. It’s a telephone call that will shatter your “easy” life. He won’t survive, but you will have four months to say goodbye to him and tell him how much you love him. You will also get to witness an outpouring of love and support from people who love you and your family.

Your life will change after that, and for a long time, you will wonder if you will ever be happy again. Then one day, you’ll be talking to your friend Mendy, and you’ll hear something that you don’t recognize – the sound of your own laughter. Mendy will become an important person in your life. She, along with other friends, will be there for you during dark times.

In September 2007, you will get another call that will change your life. Greg Istre, a former colleague, will call to tell you about a job opening for the Director of the Injury Prevention Center of Greater Dallas at Parkland Hospital. After much consideration, you will go to Dallas to meet with Dr. Ron Anderson, the President and CEO of Parkland. He will offer you the job. After discussing it with your husband, you will accept the offer. You will fall in love again – this time with the city of Dallas and Parkland Health & Hospital System.

In 2008, you will witness the election of Barak Obama, an African American, as President of the United States. You will be out of the country in Winnipeg, Manitoba on the evening of the election with your friend and colleague Carrie at a Safe Communities meeting. Your Canadian colleagues will watch the election returns and cheer the results alongside you. Your daughter will call you from a party with her friends, and you will hear them cheering in the background.

You will feel elated and grateful and will personally experience 8 years of economic prosperity. Your career will flourish. Four years later, you will watch President Obama’s dismal performance in the first presidential debate for the 2012 election while crammed into a hotel room with friends in Wellington, New Zealand. President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will ultimately prevail in the election, solidifying 4 additional years of improved scientific research for public health.

Your life will be good, but you will not escape more sadness. You will lose good friends who will die too young from cancer. But, a telephone call from your sister-in-law in November 2009 will again bring you to your knees. Your 20 year-old nephew will decide to end his life. You will be wracked with guilt. Twenty years in the injury and violence prevention field will have taught you to notice the warning signs for emotional distress. When your nephew was young, you mention to your husband that you think he is depressed and should see a counselor. Your husband will tell you that it isn’t our place to suggest that. So, in an attempt to not disrupt family dynamics, you drop the subject. But, you don’t stop worrying. When your nephew dies, you feel responsible. Once again, your friends will be there for you, but it won’t erase the guilt you feel.

You will have opportunities to travel internationally, and it will wet your appetite for more travel. A wide range of friends and colleagues of different races, ethnicities, religions, and beliefs will populate your life. They will be patient and accepting of you and will give you a safe space to help you confront your privilege. You will meet your best friend for life, along with a group of amazing friends in Texas that you will dub “Team Texas.” These friendships will solidify your craving for diversity and continued learning.

You will witness marginalized and oppressed groups of people receive the same civil rights that you have enjoyed your entire life. This will feel like progress to you. From your “bubble,” you will think our country has finally become a better place for everyone.

But that belief will be crushed in November 2016. Your bubble will burst, and everything, EVERYTHING that you believed about this country will crumble. Hate crimes against non-white, non-Christians will increase. This will impact you in personal ways. Subtle sexual harassment aimed at your daughter in her workplace will become blatant and unbearable for her. Your friends will also be impacted and will fear losing their homes, rights, and jobs. Suddenly, you will see hate in the eyes of people who make racist, sexist, and misogynistic remarks; people you have sat beside. They will make these remarks in the name of Christianity. You will recall these people questioning your Christianity, and you will see not love, but loathing in their faces. You will be heartsick and disgusted. People who profess to care about you will hurt you with their words, actions and lack of understanding. And, you will want to remove yourself from their presence.

However, you will emerge from the darkness with the help of your friends. They will remind you that you are resilient. You will vow, again, to spend more time with those friends.

At the suggestion of your best friend, you will spend time searching for “moments of awe.” And, you will realize that you can still find inspiration in the midst of hate-filled rhetoric.

You will also decide that you will no longer sit beside hatred and remain silent. This will change some of your relationships. Your friend Mary Ann’s mantra will become yours as well – speak the truth in love. You will try your best to practice this, even when others do not.

To quote Pat Benatar, you will understand that it is possible to “dance through the wreckage left behind.”

So, go live your life. Embrace the fun and love in your future. Use the sad and hurtful times to learn and grow. And, make sure that the people who have helped you along the way know that you love them.

Love,

Your older self