If I Die Young

"Make me a rainbow, I'll shine down on my mother, she'll know I'm safe with you as she stands under my colors."

So I guess I’m dead now. I would really prefer if you said that I’m dead. I didn’t “pass on”, I wasn’t “taken from you” or “bite the dust”. I died, just as nature gave me life, it also gave me death. Avoiding your mortality isn’t a reason to stay indoors and not walk around barefoot. Rather a reason to thank God for shoes and doors when we need them. Don’t stop living just because I have. I always hated a copycat.
I understand you will each grieve your own way but I can imagine who this will be hardest for and you will need each other. So once a year, on whatever day seems significant to you, get together. When you imagine yourself with me, who else is in the picture? Reunite with those people at least once a year and read this together if it helps. For one day, screw being on a diet.
Remember me by doing what I love and I love relationships. What matters most in life is who is in your life; they are what make it. Most importantly: family. So don’t spend your days rushing task to task and climbing the ladder of life. You need to make time for people. What creates and strengthens relationships is quality time. Sometimes that means involving yourself in one less activity, getting out of work early, not cleaning your room and instead make people spend time with you. They may not realize how much they need it. Even if you can only meet once a week for lunch, do it.
Wake up everyday knowing how lucky you are. Not only are you alive and I’m not, but you are blessed with so many privileges and it is easy to forget. “Privilege is the headache you don’t know that you don’t have.” –Ani Difranco. Use the opportunities you are afforded to create opportunities for those who are dealt a harder hand in life. You owe the world that. Give of your time, give of your money and give of your heart.
I believe you should eat ice cream. Eat ice cream as much as you please and love yourself while you are doing it. Because I love you and since I am no longer there, you need to show yourself the love that I can no longer display. Love others intentionally and unconditionally. Despite their sexual orientation, their ethnicity, their grades, their sex lives, their party lives, their improper grammar, their financial situation, their nationality, etc.. despite all this, love them and don’t try to change them.
Offer your seat to an elderly person, make silly faces at babies in the grocery store, give the kids you babysit too much candy, tell your friends you love them every time you see them (Warning: they will roll their eyes). Make the most of the world we were given and I hope you know by now that it wasn’t the laws of nature that created you, but the creator of the laws of nature. There is someone to thank for this world, do you best to find out how to get to them. Don’t stop questioning everything you are told, find out for yourself. In the end, it’s okay to agree or disagree, as long as it is through your own logical reasoning and conscious. Just never stop trying to discover the truth.
On that note, persistence is what is needed for each of these things. You won’t typically see the fruits of your labor immediately, but after routine practice, you will.

Don’t give up.

Don’t give up on yourself or others.

Don’t give up on your dreams, even when you can’t fall asleep.

Fall in love by choice, not by gravity. Plan each step of your life, but when there is nowhere to step… jump. Trust the ground even after you trip and forgive them sky even as it rains. Take your time getting here, I don’t mind waiting. Give some people directions on how to get here before you go. Take a right at the North Star and on until morning... it’s not in the GPS.