Dear Son

Dear Son,

Many parents wish to have children that are going to grow up to be the best-looking, richest, most successful men and women in the world, to make their parents proud. You know what my wish is for you, what would make me proud? If you were to be wonderfully, exceptionally average.

I want you to be smart, but not too smart. Extremely smart people are often socially inept. They also often feel isolated and removed from their peers, like they don't fit in. Or they feel most of society is beneath them because they're so brilliant. I want you to feel like you fit right in, that some people are smarter than you and some not as smart, but it doesn't matter, because you're too busy enjoying your life to think about those things.

I want you to be handsome, but not too handsome. Good looking people are treated differently from birth, and it's a struggle to not grow up thinking you're entitled when you're always getting the red carpet treatment because you're attractive. It's also not healthy to always get every guy or girl you're interested in, to always be the dumper and not the dumpee. A little unrequited love and the occasional broken heart is good for everyone.

I want you to be talented, but not too talented. This is a tough one, because there is nothing I would want more for you than to be a successful musician or artist of some kind, to enjoy what you do and make a decent living. But again, being insanely talented has drawbacks. The insanely talented often get taken advantage of by unscrupulous agents, managers, and accountants. The insanely talented are the media darling...until the inevitable brutal backlash. The insanely talented have few peers. The insanely talented are often tortured and lonely.

I want you to be just handsome, smart, and talented ENOUGH. And to know that you are always enough no matter what, even when you feel like you're just not making it, even when you're struggling.

I want you to be surrounded by love and friends who like you for you, not because of something you can do for them. I want you to feel like you fit in, and that you belong. I want you to know all kinds of people, relate to all kinds of people, and have empathy for them.

I want you to forever hover at the 50th percentile mark. I want you to be amazingly average to the world, even though you'll always be a star to me.

Love,

Your Mom