• Swim or sink.
• Life is not fair.
“Pete,” I said. “These are my Top Tips.”
A small smile played on his lips. “Yeah, I know. I thought they were pretty good advice for the little guy.”
I read on.
• Sometimes when nothing seems to have changed, everything has.
• You don’t always know yourself as well as you think you do.
• The truth comes out in the middle of the night.
• Some secrets are too hard to keep.
• Trust your instincts, even if they make no sense.
• You have to make your own decisions.
• When you make a decision, say it out loud.
• Be honest with your best friend.
• Mums can always tell when you’re lying.
• Be happy.
• What you don’t know can hurt you.
• All families have secrets.
• Right and wrong aren’t always easy to tell apart.
• Being freaked out and terrified is not the end of the world—it’ll pass.
• Life can be as lonely as a mountain, and as daunting.
• Chocolate always helps.
• A silly song can stop you from going crazy.
• Getting angry when someone’s yelling at you will just make everything worse.
• Sticks and stones may break your bones, but the things people say hurt more.
• This recipe makes the best flan in the world.
• It really isn’t too late to say sorry.
• Don’t jump to conclusions about someone.
• Don’t cry because it’s over; smile because it happened. And if you can’t do that, force a smile on your face and sob into your pillow later.
• Admitting you can’t know it all is scary for a control freak (like me).
I burst into tears.
Pete joked gently, “You cry a lot.”
“Yeah, giving birth does something funny to your hormones.” I smiled at him. “I have two more tips that I thought up but didn’t put on the site.”
I found a pen in my overnight bag and wrote them carefully below the list Pete had printed out.
• Be gentle with yourself.
• You will find a way.
Pete looked at what I’d written. “Those are good.”
I swallowed hard. I read over the list.
I tried to imagine you reading it, far away from me.
I said what was on my mind. “I … I don’t know if I want to give him away. I don’t know what to do, Pete.”
“Yeah, I was sort of— I was … feeling the same thing. He’s so—”
“We can’t look after a baby.”
He looked out the window. “You seem like you’d make a pretty good mum.”
“It’s crazy.”
“Yeah, but crazy isn’t always a bad thing.” He turned his grey eyes to me.
I said, “Perhaps you should have been the one writing the Top Tips. You’ve got a lot of sensible things to say.”
“You’re the list maker.” He sat on the edge of the bed. “I’ll do my best to help, you know.”
I watched him. I did know.
For the first time in ages, I knew what I wanted. I turned to look at you sleeping. I thought of all the advice I’d been giving everyone else but not following myself, all those Top Tips.
You pushed a small baby hand up into the air.
I wanted you.
Exhilaration and fear shivered over my body like a cold sweat. My life was over. My life was beginning.
I thought of something else I wanted to tell you one day. Face to face.
NUMBER 38: HOLD ON WHEN THE RIDE GETS BUMPY
Pete leaned over and held your tiny outstretched hand.
NUMBER 39: IT’S YOUR LIFE. LIVE IT
You opened your eyes.
EPILOGUE
Dear AmyAdvice,
I really love my boyfriend but he wants us to take our relationship to the next level, and I’m worried because I don’t know whether I really want to. I know I love him and I think he loves me, but I’m not sure it really feels right—does that make sense? All my friends have lost it, most of them forever ago, and my best friend thinks I’m being stupid for waiting. And I’m really worried if I don’t make my mind up soon, my boyfriend will find someone else, although I don’t think he’s that kind of guy, but I don’t really know. I don’t know what I want.
What should I do? Tell me soon before it’s too late …
Really Confused.
By the way, I really love this website. I really love the way your new Tips For Teens section lets anyone put up their own tips and advice.
Dear Really Confused,
Theres a lot of pressure on U right now. But U don’t know if you love UR boyfriend or not, U dont know if he loves U or if he just wants U for sex, U don’t know whether to trust UR friends’ advice or to trust UR own intuition and UR not sure what to do. Make him wait.
GigglyGirl
Really Confused,
Do NOT let any man push you when you’re not ready. You could end up pregnant or with HIV—use protection.
CarefulLaydee783
Dear Really Confused,
If he loves you, he’ll w8.
Brianne, 15
Dear Confused,
Im a guy and I think ur boyfriend sounds like a jerk … ur friends should be on ur side. Thats my advice.
Steve, 16
Dear Really Confused,
It’s okay to be unsure.
Most of us live our lives thinking we’re totally in control of everything that happens to us. Actually, life is outside of our control. Scary but true. Right now, you can’t control your feelings of uncertainty. So be uncertain. Let your boyfriend know that you’re not ready to make a decision, and that you won’t be rushed.
I’m telling you this from experience: trust your instincts even if they make no sense.
And remember, you know best. It’s your life after all.
AmyAdvice
IT’S BEEN REALLY HARD SOMETIMES. LONELY. SCARY. YOU HAD COLIC and didn’t stop crying for months. I quit school completely. I watched my dad sign for the divorce. I’ve been isolated, tired, overwhelmed.
I have a part-time job in a supermarket—dull, dull, dull. Mum looks after you when I work—her job with the wedding photographer is flexible. She and I have spent a lot of time together this year getting to know each other all over again. But you and I live with Dad (I never asked Mum how she ended up without her own house—some things are too hard to talk about). You got the spare room. Dad’s not so full of crazy dreams. It makes me sad sometimes when I remember how excited he used to get about stuff, but we’ve all had to be more grounded since you came along.
You’re in a Jolly Jumper right now. You look over at me with your slate-grey eyes. You laugh. You jump. Your feet leave the ground. You’re flying. I remember how much I used to want to fly. Huh. It seems so long ago.
Cleo and I don’t get to hang out as much anymore. A few months after you were born, she started seeing Griffin. They’re crazy in love. Griffin is so happy and I’ve never seen Cleo like this. Turns out everyone could see they were perfect together, except for me—but then, I was pretty self-absorbed at the time.
Cleo’s going to university at Manchester Metropolitan. She’s studying English and journalism. Griffin has a place there to take neuropsychology, and so they’ll move up there together at the end of the school year—just after your first birthday. They both promised they’d come to your party.
I’ll miss them.
Recently I set up a website for other teenagers who want to talk about sex, and for those who get pregnant. I give advice—whatever they decide to do with the pregnancy—and give them a space to communicate with one another. This means anyone logging in can give advice to anyone else, and then I throw in my thoughts too. It’s not always easy to know what to say—sometimes the questions
people ask cut very close. But I decided to use my own name for it, AmyAdvice. Miss Take-Control-of-Your-Life wasn’t exactly the right way to describe me anymore. Dad has a job with an online company. Something very boring, but it means he can help look after you while I’m at school. I’m studying photography at a local college part time. My exam results were easily good enough to be able to apply to Oxford, but, turns out, Oxford isn’t really where I want to go. Even if you were older and I could figure out the logistics, there are other universities that specialize in fine art with photography, which is what I’d like to study one day. For now, the photography class is pretty great. I’m going to base my photography project for class on a quotation I have up on my corkboard.
The best-laid plans of mice and men / Often go awry.
Robert Burns (paraphrased from the Scottish)
Mum and I have a great photography subject now. You. She comes over and we take photos together; she shows me what she learned at the studio. Sometimes I fantasize about setting up my own photography business, taking photos of weddings and babies. We’ll see how it goes. I’m still pretty good at making lists and plans, but babies, turns out, don’t always respect those plans.
And then there is your dad. He takes you out on weekends. When he comes over you light up, your smile filling your whole face. He and I have stayed friends. It’s not always easy, especially as he’s still with Kitty and I can’t stand her. But he’s a good dad to you. Like he promised he would be.
You might think I’m harbouring a crazy dream where Pete and I end up together and we become one happy family. I’m not saying I wouldn’t like that, but some things you just can’t plan. All we can do today is to be a good mum and dad to you. I’m starting by writing all of this out. Not for you to read, but to help me understand how we got here. Writing all of this out helps me remember where I got my list of things I want to tell you—the list that Pete and I plan to give you one day when you’re older. The list has thirty-nine things on it. Pete thinks there should be forty. He doesn’t know that there already are.
You’ve just started to fuss, little man. I’ll whisper to you the most important thing I want to tell you as I scoop you up in my arms.
NUMBER 40: LOVE IS WORTH THE RISK
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks, Lynne and Hadley. Thanks, Sarah and Allyson and everyone else at HCC.
Thanks, Carol, Michael, Jocelyn, Juna and Community Relations. Thanks, everyone at Saskatoon Public Library, for the terrific residency.
Thanks, Holly Calder, for directing me to the recipe.
Thanks, Barbara Hansen. The recipe Bird uses on page 241 is from her book Mexican Cooking. Find more recipes at EatMx.com
Thanks, Cassandra and Karen, for answering my calls.
Thanks, Jen, Richard, Natalia, Tim-Tim, Alexia and Adrian, for lots of fun.
Thanks, Emile, for printing. Thank you, Nicole, for holding the baby.
Thanks, Jocelyne Martel, both times.
Thank you, Mum, for all you’ve done. Thank you, Paul.
Thank you, Dad, for reading, advising and more. Thank you, Liz.
Thanks, Anneke—you’re the best. You are too, Jack.
Thanks, Yann. You know why.
Q&A WITH ALICE KUIPERS
What inspired you to write Forty Things?
When I initially came up with the idea, I was pregnant with my first child. I wanted to write a list of things that would be good rules to live by, things I wanted to tell my baby when he arrived in the world. I’d been toying in my mind with the idea of a teenage advice columnist, called Bird. She just kept appearing on the page when I’d sit down to write. I realized it was her story to tell, not mine. Her list of forty things gave me the structure I needed, and so the novel was born.
What was difficult about writing the novel?
Bird isn’t me, and so her decision process about her pregnancy isn’t the one I went through. Bird’s pregnancy is unplanned, and she has difficult choices to make. The choice she makes is right for her, and hopefully readers agree. But I also hope that readers don’t feel Bird is telling anyone else how to live. Sure, she starts the book thinking she has all the answers for everyone else, but by the end she comes to realize that her way of living is only one way of living, not the only way of living. It was difficult to get the right balance when I wrote this book—I wanted to tell Bird’s story, but I didn’t want to endorse one choice over the other.
The other part of the book that was tricky was getting the advice columns to sound right. I asked people to help me come up with particular problems and then to write their own letters so the voices would be distinct.
In the novel, Bird and Griffin have a complicated relationship. Why do you think she stays with him for as long as she does?
Bird is the type of person who finds it hard when her vision of the world doesn’t work out. I tried to hint at this by giving her photography as a hobby. When she takes a photograph, she’s trying to make order out of her world—except the world isn’t an orderly place that can be controlled. She’s so sure that Griffin is the right guy for her that, even when it’s obvious he isn’t, she can’t give up the security he provides.
What are you working on now?
I’m working on another YA novel and a book for young children. The novel is still in the mysterious, murky phase. The picture book is called The Best-Ever Bookworm Book by Violet and Victor Small.
What writing tips do you have for aspiring authors?
I have three main tips that I give (and check out my website, www.alicekuipers.com, for regular prompts and writing advice):
1. Read. The more you read, the more you see what the written word can do. There is so much potential with language to tell the stories you want to tell.
2. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. Writing should only appear effortless in the final stage, that of the finished book. Before that, writing is difficult—words come out all wrong, paragraphs get mixed up, whole pages need to be deleted. That’s all okay. It’s part of the process.
3. Believe that what you write is worth it. So what if you don’t get published straight away? I didn’t get published for years, and lots of the words I wrote during that time have only been read by me. You are your book’s first and best reader, so enjoy those projects that never get shared. Publication isn’t the only goal.
Copyright
40 Things I Want to Tell You
Copyright © 2012 by Alice Kuipers.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks.
ePub Edition © JANUARY 2012 ISBN: 978-1-443-40589-8
Published by HarperTrophyCanada™, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
Flan recipe on p. 241 from Mexican Cookery by Barbara Hansen,
reprinted by permission of the author (www.EatMx.com).
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
HarperTrophyCanada™ is a trademark of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.
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Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication data Kuipers, Alice
40 things I want to tell you / Alice Kuipers.
ISBN 978-1-44340-587-4
I. Title. II. Title: Forty things I want to tell you.
PS8621.U38F67 2
012 jC813’.6 C2011-905892-8
RRD 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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Alice Kuipers, 40 Things I Want to Tell You
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