To my future daughter, should I be blessed with one:

Sweety - Please know that, as long as I am alive, I will be there to help you, support you, teach you, and learn with you. I will do everything in my power to make your childhood a pleasant one, and arm you as best I can for a full, succesful, pleasant life. I have learned that restricting freedom does not aid in the development process; so despite my fears, and any nervousness your mother and I may have, I pledge to always try and give you as much freedom as is warranted, to let you explore and choose your own paths. I have found that this leads to women maturing much sooner, learning how to make much better choices, and value their own mind and independence.

In my experiences with women, I have found that many make mistakes and poor choices, usually from the ages of 16 sometimes extending to the age of 28, depending on intellect, maturity, and common sense. This usually makes them almost impossible to love, as they continually wrestle with what they want and who they are, reinventing themselves or pretending they are someone or something else, or sometimes falling into desperate situations. So, let me put it this way: you are going to screw up. If possible, I would like to limit this period of poor choices and intense screw-ups to just a few years, hopefully with limited long-term consequences - after which you will emerge, like a butterfly from its cocoon, aware of who you are and ready to succeed in life.

While approaching or experiencing this period of finding out who you are, which may be punctuated by various incredibly bad choices, please refrain from breaking the hearts of any good, decent, caring, awesome men. They are not as exceedingly rare as you might have been told (I would estimate maybe 10% of men, given my lifetime interactions) but you will not meet them as often as you will other men; and when you do, they might not have the courage or self-confidence to approach you. But you will know them because of how they feel about you, how they cherish time with you and want nothing but to make you happy, and sacrifice huge portions of themselves to make this so. So if you are being bratty, immature, or just really callous because you have no clue who you are right now - don't take it out on him. If you have a great guy, either stop and think about how lucky you are, or break things off as compassionately as you can so you can go screw up whatever you need to screw up.

Don't date men much older than you. 4, 5 years is about the max I would recommend. Why? Well, I've tried dating younger women - heck, even women my age in my teens and twenties - and often, our heads and hearts aren't on the same page...or same planet, even. There is some idea that during school, women are advanced in their maturation...but many women are coddled, over-protected, or just plain naive; so that isn't necessarily true to start with, and post-high school, it seems to be somewhat inverted (again, in my experience). When dating at 24 or 25, most girls my age were a mess; only around 28 or so did they begin to get their head straight, realize what a good guy was worth, and see a clear plan or idea of their life.

I know older men will be attractive to you - established, in the real world, perhaps well off with cars and homes and all that. And they will most likely be interested in younger women, of course. But ask yourself what you are both really looking for. If the man is older...why is he looking at women so much younger? Is he immature? Not ready to settle down? Or just going for the youngest, tightest eye-candy he can find? Perhaps he has baggage - divorced, kids, history, messy stuff. Maybe he's just looking for someone young and impressionable enough to fall for him, and accept/ignore all the baggage. Maybe he is looking to finally get a young cutie, now that he is financially secure and has a house and assets to offer. Is that the type of relationship you want? A guy who can't catch a woman his own age, or doesn't want that pressure or level of committment...and you, looking to someone older to provide you with a place to live, educate you on life, probably take care of you while you stunt your personal development and growth? I hope not.

Don't get married too soon. Or rush to have kids. Get married when you are sure, that's all. If it's your first relationship, and the guy has proven all he needs to over a few years, then by all means. If you have a string of failures or heartbreaks, or manage to screw things up, don't immediately settle. Men are dangerous - I've had episodes myself. We lie, all kinds of lies. Big, huge, years-long lies. Hiding all kinds of things. Even the man you know and trust the most in the world is never, ever 100% honest. The best of us can be 90% honest, maybe, with the right woman (and let me tell you, WOW is that freeing). Most of us, it's more like 30%, 40%. We lie to get things, to avoid things, to hide things, sometimes just for fun. You're almost guaranteed to, at some point in your life, absolutely be 100% in love with complete asshole. I'm sorry, those are the odds. No one will be able to convince you, because you'll be sure you know better; but eventually, you'll get it. You've inherited smarts, and I'm sure you'll surpass me in reading people and using your own intellect to judge.

Always realize that questioning your thoughts and opinions, second guessing your actions and motives in the moment, is never wrong. Listen to people that disagree with you, and put at least twice as much emphasis on what they say, as opposed to anyone agreeing. Agreeing with you is easier; it takes less effort. Arguing with you means someone has reason to feel differently, AND express it honestly, AND care to fight you on it. They can still be wrong, but taking their point of view as your own for a thought exercise can only improve your understanding of the situation, and life.

I know some things in life are going to suck. We're not always going to get along perfectly. But I will always love and respect you. And believe me, once you're past high school and all the silly shit people can put you through, you're going to be amazed at what life has to offer...and what you can do, when given the opportunity. Be creative, loving, caring, and free. Try your best to not hurt people. Accept blame when it's deserved. Love who you are.

P.S. - If you really would have liked the name Shameeka, and are upset that it did not become your real name, you have your aunt Kelly to blame.