Dear me in a happier multiverse,
How is our family? I hope grandma is still fine, keep her safe! I hope that in your universe, our family is together too. It’s been a while since I’ve seen my brother…but he’ll be back, I believe in him.
Things over here have been bad…really bad. Yesterday, I had to run all the way from the grocery store to our boarded-up home, just to avoid a man who was coughing on people. I don’t know if he had COVID-19 or not, but I have a strong feeling that he was just doing that to scare people off so that he could steal all the supplies in the supermarket for himself. Has everyone lost what makes us truly human? I hope you don’t know the answer to that question, because I want the world to be happier, at least in another universe.
I often find myself thinking about the butterfly effect. Do you remember the origami butterfly we made on the first day of class, before all this started? Imagine that butterfly, flapping its beautiful wings as it flies to its freedom…not knowing that one flap of its wings was creating a cyclone on the other side of the world. We all lived in such blissful ignorance, and when Stay-at-home orders were issued, would our multiverses have had the same, happy future if people had taken small steps to prevent the spread of the virus?
Every day I wish to forget what happened, to forget everything I saw crash down in front of me. But as I dream of the happier universe you are in right now, it makes me want to remember. I want to remember what it felt like to stroll outside without being covered in protective suits from head to toe. To laugh with friends, as the greasy smell of pizza wafted in at our favorite restaurant. To smile as we took a walk on campus at night after a heavy thunderstorm, breathing in the amazing scent of wet grass and soil.
I hope these things are not a luxury, but a common thing for you now. I do not know what the future will be for this multiverse, where everything has already gone so horribly wrong. And so, I want you, who has already witnessed the pandemic but at a lighter level, to appreciate everything around you for me. As a person living in a multiverse of the worst possible outcome, my only joy is believing that out there, in another multiverse, is a world where everything went right, and people have learned to appreciate the beauty of simple things.
May the butterfly of this letter addressed to you create a ripple in time and space, giving all of our multiverses a happy ending.
Love,
Ankita