Dear Future Me

Book excerpt: Write a letter to yourself ... in the future Take part in a sociological experiment that taps into a culture obsessed with the future and all that it entails: self-improvement, anxiety, technological change, even global affairs. What do you think your life will be like in one year ... in five years ... in twenty years? The fascinating letters in this collection are alternately sweet, sad, funny, desperate, angry and hopeful as they peek into the lives of ordinary people from around the world as they reveal their most intimate hopes and fears. The idea is simple - people can visit www.futureme.org and write letters to themselves to be delivered at some point in the future. Since the website was created, it has collected more than 400,000 letters, many of them open to the public. With time-capsule appeal, this book collects the best of those letters to provide a glimpse into the lives of everyday people, providing a sometimes humorous, sometimes poignant, but always insightful look into our culture and society - and ultimately ourselves.