Yours

December 19th

Dear Sophia,

I love you.

Sometimes when I walk to Starbucks and I know I’ve got a while before you get there I walk around town a bit. I never go too far just in case you’re a bit early.

The weather wasn’t too bad this morning and I felt like I had some energy so I decided to walk up and down the high street for a bit. I saw all the kids coming in and out of McDonalds and it got me thinking how much things must be changing. They all grow up eating so much fast food that it’s normal for them. I know it’s bad for them and all that stuff but I wonder if it’ll mean they think about food in a different way to everyone else too.

It’ll be like with music. I know some people have loads and loads of old vinyl records and love the sound of them. And some people do still buy CDs because they like to buy an actual thing. It’s not many though. I remember as a kid asking for CDs for Christmas but it seems ages ago now. I listen to music all the time but I don’t even own half of my favourite albums. I don’t have a thing I can touch I just have files on the computer. That’s enough for me. I get that artwork can look nice but the sounds are enough for me. I bet for kids now the idea of a CD seems really pointless. I wonder if the same thing will happen with cooking.

These kids growing up eating fast food probably love it. Their favourite food is probably McDonalds or KFC or something like that. Maybe once or twice they’ve had some really good fancy food and noticed it tastes good but in general it probably seems like lots of effort and lots of money for something that isn’t that much better.

It’s like how I understand why people like old records. They like having it to hold and look at the artwork and putting it on a record player. I do get that. But for me it’s so much more effort than just clicking on what I want and it playing straight away that it hardly seems worth it. I wonder if the same thing will happen with eating. Food will become easier and easier to get and more and more salty. Kids will probably know there’s a benefit to eating a proper meal but it won’t seem worth the effort to them when they can just get a burger they like straight away at McDonalds instead.

My diet isn’t great but I know the difference between a good roast dinner and some greasy lump of meat in some cardboard. Sometimes I wonder if being able to get something immediately is more important now than getting something right and at the right time.

I know you only go to Starbucks because it’s convenient and close. I know given the chance you’d prefer loads of other things instead. It’s good that you make sure you do what’s quickest to get back to work on time though.

I know it’s not ideal. I know you’d rather have the time to go elsewhere. It’s probably a quality that most people don’t have. The ability to appreciate the finer things in life. For most people it’s just about getting things as easily as possible. That’s why today everyone was staring at that girl in that stupidly short skirt instead of noticing the most beautiful woman in there. The most beautiful woman in the world. I’m always happy when men aren’t staring at you but it just seemed so stupid to me that everyone was distracted just because some idiot wanted to get her legs cold. They all missed the real beauty.

I love you.

Yours,

Andrew