Lady Gaga and Pepper Spray

My life has been a series of slapstick comedy born entirely of bad judgment. Seriously, I look back on just about every memory before my 30th birthday, embarrassed to have done any of it. It all reminds me of the way Lady Gaga lives, but if she weren't a celebrity and instead just some schlub who walked around going to the bank and picking up her kids from daycare looking the way she does. I never wore a meat dress to my job soldering ignition coils, but then again it never occurred to me either.

Just out to pick up her dry cleaning

Sometimes I think about what I'd say if I could go back and talk to myself. What would I say to my high school self? (For the purposes of this fantasy I pretend a 16 or 17 year old me wouldn't have been horrified at what I look like now.) Unfortunately I think I'd spout the same (true) platitudes everyone else was spouting at me back then. Be yourself, don't try so hard, concentrate on your schoolwork, stay away from penises, blah blah blah. The thing is, I have a 12 year old daughter now. And if all I can think of to tell myself is cliches, what can I tell her? How do I get her to concentrate on her studies and run from penises (after pepper-spraying them, that is)?