Innocence Found

Every so often, in a completely pedestrian and non-creepy way, I watch the neighbourhood kids playing on the street that my house is on. The people who live across the road have three children, all of which I remember seeing as babies. The youngest (whom I had a very one-sided conversation with the other day) isn't speaking yet, but she is certainly up and walking around. It feels like it wasn't long ago that their oldest was just a baby himself. I can't help but reflect on time and how its flow is both speedy and unstoppable.

Sometimes I feel like I'm still a kid myself-- that is, until reality's cold hand slaps me in the face.

My younger sister and her friend came to watch my buddies and I play baseball a few months ago. It's the same pastime we've been engaging in for years: just the neighbourhood kids playing America's favourite sport. That's how it read in my mind at least, until my sister's friend commented that she wasn't expecting to see a bunch of grown men on the field in the park. It was then that I stepped back and noticed the beards, the selectively aging physiques, and the beers in hand… no, she was right; these people were a far cry from being children.


Likewise, on my journeys through campus a few weeks ago, I almost brushed by a woman in a business suit until I realized that she was offering me a high five. Women in business suits don't give high fives, I naturally thought to myself. But this one was. I broke from my daze and realized that it was actually my friend Lana, who had been busy that morning assessing a client for the speech and language program she's in. It was weird seeing her in a suit-- chalk it up to the air of formality that I'm not used to, I guess-- but it totally made sense. She is on her way to becoming a professional.

Life is forcing me to grow up too; I'm in my last year of university, and I have to figure out bills, what I want to do next year, and all of these assignments I'm drowning in. We've been trying to get a band practise together for a couple of weeks now, but everyone has priorities that keep it from happening. It makes me long for the carefree days when the hours after school until bedtime were spent just having fun with friends.

My friend/lab manager/confidant Allison has a bad case of strep throat right now, and I feel just awful for her. She's spent all day in bed, and I've spent all day hearing about it. I don't know what it is about being sick that makes us regress back to a more childlike state; maybe it is the feeling of helplessness that comes with your body shutting down on you? Regardless, Allison has apparently taken it in stride, and has decided to become a full-on child again, as she spent the better part of her day drawing pictures. I received this one this afternoon, which I happened to love:

Something about the smirk on that sun just gets me. Equally amazing are the black dots that are too big to be its eyes, yet aren't connected by any frames, so are neither a pair of sunglasses. When pressed for an explanation, she said they were supposed to be glasses, but her dexterity wouldn't allow for it (it should be noted that these were all drawn on an iPod).

I guess the point of all this is that you are only as adult as you want to be. Sure, life gets more complicated as we grow up, but there's no reason you have to lose that inner kid. Keep things in perspective, but make light of situations and have a fun time doing it. As that classic Trooper jam goes, "We're here for a good time, not a long time."