Strange. I feel very weary this evening, the first in perhaps a few months. I’m feeling the full weight of knowing that certain years are now so far removed from who I am now. While the current-me is growing close to the ideal-me, and those years gone-by were good for what they were, I have a very strong urge to turn back the clock.
I can’t help but shiver inwardly at the quickly passing days.
Everyone has those moments. When whatever the next day brings is nowhere near as important, or gratifying, or fulfilling, as the current moment you’re living and breathing, the perfect moment in which your whole being is entrenched. You’re with good people who know you and love you.
I’ve been lucky enough to experience many moments such as I’ve described. My friends and I used to fish on Redondo Beach pier until 4 or 5 a.m., and although we never caught much, we knew fishing was just a backdrop, a setting, in which we could hang out and simply be. I’ve experienced the same sort of peace just hanging out in the middle of the street in the dead of night, running around like idiots and cracking-wise. Quite frankly, we could have been anywhere, doing anything, and it would have felt just as wonderful.
I’m growing up, learning not only to think in a mature manner, but also to act in a manner that is appropriate for any given situation. It seems to me that maturity simply means having the ability to behave appropriately and justly when your emotions might dictate otherwise. Sometimes I still get the urge to rail against this burgeoning sense of self-virtue. I want to be a bitch. I want to occasionally behave like a depraved ingrate. It’s easy. It takes absolutely no effort to be horrid, and that is the pure beauty of it.
None of that is what I truly want for myself, and I realize there is no sense in denying it. I don’t want to be like everyone else, and I expect more from myself.
I suppose I am really lamenting the loss of my… ignorance? As a child, the responsibility for my Self was chiefly in the hands of my parents, and by extension and circumstance, my grandparents. Now I’m fully accepting the fact that the responsibility is mine, and mine alone.
Fantastic.
I feel like I don’t have enough time to fully enjoy the parts of Life that used to come so easily. Regardless of what I am doing, a piece of my mind is always on the future. I’m always mindful of my actions and my thought processes.
Perhaps I’m just wound up a bit too tight. Visiting Los Angeles last week was so relaxing, largely due to the fact that David and I didn’t have anything too pressing on our schedules. We played things by ear the whole time, with the exception of Cris’ graduation. We can’t do that up in the Bay. Our lives are dictated by our various obligations; on some days, the largest amount of time we spend together falls right before we fall asleep.
Grown-up life is nice, but I’m already mourning my childhood and my adolescence. I know I’m still young, and I am hardly an adult, but the realities of the world are definitely breaking down the barriers that my family built for me.
So it goes.
Jaena Rae 