Spoiler! :
PROMPT: Childhood Vs. Highschool Years. My stance: If we lived by our mindsets when we were children, we'd set a better future for ourselves as we grow older.
All The Small Things
Between modern day society and our childhood days way back when, its easy to forget what happened on the playground, or how the neighbor lady was actually a cyborg in disguise. Some people say that our high school years are the years that will define the people we will become in the future. Maybe they are right, but maybe childhood should be what defines us when we’re older.
One of the first words that come to mind to any teenager or young adult when asked about high school is drama. No matter where you went to school, whether it be on the coast or in the center of a cornfield, drama is bound to circulate. Did you hear about what happened last Friday in the girls locker room? If you haven’t, you will. And what about that fight in the parking lot a few weeks back? Again, if you haven’t heard about it yet, you definitely will. All the small things, the things that seem so important now, mean absolutely nothing in comparison to what’s slowly creeping up on all of us. Reality.
Since childhood we have had to make decisions. We were asked questions about what color we wanted the elephant to be in our art project, and then which Backstreet Boy was going the cutest or which race car driver was our favorite. Then we were asked questions about who we were going to the dance with at the Junior High Halloween Dance, and what kind of soda we brought for our class field trip. Now, we are asked questions about what colleges we have been looking into and what we want to do with our future. Decisions have never been harder, and they are only going to get more difficult as we excel into our college years and even further. The high school years are the years that we learn that not everything revolves around us, and that we have responsibilities that we must fulfill. We learn that our decisions on whether to complete these responsibilities or not can greatly affect everyone around us. And with all of the drama and decisions that we deal with in a day, we sometimes forget what is really important.
What happened to, “I love you mommy.”? or, “When are you going to pick me up from t-ball, Dad?”. Now, teens across the world are focused more on their dates on Saturday night rather than when dad gets home from work. Text messages and walking around town with a group of friends overrules playing with younger siblings or wanting to help mom with dinner. We sometimes lose the ability to forget about things that mean nothing in the long run and forget also about the things that should help us turn into the people we want to be in the future.
Back in the days of PlayDoh and glue sticks, the biggest problems we faced were whether we should play with the blocks or the kitchen set, or whether we wanted Teddy Grahams or Rice Krispy treats for an afternoon snack. The decisions we had to make consisted of what bedspread we wanted in our new room, or what disney character we wanted on our toothbrushes. Life was simple. The decisions, though they seemed difficult at the time, usually only affected us for an afternoon or so, and then we put the past behind us, and started a new day with a new game for recess in mind.
By the time school was done for the day and the bus had dropped everyone off, the only major feats that needed to be conquered for the day was cleaning the bedroom and talking mom out of meatloaf for dinner. Sock monsters and mystery meat were the scariest tasks to tackle, and figuring out what exactly spawned the green creature breathing in the corner was a mystery to just about everyone. But no matter what, at the end of the day, we wrestled under the wrath of a mother’s hands in the bathtub, brushed our teeth, and were sent to bed. Responsibilities were little to none, and the difficulties that loomed ahead of us were still so far off, that there was no need to think about them. Kids were kids, and all that mattered lay out on the playground. Any troubles that we faced were washed down the drain by the time a warm towel was wrapped around us, and tomorrow was always a new day with different sock monsters and mystery meats to conquer.
Being home in time to make funny faces at new baby brothers and sisters and playing catch until the sun went down were valuable pastimes that meant the world to anyone under four feet tall. Playing in the sandbox with friends at the park or watching The Wizard of Oz with the cousins in front of Grandma’s box set TV were the best things to do when you didn’t have school. Quality time consisted of pillow fights and sitting on Mom’s lap after dinner, or wrestling with Dad on the floor. Slumber parties were a blessing and gossiping about our older siblings and how weird they were since they had become ‘taken’, were a given.
Maybe all we need today is to learn that there is no need to sweat the small things that don’t matter, and maybe we need to focus more on all the small things that could mean the most if we would just slow down, and look where we are going. Drama, having to make tough decisions, and losing sight of what will pull us through in the long run, is never going to stop. These are things that no matter how hard we try, they are bound to happen at one time or another. But maybe, just maybe, we can learn to grow by adopting the things that we did when we were younger. Becoming children, is the way to become the best people that we can be in our future.
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