Journey to adulthood nearly complete for high school senior

As each day passes, I find myself nearing the inevitable — adulthood.

With each of those days, I realize how easily I let time pass ahead of me. Now because I am only a senior in high school, many would say I could not possibly know what I am talking about until I hit at least 40.

But, I believe there is a sense of loss felt even at my age. I can not say I am really a child anymore, but I am not quite ready to cross that line of being an adult, either.

How easy it would be to just turn around and run back to the days of never-ending summers and make believe, but I can’t. One of the scariest feelings in the world is taking that first step into the rest of my life. That alone requires a certain kind of bravery.

Do you remember swinging as a child? Some of us still indulge ourselves every so often and test out the rusty park swing, but it is not the same.

My favorite part of swinging was jumping off right in the moment the swing was at its highest. It was then that I was sure I was flying. I remember thinking that if only I could swing just a little bit higher, the clouds would surely part and welcome me into a whole new world.

Usually not more than two seconds later, reality would hit full force as I found myself with my face firmly planted into the damp playground sand.Another one of the most captivating things as a child were the stars. They were so far away, but if I squinted my eyes just right while I reached up, I could hold them in the palms of my hands. I miss that, becoming so caught up in dreams and imagination that nothing else seemed to exist.

Then, of course, I grew up and everything has to have a logical explanation. There is no more time for believing in magic; there is work, bills and higher education.

Despite all of that though, I do not believe that the spirit we had as children ever really leaves us. More than anything, it is just simply forgotten. It will always be there, buried under our common sense and rationality.

It is ironic that as children we wish time away so freely. We wish to somehow make time speed up so that we can finally be “big,” and I think that it does.

Time skips forward a few years here and there, making us the adults we always wanted to be. As soon as we see what it is like, we find ourselves wishing to have those years back. The only thing is, we can’t have them back. Time just keeps moving faster and faster until there just does not seem to be any left.

What if we all just slowed down a little, took a few deep breaths and really opened our eyes? What would we see?

Stop wishing for tomorrow to come so quickly. Wake up early and stay up late, enjoy every hour of every day. We should not make tomorrow so important while we still have today.

My dream is that 50 years from now I will still be swinging, with my head so far up in the clouds that I may never come back down.

Whitney Brown is a senior at Kenai Central High School.