What Means The Most

Writing about my childhood brings up so many types of emotions. It makes me feel foolish and Happy. But it also brings me to tears knowing that I won't be able to go back to playground slides, strollers, messy writing, Barbie dolls, picture books, and little homework.

Now, I'm not supposed to have the training wheels on. They're off, and i'm supposed to be running.

And like every other teenager, I'm staying up late to do my homework, getting home a few minutes late from school, and getting in trouble a little more often. It might seem like too much, but it's actually not. Our responsibilities match our ages, and so we never are supposed to deal with more than we can. But sometimes we do, and it makes sense to sometimes feel like it, because we are maturing. And we aren't expected to act our age, we are expect to act a year or two older.

 

But we can't miss out on the precious years that are kept in sync with our brains, that keep us remembering who we are. And so I realize that keeping my memories is something really special & important for me.

And this topic of coming of age, brings me back to the 4th Grade.

Ah, my 4th grade year. It was the second year of playing the recorder in school, and I always looked forward to my music class. Music was on Wednesdays. Music was the class I wouldn't miss for anything in my life, until I lost my recorder, here at home. And so I made every possible excuse to stay home for almost every single Wednesday for two months, until I found my recorder. "mom, I've got a fever", "mom, my stomach hurts", "Mom, can I go to the doctors?", "Mom, half my teachers aren't going to be at school today, can I just not go?". Yeah, excuses, excuses, excuses. And then I also had to plan a reason to not be at after school music classes either, and not being there drowned me, since it was the only thing I enjoyed the most about those two days.

But some wednesdays, when my mom managed to get me to school wednesdays, I had to sit out for music class. And just hurt to see 50 loud minutes go to waste doodling in my music notebook. But on one of those wednesdays, The New York pops came to my school. They presented us with a book called Rhythm, Rhyme & Rap. And we studied different forms of rhythm, different ways to rhyme, and we learned how to rap. 

My group (group 5) was presented with a poem called "when I grow up" by Mary Ann Hoberman.

The Poem "When I grow Up" is planted very clearly in my mind. I know the words by heart. I was so fond of this poem, and nothing reminded me more about coming of age project but this poem:

"When I grow Up" ---- Mary Ann Hoberman

When I grow up, I want to be

A grown-up who remembers me

And what it felt like to be small:

How much I liked to bounce a ball

And pump my swing high in the air

And think of flying everywhere.

How scared I was of doors that creak

Or being it in Hide-and seek

Or if my friends* had a fight

Or when I had bad dreams at night.

How much I hated loud machines

and Slimy worms and Lima beans

What fun it was to dig a hole,

To make a cake and lick the bowl,

To ride my bike all afternoon,

To plan on going to them moon,

To find an egg inside a nest

And have my best friend like me best.

*friends- actually, the word in the poem is "parents", but to fit my life better, I changed it to friends. :D

This represents her childhood in so few words. But it means so much. These are the things that eventually, we will have to stop doing if we haven't so. But this poem is saying "hey, don't forget who you are. Who you were  and who you will always be".