I used to wake up early … really early. And now I woke up at noon and thought to myself, where has that gone. I used to wake up an hour before everyone else would groggily fall out of bed and reach out with mad eyes for the one who had splashed water at them. Then the older ones would taunt the younger ones with fresh cups of coffee, telling them how “only older guys can drink coffee”. Yes, you guessed right, I lived in a boys room with a half dozen other boys who enjoyed each others company in the way only boys could, tissue fights, Lego wars, rubber band revolutions, and power ambushes. I wouldn’t have missed that time of my life for the world, because, it was my world!! We were bonded together by those simple acts of anarchy, and at any given time, any of us could get together again, sit down and finish each others sentences in remembrance of those days, THE days.
But back to why I am remember these scenic times on the road of life, it’s because of habits I had then I have lost for a good reason now, before I was young, now I am old. I scoffed all those who told me one day I would actually sleep at nap and that I would have no time to draw pictures of my fantasies. That was for grown ups I laughed … but now I don’t, I am a grown up, who flies through life so fast he misses the times of pencils on paper, of slipper hockey on the roof, of exploring unfinished construction sites and playing flashlight tag … “and you can run on top of hide!!” What will become of me. Will I, like many gone before me, lose youth? Youth, that wondrous magic wrapped up in five letters, will it become a memory?
Never! I will find time to play soccer with an undersize ball on an undersize court with the undersized. I will draw my fantasies. I will let God keep that youthful spirit flowing through my veins. I will never, ever lose it!!
But I will drink coffee.