I remember as a little kid always wondering what it would be like to grow up and be a “big kid.” I remember always wishing I could stay up late, drink diet pop, watch PG-13 movies, eat what I wanted, hang out with friends without my parents there, and just being independent.

As little kids we always want to grow up. We are in such a hurry to grow older and for our birthdays to come, but in all honesty it is best to just remain in the glory of childhood for as long as possible. Being a little kid was great. We didn’t ever worry about going to school and not looking good, there were no cliques, no insecurities, and no pressure.

It is just so ironic how differently we view getting older when we actually get older. I now wish everything opposite of what I wished as a little kid. I wish I could get to bed earlier, but there are too many things for me to do during the day. I now wish I could drink regular pop instead of diet pop, but I can’t because it is just so sugary and I go crazy with that much sugar in my system. I now love to sit down with my little sister and watch a good old PG movie, and now more than ever I am so glad to have my parents in my teenage years to comfort me and support me in stressful times. It’s a direct paradox of what we used to wish.
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Take Romeo and Juliet’s lives for example. They were just too happy kids whose lives started to get crazy as they left childhood and entered adolescence. Before they had to worry about love, holding up the family honor, cliques, and fighting they were probably two very carefree, blissful children. That is so sad to think that the horridness of the last few weeks of their lives happened during their teenage years. If Capulet had allowed Juliet to hold onto her childhood for a little bit longer then neither of them would have been dead.
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One of the other great things about Elementary school was that there was no peer pressure. No one pressured you to date, to drink, to do drugs, to gossip, to swear, and to blend into the woodwork. High school kids are always trying to express themselves and be different, but they really are all the same. Teens are too afraid to be called a weirdo for not wanting to date, drink, and do drugs, therefore they all just conform to one another and blend in with the people around them even if they do wear their hair differently and dress differently.

I remember when I also did not have to worry about studying for tests and doing three and a half hours of homework every night. At Roosevelt school, my elementary school, I did not get homework on the weekends, and I was not super concerned about getting good grades. Now I spend day in and day out working hard to get good grades, do well, and prepare myself for a good college that will be the very beginning of the rest of my life. That is a lot of pressure for an inexperienced 15 year old, and it makes me want to just crawl back into the innocent arms of childhood and stay there forever.

I am glad to progress in my life and my academic career, and high school is not all bad. I have just realized recently that sometimes growing up just leads to the loss of innocence. Teenagers are so caught up in being like their peers and growing up quickly because they feel they have to be, but in all honesty if a teenager were to slow down and just look at the people around them they might notice that every other teenager has an elementary school kid on the inside just screaming to come out to take them back to the carefree days of childhood innocence.