Broken Crayons

In first grade, everybody has crayons. You color and you talk and share and go to recess, and so does everybody else.

You color in second grade, too. Not as much, but, still.

By sixth grade, the crayons are almost gone. You'll break them out for the occasional art project, but other than that, you're expected to grow up, to act like the almost middle schoolers that you are, and that you have no idea how to be.

Middle school will be hard. The crayons are gone, as is the façade that you're a child anymore. Everything is about grades, about high school and college and everything after, and it's so overwhelming, and you'll probably find yourself wishing for your old pack of crayons and your juice box, because in first grade, there's nothing to stress about besides who you'll play with at recess.

(Maybe it isn't so different, after all, because I still find myself in high school, wondering who I'm going to lunch with).

By high school, the crayons are gone. The pictures that your mom hung up on the fridge were torn down years ago, replaced by report cards and ACT scores and college applications and expectations and stress and the future.

The crayons are broken. They've been snatched away, worn down to a stub, replaced with a number 2 pencil and a Chemistry test.

I want my crayons back. I want my childhood, the one that I didn't appreciate enough because all I wanted was to grow up and get out.

But, oh, what I wouldn't give to go back to naptime and snacks and juice boxes and a fresh box of crayons.