Maybe you'll come back here to the place that we'd meet;

Thursday, January 1, 2015

Grown Up /6:18 PM

I hate being the wet blanket that says there's nothing special, or new for that matter, in the new year, and every one that we had before and every one that we will have. Perhaps the only thing new about the year is that I am one step closer to growing old; in other words (whose connotations are here irrelevant), old is new. It might even be so that the more 'new years' you live through, the less 'new' they feel. In years past, I've been accustomed to heralding in the new year with resolutions, anticipation and expectations for the year ahead simply because a traditional school year opens and concludes with the tide of time. You can count events by the years and that leaves for less confusion when transiting from the old to the new. On the flip side, an adult going through his/her mundane lifestyle with no room for breaks in between can hardly sense the distinction between last year and this. The new year is simply an excuse to seek hiatus from work but before you know it, you're once again going through the same meaningless motion. And it seems being in the army has similar repercussions.

It is a frightening thing getting older; you are altogether thrown into a heap of responsibilities and problems and albeit this is not a sudden movement, it definitely feels that way. You can't actually remember the last time you were a kid. Was it at 16 years old? 17? 18? When did everything start to change? Has anything changed? Questions we long for answers; questions we long to answer; questions too long to answer and or answers too long to deliver. All these fears stem mainly from the fact that adulthood becomes something we grow into subconsciously and something that we effortlessly give in to. It is like the wind of life that comes and go ever so fluidly and clandestinely we take our presence for granted. The coming of a new year has given me time to ponder over something not many of us has (possibly) considered: can we make an active choice to brighten up our own adulthood?

The phrase "young at heart" is a philosophy of choice. Nobody retains their youthfulness while fighting the ageing process spontaneously or through sheer luck. It is a conscious decision undertaken by said individuals to never forget the stages of growing up that led them to adulthood. Adulthood shouldn't be regarded as the beginning of a new phase of life. Rather, it is the period of culmination for one's childhood i.e. the obsolete transition into the most revered stage of childhood. There really isn't much difference between an adult and a child but one: a child cannot choose to become an adult at his whim and fancy but the converse is true. As adults, we have the liberty to discard our strength of maturity and rediscover our past selves through ways rejected by society. We may have an ageing population but that doesn't necessarily equate to us suffering from an ageing society. The people can grow old but our hearts and minds never will.

This year, I take with with me from the past not demands or goals I set for myself to start the new year; this year, I bring with me sincerity and nothing else. 2015 is a year for growing up but also for looking back and never losing sight of who I was, who I am and who I have always wanted to be. I will stay through to myself and in 16 days' time, I shall be bestowed with a responsibility greater than I can even fathom. But I know God has his ways and all things shall work out, as it has always been.

Adulthood is not forsaking one's childhood; it is the realization that it isn't.