we grow up

At some point, we grow up. Not on a specific day. Not all at once. It happens quietly. Between schedules and responsibilities. Between bills that need to be paid and nights that suddenly seem too short. And without even noticing, we stop looking for shapes in the clouds. We walk past flowers without taking in their scent. We watch sunsets and think about how late it's getting.

As children, the world felt bigger. Not cause it actually was. But cause we knew how to wonder. We didn't know how many countries existed, how high the mountains were, or why the stars shone. But we knew what it felt like to be happy without needing a reason.

Do you remember your first ice cream? Not the most expensive one. Not even the best one. But the first one you can truly remember. The excitement before that very first bite. The sticky fingers.

The fear that the scoop might fall off. And yet, somehow, it was perfect.

Or your first pizza. The way it sat in front of you like a small miracle. The melted cheese. The smell. That feeling that, in that moment, nothing else in the world mattered.

As children, we didn't need much. A bicycle. A blanket draped over two chairs that suddenly became a castle. A cardboard box transformed into a spaceship. We had nothing extraordinary. And that's exactly why everything felt extraordinary.

Perhaps that is the price of growing up. We learn more and more about the world, but we slowly forget how to be amazed by it. We know the names of the stars, yet sometimes forget to look up at them. We understand how things work,

but lose the feeling of how magical they once seemed.

And sometimes I don't wish to be a child again. I only wish for a single day with a child's eyes. To see a raindrop as a tiny miracle once more. To run barefoot through the grass and feel as though the whole world belongs to me. To take a bite of an ice cream and, for a moment, forget what time it is, what tomorrow holds, and all the worries waiting for me.

Maybe the secret of life isn't staying young. Maybe it's holding on to a small part of the way we once saw the world. The ability to wonder. The ability to find joy in little things. The ability to recognize ordinary moments as something extraordinary.

Cause in the end, it isn't the big things that stay in our hearts the longest. It's the small ones. The taste of that first ice cream. The smell of that first pizza. The laughter that came with scraped knees and dirty hands. The summers that seemed endless. And the memory of how beautiful the world looked when we saw it through the eyes of a child.