I feel like an impostor in an adult outfit.
Inside, I'm still that snarly-haired, scraped-knee girl. Wrists bedecked in Wonder Woman cuffs. Hands punched through styrofoam cups stolen from Taft's dining hall. Not mature enough to facilitate, guide, teach, discipline, decide.
"Do you ever have those times when you just don't feel like a grown-up?" a co-worker asked me this afternoon.
Always.
Just a kid sprinting across my back yard, rolling down the hill to the soccer field, creeping through the woods by the cemetary, playing Ghosts in the Graveyard, sledding down the baseball hill, skating on the duck pond, freeing my friends with the kick of a can.
Definitely not a grown-up.
Just a messy child pretending to be a counselor. Acting as a Mom.
Always. 100% of the time. I look around and marvel at all the evidence that I seem to be an adult, because honestly, truly I don't feel like one. One of my favorite jokes is that I'm waiting for the real parents to come home. But somehow they seem to never show up, and keep leaving me in charge. xox
Posted by: Lindsey | 04/04/2012 at 02:46 AM
You will always be our little girl but you have also turned into a beautiful and intelligent woman.
Mom & Dad
Posted by: Mom and Dad | 04/04/2012 at 09:29 AM
I'm 68 years old and I am still surprised that I am "in charge." What, I need to change the toilet paper roll?
Posted by: Sarah Lynn | 04/04/2012 at 11:17 AM
Almost all the time!
Posted by: nerissa | 04/05/2012 at 08:56 AM
I used to have a button on my backpack that said "cleverly disguised as a responsible adult". I was sad to lose it. I am 52 and have 4 adult kids, 3 are post secondary graduates, 1 is married and another getting married this summer. I still feel like I am pretending to be a "grown up" on a daily basis.
Posted by: s.e. | 04/05/2012 at 04:07 PM
Wonder Twins...Activate! Form of...a glacier!
Posted by: Stacey | 04/05/2012 at 06:47 PM
So glad I am not alone, pretending to be a grown-up:)
I've been a bit trapped in my own head lately and haven't been writing. I think about writing during the day when I don't have time and then at night I feel too overwhelmed/tired to begin. Promise to break this funk soon.
Posted by: Christy | 04/10/2012 at 06:55 AM
Don't worry about not writing...I have been amazed at how you have kept up with it all these years! truly amazed.
Posted by: fleming | 04/10/2012 at 04:32 PM
...meandering down endless passageways, finding secret hiding places, playing teacher in an empty classroom and even getting to write on the chalkboard!, discovering an imaginary world under the bleachers, making forts with football dummies, playing in the courtyard behind CPT, collecting foreign coins and Blondie records and various trash turned treasure discarded by "the big kids" and tossed out their windows onto the balcony...
Posted by: Greta | 04/12/2012 at 09:19 PM
oh, and going to the back of the kitchen for stale bread to feed to the ducks after dinner...
Posted by: Greta | 04/12/2012 at 09:22 PM