how do i feel like a kid again

it was a beautiful day outside, the kind of day someone writes about, like i am right now.

where i live, good weather is cherished because it doesn't come by often. me and my best friend are on a walk.

birds are chirping to each other. and to me. the sun is in my face and a soft breeze, in my hair. there are huge willows with delicately falling leaves, messing with the sunlight. the pink cherry blossoms are matching colours with the sky. i can smell the earth. and i am here with one of my favorite people.

in all this beauty, i felt a feeling i hadn't felt in a long, long time. my words fail to describe it, but to put it simply, i felt content. like nothing else matters because it is a magical day in nature. i only felt it for a few minutes because i became aware that i was feeling it.

and then a question popped into my head: how do i feel like a kid again?

childhood is long behind me now, but it still feels close to me. somewhere between then and now i grew up. now i realise, the happiness or peace you feel in your childhood, is the best kind. everything is whimsical, you see things in colour.

but is the world still not beautiful as an adult? are skies not pink anymore? do you not hang out with friends? or play sports? 

the world never stops being colourful, you just start seeing in black and white. 

on our walk through the park, my best friend and i spoke about it. why can't i feel this feeling again? why do i feel it in fleeting moments? how do i go back?

i wish i didnt know all that i know now.

more knowledge, responsibilities, expectations, deadlines to our future are important parts of becoming the adult you have to be. but all these things tend to take the whimsy away from life. that feeling you felt in 8th grade singing in a classroom with your friends. or on the field trip at 6:00am in the bus. or at the annual function while you bunked classes. while playing in the park when the sky is beautifully pink, riding bikes around. 

all these things become normal or rather an escape from the life you're actually living. real life is exams, lectures, competition, doing things by yourself and these things become an escape that you need. it's not something you do now. 

this is why we look back at 2016 so fondly, because it was our childhood and a moment we felt at peace. a feeling we've not felt since those years.

so how does one feel like a kid again? i dont know. 

you spend your entire childhood wishing you were older only to later find at some point, you get diminishing returns. by the time you figure this out, you're long past being a kid again. and the best you could've ever done and can do, is be present.

responsibilities come and go, nothing is the end of the world. i submitted an internship application as i was typing this, so there truly is no end to responsibility if that's what you feel is holding you back from feeling that again. i mean didn't we have deadlines and exams in elementary school?

watch cartoons i guess. spend time with nature and when you do think about nothing else. go out and play with your friends. do it everyday. be attached to nothing and have fun in everything.