It's wishful thinking to believe that you can forever be a child.

 

That you can forever cling to simplicity, to black-and-white and hard edges. Forever don a cloak of invincibility, wield a conqueror’s sword. Forever remain untouched by change, since the face in the mirror today is the same as it was yesterday. Forever see a vibrant world only illuminated by sparkling daylight, all the ugliness sequestered in far-flung shadows.

 

The rose-colored mirage will dissipate as the air starts to cool with the frost of cynicism.

 

You’ll realize sitting crisscross-applesauce is bad for your knees and the golden rule is neither golden nor a rule and Disney movies are propaganda for the white-cis-heteropatriarchy. You’ll realize your parents aren’t gods and your teachers are sometimes wrong and the blind optimism you wear as a shield is fragile and full of holes.

 

You’ll realize the world is brutal and callous and senseless and fucked up.

 

But you'll learn to find beauty in the amorphous, in the gray.