If I Didn't Have Responsibilities

Yesterday at work I got this magic little thing called a W2 form. I'm not quite sure what it is, but it looks kind of intense and adult-ish, and made me realize all the adult things that I do, and how annoying they are and how I'm not excited to grow up. The older I get, the more I have to, and the more my actions affect my life, and I'm really just not okay with it.

I'd rather be sitting in the basement with a blanket and a fire in the fireplace, eating popcorn and drinking hot chocolate with the light by the window on and the blinds closed, watching John Wayne or Harry Potter with my mom and sister.

I'd rather be at Caribou, drinking coffee and not having to worry about studying, or how much time is left until I have to go to work and struggling to cram all of my homework in and ending up doing a half-ass job on it all because I don't have the time or the motivation to do it.

I wish I had a good piano, or at least one that halfway works, so I could be playing it right now, and actually learning how to play the piece that I was supposed to have learned two weeks ago.

I'd rather be in Senegal where it's warm and foreign and I can sit at the table and eat Lebanese food and talk to my grandma, or go to the beach with my cousins or visit my aunts and uncles or walk around the streets or through the market. Or, at nighttime, sit on the balcony and watch the street below.

I wish it was summer so I could go places on a whim and not return until after dark, and turn sixteen and get my license and go on adventures, and be at spat camp and go to Senegal and have marching band and the Fourth of July and go camping and have no stress.

Except. Summer still has stress. Because we have summer projects, and I still have to work almost every day.

Summer projects are terrible. We need a break. You can't expect us to have assignments year-round. It doesn't help us, it only hurts us. Summer is supposed to be the time when we have no obligations or anything, and we don't have to worry about things being due, and time doesn't matter and it all runs together and we don't know what day it is and it's warm and we can go to the beach and we don't have to do anything. But the older we get, the less true that is. ALDKFJ;LASKGH;KAJSDHF;ASKLDFH;ALSKDF;LASDHF;ASKDF You have no idea how much I just want to be a kid again. Or to stay a teenager forever. I don't want to grow up. I really don't. The freedoms that come with being an adult aren't worth the responsibilities that also come with it.

I want to be at a Quiz Bowl tournament, with a really long bus ride so we can play Authors and have heated arguments or random conversations and listen to classical music, and then get there and do really well and then go somewhere and eat lunch and then compete more and then have another really long bus ride where we're too tired to play games so we just sit and talk and bond with our Quiz Bowl people and then after we can go to someone's house and watch Disney movies and eat junk food and I don't have to go to work after so we can spend a lot of time there, and then I can go home and watch more Disney movies and it snows a lot and it's just perfectly awesome.

I want to go to pep band and play awesome songs and hang out with people and drink Pep Band Gatorade and play more awesome songs and have an orchestra room bonding sesh after.

I want to have a goldeneye party in a dark basement with lots of food and gossip and awesomeness.

I want it to be warm out so I can go on more walks with Will and not have freezing fingers.

I want to be able to read books that I choose and actually have time to read them.

I want it to be summer or spring so I can go on a road trip and stop at a rest stop and stretch my legs and it's not too hot and there's a warm breeze and then we stop and get fast food and the car is a mess and we listen to music and then go camping and sit around a campfire and sleep in the tent and fall asleep to other people talking in low voices at their campsites and wake up and unzip the tent and it makes that unzipping sound that reminds me of camping and everything is wet with dew and it's actually kind of nasty but once you go to the bathrooms and wash up you feel better and you eat breakfast and continue your camping adventure.

I want it to be March so it will snow buckets. Like three or four feet of snow, and we can have a snow day and just chill all day, and maybe finish the homework that we procrastinated on and had resigned to turning in late, and go outside and shovel the driveway and go sledding and make snow forts and get snow down my jacket and come inside with numb red cheeks, covered in snow, and peel off the many layers of clothing and make popcorn and play a board game or something.

I want to explore the woods near Meaghan's house again, and go to the stream and make a dam and climb that giant steep hill that has the mysterious wire and make a zipline across the stream and just chill back there because it's awesome.

I want to play softball in the summer, where I don't have to wear gloves when I go up to bat, and where my glove smells like leather and dirt and we have tournaments all day and eat hot dogs from the concession stand for lunch and we actually win games and the people on my team don't suck and it smells like sunscreen and sweat and Gatorade and it's hot outside and then we finish the tournament and go to Culver's and then I go home around six or seven and maybe jump in the sprinkler, or run to Lake Ann, or go to Kaden's and swim in the pool and hang out with my neighbors and play night games and sit in the middle of the street at night and have bonfires.

This weather is depressing.