blog@thechrisbrowningexperience

Yesterday I finished Farewell Summer, sequel to the much acclaimed Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury (favorite author). So, I started reading The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, a candid (and largely exaggerated) memoir by Bill Bryson (a new favorite author?). Reading these books on adolescence and youthful naïveté got me thinking about when it was in my life when I actually “grew up.” Looking back on it, what a sad time that must have been, forgetting that world of excitement and discovery, when everyday was an adventure with new treasures to find, every block held untold secrets, and imaginations ran as wild as the ivy creepers through the garden. Instead of worrying about which villain I’m going slay or which planet I’m going to visit next, I now worry about how much I’m going to get on my tax return, and if I’ve properly claimed all my deductibles. It’s a troubling thought. I used to want to be an astronomer, paleontologist, ghost hunter, treasure hunter, fighter pilot, private detective, code buster, spy, robot engineer, and a plethora of other exciting and thrilling occupations. Now, I’m a computer technician with slowly fading ambitions of being a writer. Where did all the wonder and overblown ambitions go? How many people actually pursued their childhood dreams and are now astronauts, firemen (because all kids want to be a fireman at some point in their life), cowboys, or rock stars? Why can’t I be the world’s number one expert prehistoric botany, or the leading authority on extrasensory projection? Because there’s a point where reality, like a slow moving cancer, settles in and stifles and quells those explosive ambitions, leaving us boring and mundane husks. With job titles like “Level B Accounting Specialist”, or “Regional Engineering Manager”, it’s no wonder that our imaginations go the way of the do-do bird.

There was a point, when I was a kid, where I could tell you everything you wanted to know (or didn’t want to know) about every species of dinosaur known to man, from their bone structure to their diets and skin color, and during what era they could be found in. I was able to accurately locate and describe in detail the history of every constellation in the sky, and during what seasons they would be visible to our little city. I knew ten different categories of ghosts or hauntings and how to find them, although I was always too scared to look. I could break codes, was an effective spy, knew everything there was to know about space travel, fighting dragons, and building skyscrapers with Lego bricks. Back then we had dreams, whimsical though they were, and passion and enthusiasm, and the time to devote to such endeavors. I remember when my imagination could conjure up fantastic adventures on which me and the pack of boys in the neighborhoods would take part in. Games of tag that lasted until the evening, who could skip a stone the furthest, climb the highest tree and jump onto the roof, and all manner of other potentially unsafe activities. Since kids are made of rubber, anyways, they’re pretty much invincible, and such endeavors usually only ended with scraped knees and peroxide (which always hurt worse than the scrape it was supposed to “heal”). But, as we grow up and learn about the world and hormones change and bodies sprout new things, we lose that little flame we held so dearly as a kid. That inexorable spark, that burst of passion and excitement, gets hidden amongst the rubble of the world of reality and we forget that we still need to kindle it and nurture it and hold it dear, lest we become stagnant, musty shells of the brilliant and shining balls of energy we used to be.

.//chris 

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 21st, 2009 at 1:07 am and is filed under blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.