Growing Up

My very first memory is the first time I got stung by a bee.  I was sitting by our flower bed in the front yard of our gray two-story house, and wandering among the petunias was a strange small creature with pretty black and yellow stripes.  I stared at it in fascination.  I remember reaching out to touch it--it looked fuzzy--and the next thing I remember is blinding pain.  I can't remember which finger was stung, but I was horrified at the red dot on it as my mom held me and calmed me down.  One of her friends was there.



I remember one day when I was about 4 waking up from a nap on my lacy pink daybed to find a whole litter of black puppies crawling all over me.  Our neighbors' black lab had had puppies a couple days before, and my mom had gotten their 11 or 12-year-old son to help her carry them over to our house as a surprise for me.  It was one of the happiest and most magical moments of my life.

I remember how lost my little fingers were when I first tried to play the piano with both hands.  I remember my family's last move (almost 10 years ago) and having trouble finding my way through the new house.  I remember the day we got our wonderful dog, and we were fascinated/overwhelmed because the biggest pets we'd had before that were hermit crabs.

Maybe all this rambling doesn't seem to lead to anything, but that's okay.

I've had a lot of firsts this summer--first full-time job (also the first job I was actually good at), first month-long bus pass, first concert (Owl City!!!), first close friend getting engaged, first time a guy sent me his number over Facebook, first time looking forward to a school year and actually knowing for sure what I'm going into, and probably a bunch of others that I've forgotten.

Life was so much simpler back when I was young.  I didn't have to worry about a fraction of the things I have to worry about now.  At the same time, I've experienced some of the most amazing things since I've gotten older and peeked into the treacherous Amazon jungle that is the "real world".  But I've found it to be true that God never lets us become comfortable.  We are expected to always keep on our toes, growing, learning, improving and just...moving.  What good would it be to get to a certain point with love, money or accomplishments and say to ourselves, "My life is perfect.  I don't need to work for anything else."?  How horrible would it be to run out of things to do in this life?  As long as we have ambitions, we will keep working towards them.  Even though we often wish it were easier.