i am four. i don't want to be a princess. i tell my mother i want to be an astronaut. as young as i am, i am already wanting to be with the constellations. i am eight. at this point, i have wanted to be many things. the weirdest: a bee keeper, after a field trip to some zoo. i stick, however, to consider being a teacher; to children, i hoped. specifically kindergarten. or maybe a football player?

i am ten. i have it all planned out. i'll be taking up Mass Communication in college and i'll work as an author, or a journalist. i consider being a newscaster. or a National Geographic photographer. i am fourteen. i do not want to be anything but dead. six feet under with my feet pointing the way the tulips grow.

and now... i guess i just miss how simple it all was. how i was so convinced i had my **** together. how there weren't entrance exams to worry about, or wrongly-chosen tracks and courses and electives to regret. because it gets harder to hold it together, gets harder to hope for the better, gets harder to love and live when there are galaxies upon galaxies calling out your name;

i want to be wide-eyed and four years old again; arms outstretched to the sky, the stars at the tips of my fingers. i want to be that little girl again. that little girl who was excited to get up in the morning and face what the universe had in store. that little girl who wasn't cynical for tomorrows she was not promised. that little girl who smiled bright in pictures, and actually meant it.