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Some Reasons Not To Grow Up

There comes a time in every child’s life when he or she has to learn limits. This can be disillusioning, and I’m still getting over a couple of related childhood traumas.

Years ago, my mother had gotten some flowers as a gift, and she decided to give them to a sick friend. This was nice of my mother, but she wanted some extra credit, so she pretended to have bought them herself. When the sick friend told my mother how grateful she was, I blurted out, “Well, we had to get rid of them somehow.”

My mother was furious and punished me later. I suppose I deserved it, but I’ve long admired the words of Bart Simpson: “I wish I was an adult so I could break the rules.”

And then there was the time when I had a metal Slinky toy that got hopelessly tangled up. The wisest man in town was the local druggist, so I took it to him to see if he could untangle it. He kept it a week and reported that he couldn’t untangle it at all. I’d just have to get a new one.

I’ve always wondered if he weren’t just humoring me. I had once more seen an adult fall short. And soon after that, one of my uncles told me that my cowboy hero Roy Rogers was just a sissy.

Adults were failing me. This is why I’ve never wanted to be one, and so far my resistance is working.

I’m Tom McBride, and that’s my Perspective.

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