I was always afraid of
children. Even when I was one of them, I hung back by the
grownups. They were safer. They never tried to get me in
trouble.
I wonder if that’s part of why I’m such a
disaster now, never knowing how to
take a
chance. The only real
risk-takers in our society are the ones who don’t know any
better, the ones too
young to care. And yet there I was, making
chitchat with the
fuddy-duddies lost in their search for what used to be their
youth, sipping
whiskeys
and talking amongst themselves about crap that they couldn’t care less about, trying to
hide that they’re almost
too scared to move.
The
grownups always said I was so
old for my age. I wonder now if that was a
compliment, or a
warning for what was to come.