Looking Back

First, listen to this song:
http://hypem.com/#/track/784858/Fionn+Regan+-+Abacus

At this time of year, I used to listen to my mom talk to the big kids who were graduating from high school. I would look at them in awe, like they were a million years older than me, and a million times wiser. Now that I'm there, I'm wondering what happened to that promised wisdom.

Here's a portion from a memoir I wrote as a part of my English class.

I admired my brother's friends very much. I marveled at their free-spirited lifestyle, and creativity. I had skin and bone relationships with my friends. There was no depth. I always felt as if I was holding myself back around them. When you are thirteen, creativity is not a desired virtue. I was able to look at these people as icons of fabulous teenage years to come. I realize now that I’m at that stage, that “thrilling” time, that I was only seeing one dimension of 17-year-olds. I did have good reason to admire them, and I still do admire those qualities, but I’m now able to criticize other aspects about my brother and his friends that were in my blind spots at thirteen.
-They did have a certain youthfulness I was never able to capture.