A Wrinkled Soul

Tonight is a lonely night. The world is still and peaceful. Every thing keeps to its own way, and so I must trudge this path which is laid before me. I could not help but think of them all: my dearest friends talking, having fun...living life together happily. They are all so young and so jovial. There's an innocence, a blindness to it all. And yet people rise with anger to hear this and protest: "I'm old! I'm old enough! I'm smart!" There is a difference, my dearest reader, between brains and experience. There is a difference between maturity of mind and limb and maturity of action and choice. There is a difference, reader, in mental capability and experience of life. And, alas!, oh my dear reader, this is where I make enemies. I look at my friends, my heart in other bodies, their lives, their talents, and I cannot help but see....I cannot help but observe...I cannot help but whisper my thoughts to my soul and say "There goes one who is more mature in mental and physical abilities than most, who speaks well, who loves well, who is well. A person who looks and talks like a very mature person.... and yet.....they are not. There is not the action of..." and here my mind falls me. I cannot put into words what they lack, but rather it is something I feel inside of me. Perhaps it is this innocence. It is of a strange sort for it does not accompany a dull mind nor a trained brain. It dwells in capable, loving, and extremely intelligent individuals, yet it resides there all the same. Is this an innocence worth removing? No, and indeed, I would not if I could for it is an innocence which only time will taint, only life will change. There is a time for it. It is called childhood. There is life beyond it. It is called adulthood. To pass from one into another is to pass from innocence to experience. I do not use experience in the way that the world uses it. They use it to excuse the sinful behavior of this generation. "Oh look, they must have experience!" No, reader, that is wrong. For they are blind to the fact that experience without maturity is like icing without a cake. Sweet at first, but once inside, it sickens. What experience do I speak of then? Experience as in life outside of the inner world... of... Words fail me, reader. I still cannot grasp at what I think and feel. Perhaps, someday I will.

Yoni is right; I am older. I am older in a way that not many are old. My soul is wrinkled I might say, like an woman who, without knowing it, has lived a life unlike those around her. She is experienced, not like those of the world, who seek after experiences in the wrong time (though she has done that), but rather like one who has been through experiences of the mind and body where.... again, lack of words. Nor is she like unlike her companions who are mentally the brightest and some of the most mentally mature people she has met, but is rather unlike them. I feel thirty when I am but seventeen. I have experienced as much as a twenty year old typically does, but without the stain of world. I have lived long and been blessed much. Given time, I shall try to become more like the Shepherd of the Bend, the Otto of the Norway, the Tingley of the Ottawa, the Nobleman of the Fort, the Bloedow of all lands who are unto Plato and Aristotle only with life and limb. Do not think, dearest reader, that I idolize these men. No, I see their faults. They are not perfect. Mortal they are and, indeed, I love them all the more for it. They sin, they fall, they fail. But they are like unto the Greeks in their philosophy. They are brilliant, firm, kind, loving, and, best of all, they are godly. But more than that: they are men. They have stepped beyond the threshold of childhood; they have begun their search. Ah, yes, that may be it. A child does not know what to seek and what in life to seek and it does not seek with drive, with purpose. A man does. And that is what I am doing. I am passing from childhood to womanhood. My hand has already turned the knob; indeed, the door is opened. My foot is on the threshold. Behold, I am passing. I was passing. I have passed. My childhood characteristics and traits still linger, but in this new light from this life, they will change, mold, and pass away into what a woman is. I look back. My heart is breaking. My friends, my dearest ones still stand there, laughing and joking. They are so happy, so blissful. I turn my face. The light around me dazzles me, warms me. I raise my arms, tearfully embracing a new life. The sunlight dances around me; I can feel their warmth enfolding me in their arms. I smile though my heart feels nothing but dullness. I close my eyes; the tears trickle down my cheeks. I belong here. I will live here, embracing this newness. A chance for a new start. I am blessed. My dearest reader, I am because He is.