Growing pains.

Pain from never being able to return to a time of what was.
What was my ah-ha moment? My moment of realization that I can never return to the innocence and vitality of my youth.
Was it the subtle creaking of my knees as I walked down so many familiar paths 
that I once ran and leaped with joy and excitement?
Or was it the pieces of my memories strewn together in my ragged photo album that began my moment of eureka?

The distance between my past self and my present stands light-years apart, colliding with the hot bursting stars of my future.
This is where my growing pains are born. 
A product of miniature big bangs sounding alarms to my decaying youth.
Lost in a cosmos of regret and longing.

As I shed old thoughts, memories, feelings, my old self 
And invite new beginnings and adventures, 
I’m still reminded of the past as the dust of forgotten memories surround me, 
dotting the air with stifling particles illuminated by the setting sun.
As echos of my past begin to fade with the passing breeze, I reflect on my growing pains. 
Pains for the future, pains from the past, pains for a new me.   
 
“We grow. It hurts at first,” something I’m beginning to learn.
Learning how to mourn the coldness of my past while embracing the warmth of my future.
By acknowledging my growing pains, I place honor on my endless journey to this point, a new starting point.

I’m learning to enjoy my growing pains as they stand as a reminder of what will always be.
Not what was but what will remain.
My growing pains.

-Sheanna M.