I miss...everything 🤣.

Here I am, happy to post again, in response to one of the topics proposed by Galen for this Weekend Engagement. Thank you 😊.

Oh, what do I miss about being a child? Almost everything! I miss the house where I grew up. The smell of wood and thatch from its roofs. The fresh breeze that came in through its single-leaf windows, which were like little doors. That house no longer exists; in its place there’s a more modern and “comfortable” one, but nothing like the old house. I loved sliding on soapy water along its long hallway and playing with the streams of water that fell from its roof when it rained.

I miss getting soaked in the downpours and splashing in the mud, even though my grandmother would yell at me that I was going to get sick… and sometimes I did 😜. I miss the lack of responsibilities, that thing of not having to worry about anything except playing and wishing night would never come… so I could keep playing 🤣. I miss the snacks of salty round crackers with guava paste and cheese, the ones that tasted better on stormy afternoons when the thunder kept me from going outside. But as soon as the rain let up, I’d run to make little boats out of newspaper and float them down the streams of water and mud left by the rain. I also miss walking to school very early in the mist that wouldn’t let me see even a meter ahead, and I’d arrive soaked as if I’d been caught in a downpour.

Climbing up into the mango and tangerine trees and eating their fruit while sitting on their branches is a memory I treasure like gold. Running around under the coffee plants, which were always in the shade, was so much fun. Though more than once I’d come out screaming from the stings of santanillas (fire ants), which burn like hell 🤪.

I miss the ice cream cart that came by with its classic song and its white cardboard “pintas” with a red stripe and a blue one. The “Beatriz” yogurt that had a cow painted on the label and tasted like heaven. I long for the candies and pastries from the little candy shop in my town, I’d buy them on my way back home from school, fresh out of the oven. I’ve never had any others like them.

I miss the traveling library that came every week and the mobile cinema with its movies projected onto a white cloth. That capacity for wonder I had for everything is something I remember with nostalgia. But what I miss the most is the ability to apprehend, that ease as a child to absorb effortlessly, to learn just by looking and asking. That ability I feel I’ve lost… but oh well, age takes its toll 🤪.

In short, I miss being a child because I miss a life that tasted like rain, mango, tangerine, and salty crackers with guava paste and cheese. Because I long for a home that no longer exists, and for a version of me who learned without even realizing it. Because back then, the worst thing in the world was night falling or getting a "santanilla" bite. Because in the end, it’s not things I miss, I miss that ease of being happy that only children have.