Retrospectivepart 2 of 2

I despair because of this: while the world that I left behind has not changed, I have. I have changed a great deal. Living alone in the continental state furthest from my own has changed me in every way. I have grown up. I have moved on. I have become what teenagers fear: a responsible adult. I've fallen victim to this corporate world, the every day grind, the pull of the alarm clock, the slavery to time. I am now a primitive form of who I will be when I grow old, professional, working and wise. It sounds depressing, and it sounds harsh. But of the transitions that we have to go through in our lives, two stand out. The first, puberty. Our entire physical being is turned upside down as we physically transition from childhood into adulthood. The second is less definitive. It is this transition from dependency to independence. You could say that we perceptually transition from childhood into adulthood. We gain our perspective, we open our eyes to the medial tasks that keep our lives functioning; taxes and investments and bills and Windex and laundry hampers and Captain Crunch. We must become independent; A concept that is difficult for many to embrace. But there is only truth in it. Once we throw off the lies that our minds tell us about how great life once was, it is then that we can see the joy of responsibility. The desire is to be young and ignorant, to be oblivious to the pain and struggle that go on around us. For essentially, that perspective is childhood. Once our perspective changes, life gets harder, because we are forced to embrace those struggles that we could easily ignore in childhood. So to be young, to be in high school again, they are desires and wishes that cross into my mind as I'm sure they do to many. But the natural flow of life in God's perfect plan leads on to the next step, onto this responsibility of independence. And coming back to the Midwest, I realize that besides any changes in my stature, my appearance, my beliefs or my convictions, the most-important is the transformation of my dependence that has made me a completely different man. And I sincerely hope and pray that this man that I am becoming is exactly the man that the Lord will use to change the world for his names sake. Though I feel as though I've lost my place.