Growing Older Has Become Something I Like, a Little More

  
When I walk through the city, I see students,
living as though this very moment
is the brightest time of their lives.

I watch them, thinking,
I had days like that too,
and feeling just a little envious.

When I meet friends from my school days,
it is not our recent lives we talk about,
but the memories we shared.

Back then,
When I was that age,
When was it that I began looking back like this so often?


Is it only the past that is beautiful?


As the years pass,
my circle widens,
and I encounter more and more people.

Generations, nationalities, walks of life.

Their perspectives gradually accumulate within me.

Little by little,
the outline of who I am begins to emerge.

I come to know
that there is joy in the quiet passing of time,
just as there is in life's vivid moments.


This moment will never return.


But I already know
that it is not being lost.

It is being layered
to all that has come before it.

One day,
I will look back on this time too,
with a sense of nostalgia.

And by then,
perhaps I will have discovered
another kind of joy.