My Sparkling Youth

   I can vividly remember being in high school and saying "This is our sparkling youth!" I had heard over and over again that the high school years are far too fleeting and ought to be appreciated, and I took that to heart. I still don't think I really comprehended that they would end, but I did my best to enjoy and savor every moment - because really, I had one of the best high school experiences anyone could hope to have. I went to Mountain Valley Academy, a home school program that was set up pretty much like a junior college. But it was so tiny! - compared to the attendance of most high schools, anyway. Our entire senior class was in Civics and Economics together. Most everyone knew each other and was friendly and kind; sure, we had our conflicts and drama, but there was little oppression or cruelty that I could see. Speaking of drama, woo hoo! Drama was to our school like football is to most schools. We didn't have a football team anyway, so that was just as well.
   I brag and reminisce as if those days were long ago, but they were really just last year - I'm a freshman in college. But they feel like an age ago. Perhaps because I know I can't ever go back, even by returning to the school. I've visited MVA, and it's just not the same. Not all is lost; many of the key people that drew me to that place are still in my life, even going to the same college as me. And I'm thankful for that. But it's not just them, either. It's that period of my life, the best I've yet known, that I miss.
   I have mixed feelings about growing up. Sometimes I cry and mourn the days gone by, and resent that I have to participate more in this world that is big, scary, and opposed to the things of God. But I do want maturity; I want to become the person God plans for me to be, more devoted to and capable of serving Him. And I want to be someone that people can rely on, a success in the small and big things I do. I want to be a wise, responsible, pure, lovely woman of God. It's going to be a hard road though. Never pray for wisdom or patience, they say! ;P lol
   I suppose if my sparkling youth is over, my time to be cut and polished has begun.