What do you want to be when you grow up?
A Racecar driver. To anyone who knows him as he is now, this may have come as a surprise to learn that once upon a time, before he knew what the world had in store, he wanted to be a racecar driver. The 9-year-old had found a new answer for the dreaded question whenever adults took an interest in his aspirations. However, the reasoning behind it was a bit odd; he had recently learned what a palindrome was, and the first example of that was indeed the word racecar. The thought that something could make sense both backward and forwards meant that it was obviously way more cool than any other profession, and there began the strange connections between future ambitions of our young student.
Once the world started to show itself a bit more, and reality started to settle in, the thought of being a racecar driver began to feel more and more juvenile. Not because it was a bad profession, but because of certain upbringings, it felt like an impossible dream to reach - this would, unfortunately, become a pattern.
A Scientist. Now this was it. The perfect answer for any 12-year-old. It was kind of realistic, parents loved it, teachers loved it, it made you feel like you were smart enough to take on the world, and it was vague enough where you didn't feel too much pressure being locked into any one profession in life. High School was the start of academic seriousness, physics, chemistry, and biology classes - the backbone to any future scientist. Now imagine hating every single one of those classes. That kinda throws a monkey wrench into the works now doesn't it?
Rich. An answer that was proclaimed for the longest amount of time. It always seemed to make people laugh, maybe it was the cleverness of the answer or the realization that that ambition was one shared by everyone else on the planet, and it would be way easier said than done. After deciding that being a scientist wasn't the best option and frankly it wasn't realistic anymore, he figured he'd skip the normal answer and just jump to being rich when he grew up. From the super mature age of 15, a goal had been set, to become rich so anything that's wanted could be gotten. Never having to worry about money, having long fun vacations with friends, it would be the dream. That's where the first mistake was made - wanting a dream but not thinking of what it would cost to get it.
Happy. Being an adult isn't always fun, that's inevitable when it comes to life, and sometimes when you grow up faster than you're meant to, it becomes really hard to reconcile the once cheerful carefree life with the work-forever-till-you're-60-and-pay-for-every-single-thing-you-enjoy life. It becomes much easier with friends, and luckily he has some amazing ones, they're lovely to spend time with but when that's not an option, he recalls his past ambitions and realized that they all pale in comparison to one thing - being happy when you grow up. So that's the new goal :)
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