Kids...

I've decided that I love kids! I've always been around kids, babysitting and helping my family with siblings and cousins. One would think that with all of the time spent with them that I would have been scared away from the idea of eventually having kids, but that's not the case.

For my work study job here at school at work for an after school homework lab/ after school program fro kids from kindergarten to fifth grade. This job has really openned my eyes to the full experience of being around kids. Sure I got a lot of experience growing as the oldest of four in my house, but it's different when you are related to the kids that you're responsible for.

In the past couple of months I've really connected to this amazing group of little hellions. I adore and admire each and everyone of them for their little quirks and their charming smiles. There's nothing in the world like teaching them something new or helping them to achieve something. I have never felt this way before when I go to work and hang out with the kids coloring or playing on the playground. It's a new adventure everyday and they've openned my eyes to a lot of things. They halp me to see the innocence and purity that is still left in this ravished world.

I can't seem to get it through my head that these brave and intelligent little people are going to have to eventually face the world some day. It makes you just want to hide them away from the rest of the world and protect them from everything and anything that will harm them. It pains me to know that they will soon lose whatever youthful innocence that remains. I'm not sure that they can even imagine what the world holds for them. For now they live in their blissfully naive little world of childhood, but how soon will it last?

I envy their outlook on life. They are so opimistic and pure that I ache inside thinking about how cruel the world can and will eventually be to them. I've grown up from the serious little child that I once was, but a part of that little girl survives in me and is in awe of the world around me. I love to color and play outside. I love to swing and read silly stories. I just love doing all that things that make life so simple and yet so comfortable.

These kids have made such an impact on my life and I didn't even know that they wiggle their way into my heart until it was too late. I have come to care about each and everyone of them. I love children in general. Kids are like no other group of people in the world. They can take you to far away places with their stories and adventures and they can bring you to your knees with their tears. They hold the future and the world in the palms of their tiny hands and yet the rest of the world seems to forget that simple fact.

It makes me sick to see most of what happens to children in the world. How anyone can harm or kill a child is beyond me. I have to turn off the TV sometimes because I start crying when I hear how a parent murdered their child or beat them until they were hospitalized...and don't even get me started on the sexual abuse that you hear about. Children are the world and to tarnish that innocence or to take it away prematurely is wrong and vile.

Maybe it's the maternal side in me coming out or maybe its the humane part of who I am, but I can't stand to see anyone harmed, especially not children. I can't say enough, but I love kids, and if my mother reads this she may very well panic because up until now I have convinced my family that I'd never have kids. Don't panic yet mom, I'm planning on starting anytime soon! Eventaully, yes, like five or more years down the road, but right now, nah. Life's just beginning to get interesting here and I'm not ready for that kind of responsibility. I can barely keep myself out of trouble, never mind a whole other person depending on me for survival.

Jen