"What do you want to be when you grow up?"

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

This question is the beginning of the end. It’s the question she had to ask before she was leaving me for the night, as she does every night after our routine convenient-store run to get a bagel, a beverage, perhaps some pudding, maybe another snack…

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

I used to be able to answer that question. Now you ask me, and if you actually want to know, I’ll tell you for a half-hour about the doubts I have in life. I’ll tell you that all I know is that I want to be happy and make a difference in the world. I’ll tell you how I want to do music, but I have an escape route planned. I tell you that I want to do music, but every time I have a class with a bad teacher, I call home and say, “I want to teach, because I know I can do better.” I tell you that I’d be just as happy teaching as I would composing. That I could wake up and look at myself in the mirror okay not feeling like I’m betraying my life’s work.

I’ll tell you about the fears I have and the doubts I have about myself. I’ll tell you that as much talent as I have and as much as I compose and arrange and as much praise as I get, I don’t think I’m as good as everyone else does. I’ll tell you that I’m a fraud and the thing that gets me out of bed in the morning is the will to work and keep people from finding out that I am, in fact, a fraud.

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

I want to be eight-and-a-half. I want to see the world as I did back then. I want to get the simple joys out of life that I once could, but seem to have lost. I want to contribute. I want to have an unfeigned and indefatigable cheer that is contagious and makes those around me smile.

When I was eight-and-a-half, I could answer that question without a pause. Without doubt or fear or worry that I may not succeed. I could tell you that I wanted to spend my life in music. Yes, I wanted to be a famous pianist, but I have since realized that I don’t have the sheer abilities to do that but do have what it takes to be an arranger/composer. But I could tell you, no less, that I wanted to do music.

Now? I want to be eight-and-a-half.

The eight-and-a-half year-old in me lives. My teddy bear still means the world to me. I occasionally get a new stuffed animal and hug it as if it were the greatest thing to happen to me in my life. When I get depressed, I’ll buy myself a new toy car and play with it for days on end until I’m back to feeling (closer to) my age.

Hell – I still watch the Muppets on a daily basis. Kermit the Frog is a role-model to me.

All my teachers have such faith in me that I, myself, do not have. I’m getting better at it. But I will always have that backup plan. I will always have an escape route. I will always, as my drivers’ ed. teacher used to instruct, “leave myself an out.” I’ve never had to use one yet, but it’s there.

So, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

I want to be eight-and-a-half years-old.