Daydream

I hear a child screaming from outside the window, and look up from my desk. There are three children down there, two boys and a girl who seems substantially younger. It was the little girl who is screaming, running away from the two older boys who each look around 10 years old. The little girl’s blond pigtails flap up and down as she runs, her scream turning into delighted laughter. The boys catch up to her, and one of them, perhaps her brother, bends over slightly as he catches her and pulls her arms behind her back.

“Hands up, pirate! You’re under arrest!” shouts the second boy, hands put together like a gun pointed up into the sky. The little girl laughs again, and struggles to get her arms out of the first boy’s grasp. When she finds she can’t do it, she kicks off a sandal and sticks her foot up in the air, wiggling her toes.

The boys and girl yell and laugh with each other some more, running around and jumping on each other all the way down the street and out of sight. I gaze out through the window, watching their little figures get smaller and smaller in the distance. Suddenly, I remember the open biology textbook sitting in front of me. I grudgingly go back to outlining chapter three.

It’s hard not be jealous, watching those little kids playing so happily outside. They are so carefree, so energetic, so happy. There was a time when summer vacation really was a vacation, a time to go out and play until the sun sets, a time to be idle and work-free. Not that elementary school kids have much to do during the school year… In any case, with increased work during the school year comes more school work during the summer. My gaze floats back out to the window, as if staring long enough would make the little kids come back.

I know I really shouldn’t be complaining. Summer still is better than the regular school year; I can set my own schedule, and do more exciting things than I do when school is in session. All the same, hearing those delighted shrieks makes me nostalgic and wishful for those good old pre-high school days. I pull my eyes away from the window and back to the textbook. The sooner I finish this, the more time I have for other things.