My Favorite Blonde Children

There are two kids I hang out with on a regular basis and over time, I've started referring to them as my favorite blonde children.  They're amazing tweens, and I invest a lot of time in them.  Lately I've been feeling especially isolated from people my own age since I work so much and that's led me to recently question whether I should spend less time with them and try to widen my circle of friends.  But the second I started thinking about that, invites from people my own age to do fun things started pouring into my inbox and facebook events page, reminding me that it was only a temporary lull.  But more importantly, I've just come to the realization that my life has come full circle.  When I was 13 and working at a summer camp I met a wonderful lady with whom I've been friends ever since.  She was and is very supportive, and is primarily responsible for me turning out as a relatively well-functioning, college-educated adult.  All of that happened because she gave me huge quantities of her time over the years.  I definitely appreciated it then, but I have more perspective on some of the things she sacrificed at that time to be available to me.  The other night, I chose to go hang out with the kids after work instead of accepting a social invite from an acquaintance and realized that I didn't feel guilty at all.  I also don't feel guilty about the fact that my favorite blonde children receive more of my time than any of the other wonderful kids I know.  And I feel 100% confident that I'm doing the right thing because it's exactly what someone did for me when I was their age.  That sounds like such an old person thing to say, but I feel very fortunate to have had someone and to be able to give to these kids, because they don't have nearly as many positive adult resources as any of the other children I know, and they've come to view me as a constant in their lives.  And so I've evolved into the young childless adult who listens and helps with homework and gives more lectures than they'd prefer, but whose phone rings off the hook if I don't appear at their house often enough.  It's really scary to stop and think about how much older I am, and how parental I've become, but they're worth it.  That's probably enough nostalgia for now...busy day tomorrow, and short on sleep.  Good night:)