let this week last forever

My head and my heart are colliding, chaotic
Pace of the world, I just wish I could stop it
Try to appear like I've got it together, I'm falling apart

Slow me down, don't let me live a lie

Before my life flies by

I need you to slow me down

Emmy Rossum

I turn thirteen on Sunday. It feels like my life has flown by me so fast. It seems like it was just yesterday that I was excited about going to China. That was eight years ago. It seems like just yesterday when I was escastic about creating my bank account. That was three years ago. It seems like just yesterday I moved up into the junior high group at church as a seventh-grader. That was a year ago. Now I'm the one welcoming the seventh-graders...I feel so old. I'm ninth-grade, a highschooler, in the fall. In two school years, I'm starting college classes full-time.

I'll be done with college at twenty years old. It'll be weird, to be twenty. Before I know it, I will be twenty. Time goes by that fast. It'll seem like just yesterday that I was on the verge of a teenager, looking towards thirteen, saying good-bye to twelve. Coming to terms with growing-up.

Let this week last forever. Let it be the longest week of my life. Let it be a single week that doesn't fly by me at the speed of sound. Let it be a week in which I can breathe and in which I can reflect...and let Sunday dawn on me, ready to be a teenager. I don't want to be sad to be a teenager. I'm excited, but there is a seed of sadness that I hope will be uprooted over the week. I want to look to the future with happiness.

But for now? I look at these pictures, telling the story of my life. Sunday will come, too fast. Growing up will come too fast. But it is not a bad thing, growing up. There's no need for nostalgia. But I can still feel a twinge of it in my chest as I scroll through my pictures...

And that's me now. But in the blink of an eye, it will be five years from now. God help me appreciate life before the time slips away.