P is for Puerile

Almost straight white chalk lines beckoned me from the tarred pavement. Squares joined together. I looked around, stole a flat stone from the roadside and flung it into the first square. My legs twitched, wanting to hop along the pattern.

“Did you want to play atya-patya with us, aunty?”

Aunty. I grimaced. When did I grow up? The little girl grinned at me with an odd look of pity. Her green and white cotton frilled dress swayed in the wind as did her flyaway bangs on her forehead. It looked as if her two well tamed black braids were her only disciplined traits.

I shook my head sheepishly, “No, just remembering….”

She giggled.

I looked away hurriedly. I had my jejune moments. I’ve always had them. Only, back when I was a kid, they were just called moments. I hate to say that I want to stay back in my childhood days. Days when worries were probably smaller, or at the very least different. I probably do.

A second girl ran up to us. I smiled back at the one in the green and white dress and lay an almost condescending pat on her head. “You’ll understand when you grow up.” Then straightening my spine, I turned away. Whispers between the girl in the green and white dress and her friend floated along on the wind.

Giggles.

A clink of a flat pebble and the sweet sound of feet on the pavement. 

I jerked my head trying to shake off the childish feelings dancing in my mind. Hopscotch was just not in my destiny that day.

P is for puerile

No, not the generic adjective, but that particular feeling which some of us enjoy from time to time.