i wanna stay like this forever

growing up is hard.  anyone who tells you otherwise is lying.
if i had the choice, i would be a little kid forever. maybe.
its weird to even think that i was a little kid at one point. it almost
seems as if i woke up and was 20 years old. sometimes it seems the only
way for me to know that i was at one point in my life a little four year old with crooked "orphan bangs"
and a round rosy face is looking at pictures. its such a distant memory. almost like a dream.
the kind when you can only remember bits and pieces and nothing makes sense when you
try to recall it to a friend.  but you know it makes sense.
        while i was working today i decided to listen to Taylor Swift. as my iphone was shuffling
her songs a song came on that i had never heard of.  pretty soon into the song i found that i was
getting all choked up and teary eyed. which was odd to me, because i wasn't really listening to the
song, but this hazy dream-like memory of myself as a four year old with my dad was playing in my mind.
   
i remember it was around christmas time and i was looking at an american girls catalog picking out what doll i wanted santa to bring me that year.  as i jumped up on my dad's lap to show him my dream and hope for that coming magical morning he looked at me and said, "hannah, will you promise me something?" and me, being the daddy's girl that i am, shook my head earnestly waiting to promise him what it was that he was about to ask, and he said, "don't ever grow up! i want you to stay little forever!"
and i said ok, willingly.  he then said, "and you never ever have to move out of the house, ok? you can live with me and mommy forever." with my mom shaking her head and in the background saying, "shawn! don't tell her that!" he then looked at me and said, "one last thing... promise me you will never get married!" and of course i responded, "i want to marry you dad!" with a smile on my dad's face he just hugged me and we sat there until i woke up to the dark in my room tucked in bed.
      i miss being that little. so naive, so innocent. everything was such an adventure, so exciting so hilarious.
i wonder if i had any idea that one day i wouldn't be able to sit on my dads "soldiers" anymore.  wonder if i knew that when i got into junior high that i would never want to be home, never want to see my parents.  wonder if i knew that one day i would only see them maybe 5 or 6 times a year. oh to be a child again, what i would do.. to not wish it all away so quickly.