Hey yourself, Matt Smith.

I saw these two little blond kids today -- a boy and a girl of about 6 or 7 -- walking through the Armstrong Tunnels with a older guy, who I blindly assumed was their father. Only I guess he couldn't have been that old. He may have been 25 or so -- which isn't old at all -- but he seemed older to me because he had to be their dad.
The kids were absolutely loving the tunnel. I mean, tunnels -- on a whole -- are remarkable. They're big and long and empty and hollow-sounding... tunnels. (Side note: My sister and I used to play this game on road trips in the car where whenever we'd come to a tunnel -- I mean, come right up on top of it... right where there was no turning back -- one of us would shout, "Imagine you're a spitball!" Funny the things you remember when you're not trying.)
But back to the blond kids. They were screaming just to hear the sound of the echo. (The little girl was doing more of a squealing, stuck-pig sort of noise, but you get the idea.) And they were singing, but not real songs. Just songs you'd make up if you were six and wanted to hear the sound of your voice singing back to you in a tunnel. And they were shouting and talking and making up nonsense-words and just being annoying in general.
The thing of it was, I wasn't annoyed. I hate kids. Especially the loud, squealing kind. And all I could think was, "How perfect."
All of a sudden I wanted so badly to be six again. I wanted to love the sound of my own voice, talking back to me, but not really saying anything at all. I wanted to be a little blond kid, whose dad was only 25 and happy.
I wanted to not have to worry about how loud I got in the tunnel.

Love,
Meredith