when i grow up

part of this is exaggerated, but the parts about my life are real.

when i grow up, the last thing i want to be is old.

it's not that i don't ever want to die- i've actually been very successful at convincing myself that i won't be aware that i'm dead so it won't matter anyway lately. i just don't want to seem stale.
don't think i'm crazy: you know what i'm talking about, i've just used a different word. old people are different than us, and i don't mean "old," as in middle-aged, but bona fide elderly. old at it's finest. people don't think there's a difference between themselves and the old, but oh, they're wrong. you can't tell if honey nut cheerios are stale unless you break them in half or eat a few- they're the same on the outside, so you assume that there's no difference. old people are humans, but not necessarily. it's sort of a subhuman level- maybe sixty or seventy percent human, because the things that they have lived through and learned and listened to have changed them. and if these people haven't been careful then these scars can lead to this said staleness. you know..

the elderly odor, the yellow toenails, the urge to convert to blue hair that defies gravity.
the refusal to believe they might be wrong, the horrible results of lifelong bad habits, the inability to stop worrying.
bias, prejudice that has been passed through generations, the old times, the false facts drilled into their now-balded heads.
liver spots, soft saggy skin, toothless smiles, dimensia, arthiritis.
pills, canes, wheel chars, life alert, insulin, coke-bottle glasses.
...those things.
both of my parents work full time. when i was young, i didn't really see my parents, who spent long hours at the medical center and attended nursing school. sure, it was nice having a doctor and nurse to diagnose and take care of you when you were sick and take you into the operating room to sit in the corner and watch procedures and bring home slides for you to sit on the stars and look at and get quick, easy prescriptions for you in your very own house, but it almost wasn't worth it when you had to wait for hours, hoping that they would walk through the door and hug you or play with you or cook you dinner. with no parents to watch us, my sister and i were dumped on our grandparents. especially after the divorce. they didn't mind though, they loved us. with a strong prevalence of iranian tradition in their blood, they made it their destiny to bow down to us. my grandmother would cook rice and my grandfather would grill chicken and they would encourage us to sit in front of the tv and beg us to eat unreasonable amounts of food.
i'm not making this up. my grandmother even told me that it was her mission to "serve" me. it harbored our independence, and we are rarely allowed to conduct things on our own. my grandparents still get discouraged when i make my own meal or pour myself a glass of juice. one day my sister and i were at home alone, and my grandfather argued that he needed to come over and watch us because i was "only sixteen years old."
only sixteen years old? that's right, in a little more than a year, i will be graduating from high school. i will be going to college. and my sister isn't far behind me. and my grandparents repay our success by stating that we still need a babysitter.

it isn't fair. when my dad was sixteen, he lived independently, 2500 miles away from his parents, though they had no choice. it is why he is so independent. when i was a baby, we lived in chicago, far away from my grandparents. it is why i crave so much more independence than my sister does and hate to have things done for me. my sister wasn't so lucky. when we all moved to macon my grandparents moved in with us, and later moved a convenient twenty minutes away, making it so easy to stain our childhoods. i feel even worse for my baby cousin. my aunt and uncle actually encourage my grandparents' presence, dangerously unaware of what it will do to my poor cousin's future. and the effects are already taking their toll. my cousin isn't even two years old, yet he has been slightly overweight, has horrible manners, and remains very spoiled.
it isn't fair.

Author's Note

not done yet.

do i sound too harsh?