How do you define innocence? (Personal Essay)

Sometimes, when the world seems to be corrupted by unspeakable impurities, I try to find restoration through children. I look at their eyes and this instantly brings me into a different place, different dimension. There’s neither intentional hate nor desire to overpower. Everything is wonder and plain satisfaction, no matter what you offer.

They’ll look back at me and they don’t seem to see my flaws. In their eyes, I’m this perfect stranger that shares the same image as them, only bigger. I don’t have to pretend in front of them because they don’t know how to process pretensions, making them the only breed in the world that’s free of judgment. Yes, they’ll look at you just like how a blind person looks at the world.

I always think of the thoughts that run into their heads whenever they return their eyes into what seems to be a permanent void that no one could ever access but them. I always thought maybe they could see something that I don’t have the ability to see or beyond what I could see. Maybe, it’s the true happiness that they could access but tend to forget the moment they start to grow up.

You’ll agree with me that they are not just a breed who’s free of judgment. They are also a breed who’s not capable of being sad. Yes, they do cry a lot but crying doesn’t necessarily mean sadness, does it? It’s a kind of thing that adults do; sadness. Whereas crying, it’s for children who left home for the first time and stop in the midst of the ride knowing that they’ll come back home, eventually.

I guess, it’s what makes them remarkable. They have the ability to be satisfied and so they never get sad. People stopped to get satisfied when they became adults. They always want more and ask for more. Children don’t do that and if they ever will, they never ask for something that you couldn’t give like love or trust. They only ask for candies and teddy bears.

I always miss my youth whenever I look at children. They reminded me of the past, and at the same time, the approaching future. I always think of the thoughts that run into my head when I was a young one too and so as the possible adults who look at me the way I look at children now. It’s sad that I couldn’t go back to the past and it’s scary that I have to go through the future.

I wish I have captured my youth the way I did to these babies and children.

The smiling, satisfied, and stunned look on their faces make sense more than life itself.

Our paths may cross again in the future and I may not recognize them but I’ll always know in my heart that it’s them; the breed who made me go through the nostalgia of innocence once again. xx