Oh, Peter.

"The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease forever to be able to do it."
-J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens

If you had to examine my obssession with Peter Pan and put it into some measurable amount then you would never to have a very large device by which to measure. Or you could just give up on the task and ponder forever how one person became so infatuated with one fictional character. It is to this question that I can give no answer. I just became. I think I was about three years old when I first watched Disney's version of Peter Pan. For some odd reason, I remembering knowing him and having some vague knowledge of the story before. It have no idea why, because as for as I know in my short three years of life no one had mentioned Peter Pan before. Sometimes I like to pretend that I was remembering my days as a bird in Kensington Gardens and the adventures Peter and I would have there, this is why I knew him so well in the Disney version. This is why I was so in love with him. I formed in mine there, at three years old, that Peter was thirteen. In truth, his true age has never been mentioned in any work. Most versions have the classic line of Wendy Darling asking his age and him answering, "Quite young." But I assumed, because he was at the age where he was at the pinnacle of growing up, when parents talk about a child becoming a man, that he must have jsut broken upon his teenage years. So therefore, Peter Pan became forever thirteen in my mind. For years I went without Peter, but then the 2003 movie came out. I was ten then and I fell in love with Jeremy Sumpter's version of Peter Pan more than perhaps anything. That movie is still my favorite version of Peter Pan and I do believe it always will be. I think it was around then that I started telling people that on my thirtenth birthday that Peter Pan was going to come and take me to Neverland. It just became something I said. I'm not sure of what people really thought of it, if I really was convinced Peter was going to come take me and therefore crazy or if I was just find me amusing. Of course, as you should know, I turned thirteen and Peter never came. With more years I grew more fond of Peter, found him in other ways. There the books, a series of three written by J.M Barrie. Then there was the musical version where even the woman in the lead could make me swoon. There were the Peter and StarCatcher books which led to their plays (which, in my opinion did not win enough Tonys) and most recently SyFy's version of Peter Pan, which almsot won me out as my new favorite. But the the boy in that role is just not as charming as thirteen year old Jeremy Sumpter.

I kepts saying it, that Peter would come get me, and I still say it. I turned twenty a few days ago and yet I was still saying it. Every year of my life since I've been thirteen I have continued to turn thirteen and continued to wait on Peter. And I really don't think I ever will. If people ever asked me what my idea of heaven was I don't think I could ever describe a better place than Neverland.

But that's not what this blog is about, what this one is mostly about it flying. Or mostly about Peter, a little about flying. You see, ever since I've been young, maybe even pre-Pan I've had dreams of flying. And I know flying dreams are a common thing in people. But flying dreams, they were incredible. They felt real. I would wake up with my fingers buzzing and my body itching, sometimes I wanted to jump off my bed, up into the air, just because I as so convinced I could fly. They felt so real to me. I loved these dreams, they were always my favorite. And sometimes in them, I was with Peter Pan, in others, I was in other situations, not with Peter but still flying. A few years back, though, something happened. I was somewhere around the age of seventeen, I had a horrible, horrible dream. In my dream I was fifteen, even though in real life I was two years older. I was wearing a long, white nightgown, one like Wendy wears in almost all versions of Peter Pan. In my dream I tried to fly but I couldn't. I would get into the ait, floating just for a moment but then I would fall. I felt to heavy, and I just couldn't fly, no matter how hard I tried. In my dream there was an elderly man, who for some reason I listened to ardently. And he told me I was losing my ability to fly, not because I was growing up, but because I had lost my faith. I woke up soon after that and it felt so hard, I felt so sad, pulling the emotions of the dream up with and into the real world. I could only cry.

Last week, finishing them up the day before my birthday, I re-read the three books by J. M Barrie about Peter Pan. Which is where I found the above quote, and I was somwhoe sad again, but I had doubted my ability to fly, and I would enerv be able to do it again. But then in my dream last night I flew, I really did. It was just like it had always been. And I know, just know, that Peter Pan is still going to come for me one day.

Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading On Writing by Stephan King.