This is my nephew Francis. He’s sitting next to me right now which is making it difficult to type. I just ended a phone call complaining to my friend about all that I should get done tonight: this blog entry, my math homework, laundry-I’m out of socks and underwear-, work on my thesis, work on a poetry assignment… countless other things I understand I need to do but don’t care about at the moment. I just wanna play with this kid. Maybe I’m just procrastinating.

Still, sometimes kids terrify me. Just look at that photo.

The other evening, I was on Facebook (again, I probably should’ve been doing something else). I usually don’t have the messenger on. It makes me feel like I’m spending less time on that site than I actually do. I also tend to turn the chat option off so that I don’t have to talk to people. Antisocial behavior on a social networking site. But the other night, I was on Facebook with the chat on and my much younger cousin sent me a message.

She lives in the Manila, which is 24 hours ahead of New York time. She’s 12 years old and looks and tries to act a lot older. We smalltalked. She asked me how my life is and I responded that it’s fine. It’s all about work and school right now. She asked me when I will graduate. May. Her response just killed me. She said, “Oh really? Wow. You’re graduating and my life is just beginning.”

What is that supposed to mean? I’m attributing my interpretation of that statement to a language barrier. There’s no way that I’m dying, metaphorically or otherwise, upon graduation, right? Right?

Kids say the most terrifying things.