31 going on 12

Yesterday, at around 8 p.m., I was at peace.

It had just occurred to me that I'm in love with everyone I know -- coworkers, friends, family -- and for a few short hours I couldn't stop smiling. I was blissful and serene and feeling blessed to have the relationships -- some of them old, some of them just beginning -- that I have now.

But later, in Brooklyn, a chance encounter tarnished the day's simple happiness.

It's become my goal to seek out and spend the majority of my time with people who make me feel like a 12-year-old, not because I want to sit around giggling about boys and fart jokes -- though both are fine in my book -- but because youth is largely free of labels, of constraints. When you're 12, you aren't branded a mom, a wife (or, when you're my age and older, single and/or childless), a lawyer, a vegetarian, a Democrat. You don't worry quite so much how you'll come off, whether you'll impress your conversation partner, etc. -- that comes a few years later, in high school. When you're 12, you just are.

Around certain people, I forget that I'm an adult, and I know only laughter, listening and the eager exchange of ideas. Certain people manage to surprise me, and I'd like more of that.