Finding my elementary school

This summer, my boyfriend and I visited our old elementary and middle schools together at night to look at and take photos of stars.
I probably havenβt visited my elementary school since eighth grade (thatβd be around nine years ago). We didnβt go inside the building and everything looked different because it was night time, but I recognized the place so clearly. It looked and felt exactly the same, but also so different. The moment I stepped foot out of the car, I remembered all these things that I thought I would have forgotten by now.
I want to share a lot of my memories about my elementary school because it is a place and a period of my life that I truly enjoyed, but I feel like thereβs no point because you probably have no idea what Iβm talking about.
You donβt recognize the little gravel walkway to the kindergarten classrooms like I do. You donβt have the memories of experiencing your first winter in Vancouver, seeing real snow for the first time, and having Mrs. Smith bundle you up in all the snow gear your mother made you wear, only to hear the bell ring for the end of recess by the time you are ready to go out.
You donβt remember that day when a bear visited us from the forest behind us (before fences got built). You werenβt one of my classmates who rushed to the windows together to touch its nose as it poked through one of our open windows with my teacher yelling at us in the background.
You donβt know that there used to be a little parking spot left by other parents just for my little sister to pick me up in our battery-powered Barbie jeep. You didnβt hate the new principal we got in fifth grade, simply because she wasnβt our beloved old principal. You werenβt a part of the Christmas concerts I was in. You didnβt stand next to me when I sang in the choir, or acted in the school play, or played piano at the annual talent show. You didnβt collect berries with me, or paint your nails with me under the slide. We never played hopscotch, skipping rope, or handshake games together under cover when it rained. You didnβt see the drawings I made that were proudly presented in the main hallway for all to see. We didnβt celebrate when there was news of a new playground being built.
Elementary school was fun. It was a place where I made my first friends, wrote my name for the first time by myself, and learned how to read. There were moments of pure joy: hot lunch days! Field trips! Grounders and freeze tag! Snowball fight! The TV is rolling in⦠BILL! BILL! BILL! BILL!
These were all the things that floated in my mind as I explored a place that used to be my every day for five years, but by the time we found a flat place to set up, a sad realization hit me: I had already walked around the whole place. Everything is so small. It didnβt used to be.
The soccer field used to be huge. The monkey bars were high up in the sky. Walking from the kindergarten classrooms to the fifth grade area was one long journey. The forest used to be dense, but now it looked scanty and empty. The big hill that was thrilling to run or sled down was nothing but an average slope to me now. Everything around me seemed to have lost its magic.
And I knew (obviously) that nothing had actually changed. The soccer field, hill, forest⦠everything is the same size as it was twelve years ago. I was just much smaller at the time so everything seemed bigger and more exciting.
And I also knew that itβs not that this place lost its magic. Itβs probably still a magical place for many children, just not for me.
Because itβs not my place anymore.
Sincerely, Loewe
P.S. Mitchel, if you happen to be reading this, Iβll never forget that you brought a stuffed bunny to our kindergarten teddy bear picnic.