how come people change?

People change. Of course. But sometimes, it's a real pity that they do.

Have you ever looked back at someone's old pictures and thought how happy they looked when they were younger, how carefree and smiley? And then you contrast those pictures with their current pictures. They may be smiling and they may look happy, but something's changed. Something is different.

The spark has maybe left their eyes. They smile,  but it doesn't reach the eyes. It is as though, somewhere along the way, they grew up, they had their perspectives shifted, and now everything they see is just a fragment of what they had saw once. Like what's left is just a uncomparable speckle of what once was. How they once saw things. Some people never have to go through that phase, and they live life in a bubble of their own blissful ignorance, and the world is always a good place. And sometimes I do envy them. But more often that not it is not so lucky for the rest of us. I can safely say that most of us are just now a pale comparison of our once more genuinely happy selves.

I do miss that version of me sometimes. O, to be free of the disappointments of this world, free from the boundaries of oblivion and the endless spiralling abyss! So little we see in our innocent child eyes, but as we grow older there are less things to look forward to, and more to dread. As we grow up, more and more people leave, more and more inhumane and cruel truths thrust before our eyes that we have to learn to accept. Stories of war, of death, of oppression and suffering. Knowledge that Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy doesn't exist, further diminishing the child-like hope that is in us all. The cold reality that we have come to face. Knowing that nothing is ever new under the sun, and that our days will just be different variations of the same, monotonous routine. The king and the pawn to return to the same box. The sheer boredom and the burden of living. We've been let down, trashed, and these just keep heaping up as we grow older. No amount of "faith in humanity restored" moments can wipe out the evil of this world. Sin is a plague, so widespread and common that nobody resists it anymore. It is no wonder, that the wide grin has slowly faded into a half-hearted smile and that the life has slowly left our eyes. It is no wonder that people change, but it is not, often enough, for the better. How do we live with ourselves? How do we tolerate the world? How do we learn to accept evil? How soon before we go home?