Every year I go on this vacation. A cabin on an island, in the Delaware River. Just me and my family; that is, my parents, my sister and I. We go with our friend's family, and they have four kids: three who are my sister's age, of 16 or 17, and one who is 9. Of course, there's the dog, too. For as long as I've known this family, we've gone to “The Cabin”, as we fondly call it, every summer. No matter what other plans we have, the cabin is always one of our summer destinations. But now, things are different than they used to be. Now, instead of hanging out with the teenagers (I'm only about 2 years younger), they act as though I am not worthy, a disease reminding them of their naive childhood. They don't want to swim in the river and laugh and go tubing and knee boarding; no, they would rather sit inside all day and talk and laugh and text boys and pretend as if I don't exist. Sure, they make an effort to include me on occasion. But the effort is half-hearted at best, because they truly do not wish to have me around. It is worse when they bring friends up to our cabin, our place to stay. The friends of the girls will make our vacation, which is supposed to be about the outdoors, all about what is happening back home. The boys who come will just look for excuses to flirt with the girls, myself not included. And thus a circle forms, and those who do not have an all-access pass to hang with them are not invited to join in their secret society of drugs, drinking, flirting, and being overall annoying. It makes one wonder what age does to a person.

Take my neighbor, for example. We used to hang out all the time. My sister would bring me along and we would make up fairy tale stories, and I was always the good fairy. My sister was the witch. Her friend was some other magical creature. We would play make-believe for hours, and then when we got bored of that, we would eat popsicles and pretend to make gourmet meals out of the leaves and twigs in the yard. I wish I could capture those years and keep them in a glass jar, never to be contaminated by age. But of course, those golden years couldn't last. My sister and her friend grew older, and while they didn't exclude me, their version of what was fun grew dramatically different from mine. They would just sit around, talking, and watching TV, not even good TV, and eating and gossiping. I was still caught in fairy land. I still wanted to pretend that the swing set was our castle, and the garden our safe haven, and that one day we would run away into the woods next to our house and build a cabin where we would live. I still lived in that fantasy, although the others had moved on. At least, my sister's friends did. I knew that secretly, she hadn't.

My sister was always my one hope for my fading world of silly games and dolls and dress up. She seemed to hold on to her innocence, her childhood, longer than anyone. Maybe she was just waiting for me like a good older sister, waiting for me to learn that it can be fun to talk for hours, if you're talking to the right person. And she showed me ways to have stupid, pointless fun even when you're older and it's no longer right to pretend you're a fairy. When it was just us, though, just the two of us, we would play with her plastic horses and dolls and we would dress up, sing karaoke, have dance parties in her room. We would roll on the floor laughing and play board games until we were actually bored. She was the life ring that kept me afloat when I learned that not everyone could see the magic in the world.

Now I am older. Now I am supposed to be the one maturing, and growing up, and learning to be responsible. I am supposed to dream about boys and shopping and gossip, and I am supposed to care what my hair looks like every day. Clothes are no longer just something to wear, now they are a reflection of who I am. When I was younger, I always wanted to grow up. Now that I am older, I want to become young again. In my mind, I still am. I still see the fairies outside of my window, but their glow is fading. I am still waiting for my knight in shining armor to come and rescue me, but he grows farther and farther away. I still hope that one day, I'll discover that I have super powers, like the heroes from my books. Is it wrong to hold on to that imagination? Everyone else my age seems to have lost it. Maybe it's just the mind of a writer, grasping at her last chance for childhood.