Oh to be ten years old. . . .

I am at work in the Learning Resource Center at the Harold B. Lee Library on Brigham Young University campus two days before finals. I am at work, surrounded by frantic students with rumpled hair, some odd imprints on the sides of their exhausted faces (the unmistakable sign of an unplanned nap on a keyboard or textbook), stacks of books slipping out from under each arm, barely-honor-code-appropriate 5 0'clock shadow on their faces, and clad in the same sweatshirts and old jeans they wore yesterday which were doubtless picked indiscriminately from a pile on their floors that has been there since the last time they did laundry--if they can remember when that was. Yes, everyone is in a state of frenzied half-consciousness, exchanging knowing glances with passers-by, acknowledging the fact that a wave and a smile might just suck up the last of their energy if they tried it. Everyone, that is, except the blond-haired, blue-eyed, rosy-cheeked ten year old standing in front of me. There he stands, using our phone for the seventh time in the last twenty minutes to call his mom who works upstairs, smacking his gum, and carelessly spinning his neon orange yo-yo in ten feet concentric circles which I can't help thinking could easily take out a sleep-deprived freshman. I can hear him trying to convince his mom that he cannot complete the rest of his homework alone, that it would be more fun if they could do it together later, and that he should therefore just watch TV until she gets off of work. Yep, I totally wish I was this kid. I want a neon-orange yo-yo, and I can already think of five solid arguments as to why I should watch TV and not do my homework.