Veterinarian

At a very young age, I helped rescue a stray dog. A week later, after he learned to walk again, I told my mom I wanted to help animals, that I wanted to be a veterinarian. My mom said not to worry, that I was young, as though being young was an excuse to waste time. I listened to her, ate a big spaghetti dinner, played cards with my brother, and memorized my multiplication tables. After all, I was still young and I shouldn’t worry and all I had was time.

But I wanted to help animals. I wanted to be a veterinarian. Every recess I would pretend, and my friends would clamor around me. One, a cheetah with a mangled paw, another an elephant who lost her trunk; one boy even said he was shark with no teeth. But I knew sharks didn’t need dental work. I was young, but I wanted to be a veterinarian. But being young was an excuse to waste time, and my mom had said not to worry. So I joined the softball team that year and spent my spare time roller skating and dripping strawberry ice cream through the cracks in the back porch.

I still pretended I was a veterinarian. But none of my friends liked to play along anymore. Most nights my mom found me reading a textbook after my bedtime and she would say I shouldn’t worry, I was young and I needed to sleep, even if I was last in my class, even if I didn’t test into advanced science. I was young. Nothing counted in middle school anyway. Summer came again, and I had nothing but time.

But the next year I didn’t make advanced science or the softball team. And faster than you can fall asleep, high school had both started and finished. But I was young. I still had college, and my mom said not to worry, that it was all a part of “growing up.” 

But I did worry. I worried and worried and one day after class, my worry made it hard to breathe. I told the doctor I didn’t want to be a veterinarian anymore. I told her I didn’t want to be in college. I didn’t want to be anywhere. I didn’t want to lose any part of me. I only wanted to dissolve, all of me. I felt I had wasted my time, like its sands were dripping more rapidly to fill my puny hourglass and that soon it would surely shatter. I felt suffocated. Was I a grown up now? My mom said she was worried, and that I really needed to sleep, or play cards with my brother, because sometimes grown-ups still need to play cards with their brother.

I wanted to be a veterinarian, but one day I grew up.