I'm Very Disturbed...

By all these grown people who keep popping up where my widdle babies used to be. They've got piercings and boyfriends and girlfriends and career plans and college acceptance letters and one even has a baby of her own. They can drive! They can vote! They can buy cigarettes! Some can buy alcohol!

I changed these people's diapers! I rocked them to sleep in their little onesies. I fed them baby food and gave them stuff to chew on when their first little teeth came in. I helped them practice walking. I kiss their booboos and gave them bandaids for invisible scratches. I tucked them in for naptime and told them bedtime stories. I taught them how to throw a ball and hold a bat and balance themselves in bizarre positions. I colored with them and watched cartoons sprawled out on the floor with them on Saturday mornings. I brought them to the Children's Museum and went with them to amusement parks and fairs. I threw them pizza parties and taught them magic tricks. I taught them to dance the box step to old 80's music. I pretended not to notice that they were singing off key at the top of their lungs. I taught them how to subway surf. I bought them porcelain angels and fairies for cleaning up their rooms. I had belching contests with them and played the "gross out" game. HOW DARE THEY GROW UP?! HOW DARE THEY!!!!!!

So, what has brought on this week's freak out?

I was talking to my nephew Brandon (who's 11) and my sister-in-law the other day as they were travelling out to Arkansas to visit a friend of hers. She tells me they had to leave on Saturday rather than Friday because... because... No, it's too disturbing. Okay, let me brace myself. Okay. BECAUSE MY FOURTEEN-YEAR-OLD NEPHEW, BRYAN, HAD A DATE! A DATE, PEOPLE!!!!!!!!

Just today, I was looking at my 18-year-old niece Aemanda's photos on MySpace. She's kissing a Marine and wearing formal evening gowns. She has piercings! There are pictures in there where the look on her face is exactly my little girl being all super-goofy as a kid. Then, BOOM, the next picture is this beautiful woman who'll be going off to college in a few months. COLLEGE! GET IT? COLLEGE!!!

Just yesterday... I SWEAR IT WAS JUST YESTERDAY!... I was in college playing hide and go seek and Laser Tag and drunken volleyball with my crazy ass friends! I don't remember growing up! I grew up, didn't I? No. It can't be! I'm still just a kid, right?

Darnit! It'd be a lot easier to believe that if these darned adults would stop calling me Aunt Neecee!