Old and Jaded
Two Fawns were busy exploring a new section of the world together. The two friends had been doing this a lot lately. They were new to the world themselves and exploring had quickly become the Fawns’ great pastime.
“I hope we never run out of new things to explore,” Samina, the first Fawn, said to the other.
“Me too,” Farina, the second Fawn replied, “But, what are the odds of that happening, the world can’t be that big?”
Now, Samina and Farina, being so new, hadn’t yet learned just how much of the world there is. So their skepticism was certainly warranted, if perhaps naively misguided.
“Yeah,” Samina concurred, “We’ll definitely run out of new sections to explore. So we should really enjoy all these moments now before we get too old and jaded.”
Farina looked at Samina, confused —
“Old and jaded,” Farina asked, “What does that mean?”
Samina quickly felt embarrassed. She didn’t know what the phrase ‘old and jaded’ actually meant and had only heard it muttered in passing by a group of grumpy old Turtles (Samina had attempted to commiserate with the grumpy old turtles over a crazy-looking leaf and they had said the phrase to her). She simply thought that the phrase sounded cool, and grown up, and figured she could just say it herself without thinking about it too much.
“Well, I think it means that after you’ve seen everything there is, then you’ve already seen everything there is, so a cool leaf that used to be cool isn’t really that cool anymore,” Samina guessed, “Or it might mean that when you’re old you can’t really see anymore so you can’t really explore.”
Farina thought about this for a long time.
“You think that when you’re older you can’t see things because your eyes have been jaded shut?” Farina asked.
“Hmm, yeah, sure, that could be it,” replied Samina, hoping to end the conversation and move on.
“I think it must mean be that,” Farina continued, “Because if something looks cool today, why would it stop looking cool just because you got older?”
“That makes sense,” Samina agreed.
“So that means we should probably try to see as many things as we can before our eyes get jaded shut,” Farina concluded.
“Well, let’s not waste any more time talking when we could be looking,” urged Samina, still trying to end this inquiry into her flippant use of phrases.
“You got it,” Farina concurred.
The two Fawns continued exploring the new section of the world they were in, hoping to see as much as they possibly could, before they couldn’t see the world anymore.
