"Youth Is Wasted On The Young."

Not sure who said that phrase, but I think I agree. You don't know what you have until it's gone, and before you know it, your youth will disappear.

When I was younger, I wanted to grow up. I'm guessing most people were like that. And, I'm guessing that by the time I turn 90, I'll have wished that I knew the importance and magic of my youth when I was young. I'm guessing most old people think that.

In a way, life goes in an arc. When you start young, you're not sure of anything, you're small, insignificant to some because you don't hold much power in the society [unless you're a celebrity baby, then huzzah!], and you're frail. But as you get older, you climb the arc of life and you reach the highest point in your life, when you're at the top of your capabilities, and you can do anything. Or, that's what it seems like anyway when you're the person thinking. Then, as the arc slowly reaches the ground again, you realize that you're just as frail as you started out. The wrinkles on your skin show like battle marks, scars to prize because you made it. You made it through the curious times of being a toddler, rebelling times of the teenage, growing times of the middle age, and just now making your way through the last stages of wonder. Which, in fact if you look at it from a different perspective, is only the beginning. The arc, or cycle of life if you're talking about Lion King [Disney movie], is only an incomplete, crude graph for something which we can only try to depict in pictures. Youth is something that we can only try to keep.

"Youth is wasted on the young."
Well... I guess that... if when you're old, and you appreciate what you had back then-- the beautiful skin, the sharp mind-- it's okay. It wasn't wasted.