**I Remember Free** I was a kid nobody understood. Diagnosed with nothing yet. Just called too much — or not enough. I was already chained. I just didn't know the word for it yet. Summer was loud enough to drown out the sound. Summers didn't end. They just kept going. Bike tires on hot pavement. Streetlights were the only clock I answered to. I drank from the hose. Nobody flinched. Nobody Googled it first. Sprinklers turned front yards into holy ground. I ran through water like it was baptism. Because it kind of was. If I wanted you — I walked to your door. I knocked. I didn't wait for three dots on a screen. Life wasn't perfect. My brain was already loud back then. I just didn't know its name. But it was simple. Simple enough to run. Simple enough to be a kid before the world handed me a diagnosis and called it a warning label. But I remember free. Before the mask, before the name — I remember free. And what I remember, I can still become. Now I'm grown. Now I'm masked. Now I'm chained to calendars and expectations that never asked if I could carry them. Some days I run the numbers just to prove I'm still working. Some days the loud kid in me is still looking for a streetlight to answer to. But I remember free. Before the mask, before the name — I remember free. And what I remember, I can still become. I'm not asking to go back. I'm asking to remember that simple was possible once — so it's possible again. But I remember free. And what I remember — I can still become. I can still become.
