I found myself today hugging an old teddy bear. As I pulled it closer to my chest and squeezed it like there was no tomorrow I found myself in tears. For I had ignored this long loved beast for quite some time now as it sat in an unimportant place on my bed constantly being tossed around at the inconvenience of its placement. But as I held it tightly remembering how once upon a time it was so treasured to me, memories of childhood flooded back to my mind as the water soaked into my cheeks. In that moment I looked around my room. While I had only lived here since I was 14 this room still had a major role in shaping me into who I am today -18years old and roughly two months shy of moving out. My eyes wandered across the posters and pictures and memories on my walls. They floated to the clothes on my floor and I chuckled because maybe the only consistent thing throughout my life was the way I could never seem to keep my stuff completely clean. I hugged my bear and cried some more. But the tears weren’t necessarily out of pain or sadness really, but more of a bittersweet feeling for at one point in time everything around me was all I had. These small things such as this innocent little teddy bear were the most important things in my life and they represented the biggest problems in my mind at the time. The imaginary world I held as a child suddenly seemed to fade into shades of grey over the years as I battled with some things that I shouldn’t have had to fear. This bear was more than just an old temporarily forgotten memory, but rather it represented the childhood that I was getting ready to say goodbye to. As I held this somewhat raggedy pink bear in my now adult arms in the room of someone who was not quite ready to grow up I continued to cry as it hit me once again that I was one day closer to saying goodbye.