When I was younger, I- like so many others, desperately wanted to be a mermaid. I was born for the water, grew up in it, and if you’d asked me to tell you the truth about what I really wanted to be when I grew up, I’d have told you a princess and a mermaid.
Ariel was both a princess and a mermaid, so to me, it was like, huh, best of both worlds. I was also in love with The Rainbow Fish book. I was really quite an odd bird, now that I look back, always caught between pretending I was a princess-slash-mermaid and sneaking the U.S. New & World Report or Harper’s Bazaar from my parents. When I lived with my grandma when I was really little, I’d catch up on my National Geographic (my grandma had quite a collection of back issues), and then head outside to play in the kiddie pool, and pretend that I was Ariel and best friends with The Rainbow Fish- even though he was a total d-bag for most of that book.
Sometimes, when that got old, I’d try to walk on water (not joking) with my brothers. We obviously failed, and usually the sides of the kiddie pool would fold and the water would go spilling out.
But when I was in that dream land, I imagined my life as something like my above little sketch. (Sorry, my sketching has diminished from lack of discipline.) I replaced Flounder with the Rainbow Fish, and he and I would go out dancing all the time, and swim around while bands formed by sea creatures would serenade us. And of course, Sebastian would be there all the while, chastising me. Eventually, I would meet my prince and live happily ever after.
It was a beautiful life, really, those days in the kiddie pool.
