Twenty Yards Ahead and The Gap We Forget

Twenty yards is nothing on a country lane. Gravel under small boots, hedge shadows, a skip now and then. But that distance is its own country. You can't recall it because at that age the world smells different, sounds louder, stretches wider. Parents are the blurs behind you, irrelevant for ninety seconds. Adults chase this again but their map's are long gone. We call it freedom or autonomy but it's cosplay. The child doesn't know she's independent because she hasn't even learnt that she's tethered. The rest of us only get it backwards - breaking leashes we can't stop checking are still there. What did you forget when you learnt the word for it?

Listen : ‘Youth’ by Daughter – - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QT5eGHCJdE

Read: Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome – https://www.allthingsransome.net/literary/rev_sa.htm

Watch : Where Is the Friend's House? (1987) dir. Abbas Kiarostami –- https://youtu.be/run-u_2zAdA?si=agGla395JAddCW5B