Don't act your age

I recently slept outside.
Now this is no small decision. After all, there's been a few decades pass since I entered this Earth. The ground and I became much less friendly a long time ago.
Part of it was that it was Earth Day. Part of it was that there was a meteor shower expected that night. Part was the weather cooperated. A big part was that I simply found my tent again.
I know I recalled elementary school years camping out in backyards. That would be in a more trusting, safe time. A friend and I would throw up tents and wait for the adult world to settle in. Then we'd roam the neighborhood some, through backyards that didn't have fencing distinctly marking territory. It was like taking to the prairie before barbed wire. We were limited only by our imaginations and braveries.
We go into our freezers in the garage and sneak way too many Fudgesicles. We'd swear that we were going to listen to the wind and our own tales right through the night and see the sunrise.
I doubt we ever really made it too far past midnight.
Then we'd creak out of the tent when awakened by the dawn, finding the frozen treat wrappers scattered all over the yard and feeling the sticky still on our hands. Usually, we'd part ways and go inside to warm comfortable beds for a few more hours, with a pact we'd say we'd seen every single-digit hour in the a.m. right up to sunrise.
It felt so good to remember all of it that I convinced myself a night in the outside dark would do me good. I didn't know what kind of good, but good.
My tent has netting over the top for which you can remove the cover and see up to the stars. I thought it a good viewing point for the after-midnight meteor shower.
I expected to make it to the shower easily as I hadn't been sleeping well anyway. Awakened at all hours by myself, random thoughts then keeping me from slipping back. Not worries really, often just questions or possibilities, those both out there and already missed. I guess the kind of stuff that sits in the back of a mind that lives long enough.
But I didn't make it to the celestial show. Nor did my expectations of cool night weather, humidity or hard ground keep me from sleep. It came on kind of easy and unexpected as a real love. Only daylight roused me.
And I realized why I'd really wanted to sleep outside, why I conjured up those long ago days and why the difficult elements didn't deter me from sleeping solidly. It was a feeling with which I awoke.
It was simply innocence.
Simple little things done completely on my own for my own edification give me something back. Something seemingly lost in everyone I know no matter their age. You can't really describe it, but you know it. It's when something feels pure and real. I had to call it innocence.
In the beginning I noted I'd done this recently, but the Earth Day reference shows it was weeks and weeks ago. In the interim I've thought it through and considered referencing it here. But I think I feared it would be tainted.
Instead, I decided to use the experience in hopes it might encourage someone else to seek their innocence. It's still there for everyone. They just have their own special version.
I fear as we get older, we give up on innocence. I more greatly fear as time goes on giving up happens earlier and earlier in life as life seems to get tougher in general. As more give up, it makes it harder on others and influences them to give up. It's a downward spiral.
Unless we don't let time beat us down and we still reach for innocence. Even if it's just a pilfered Fudgsicle with a friend at 10:30 at night. If we'll just ignore the common wisdom that says sleeping in the night air on the ground is no good for a body after a certain age. Because the truth is, the good it does for the soul completely heals the body.