Wings. Beautiful. Graceful. Free. Everyone possesses wings. Everyone's wings are different, soaring their owners through the sky. Some soar too close to the sun, never to recover, those stick close to the floor, too scared to take risks to go higher. The sun beats down on us every day, the moon cools us down every night. Those of us with wings make the choice of either going too high, to eventually fall and collapse, just like Icarus, or we stay too close to the ground never advancing in anything in life. We live in the sky and regret or we live on the floor and regret. There are those who manage to live in between, neither burning their wings in the hot sun nor living in fear cowering close to the ground. They are the ideal. That’s where we should all be. Controlling our ambitions, controlling our fears. But we still live with regrets. 

I have lived far above the ground, farther than anyone should have. My wings helped me reach my best. Although that didn’t last long, my friends, family, even my coworkers, all stayed below me, staying close to the floor, or staying in the middle. I could never see them from my height. Soon enough the sun burned my wings, rendering me incapable of flying, at first out of the physical incapability to fly but after my recovery, despite my desperation to spread my wings and lift my feet off the ground, out of fear, not wanting to suffer the same burn I did prior. Years went by, stuck to the ground, I got a bit closer to my friends and family once again. However, they seemed to always be out of my reach. One day I saw two wings, they were the most beautiful wings I had ever seen, the mix of greens and yellows, which reminded me of the sights when I flew as well as the length of the wings, almost as if they covered the whole world. At that moment they were the only thing in my sight, they made me want to remember what my own wings looked like. It was a long and painfully slow recovery, but through years of trial and error I have finally managed to fly, only a few inches, only for a few moments, but I never thought I would be able to again. My wings were more beautiful than I remembered, and it feels amazing to stretch them out, so hopefully one day I will be able to soar higher, not so high that I get burned, but high enough to see the world once again, and hopefully to see those beautiful wings that brought me back.