Dandelion, New York, c. 1973
Photo: Irving Penn
“What do you want to be when you grow up?” our tour guide asked the group of five year olds.
“AN ASTRONAUT!”
“A SUPERHERO!”
“A DOCTOOOOOOR!”
Then the tiny girl in the middle raised her hand and said, “A flower.”
Mighty Girl 
For Halloween, when she was three, my niece decided she wanted to be a windsock.
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Definitely a good one.
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My 3-yo son frequently says he’s going to be an animal when he gets taller. Maybe a giraffe!
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No she did not! Oh, little one.
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God bless that little bud
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…and an artiste is born. sigh, I think that creative of my brain withered away as I got older…
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lovely.
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My little cousin said “just a boy” when asked this. He died from cancer when he was 5, so he will always be just a boy. Clearly he knew way more than the rest of us.
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My family has a picture I drew in school when I was four. The question at the the top was, “When I grow up I will be a” and I drew both a cat and the sun. I guess if one didn’t work out I could be the other?
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me too! still waiting!
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A friend told me her five year old wrote a poem about wanting to be a flower. She had it framed so one day when he was older he could look back on it.
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When I interviewed my then 5 YO sister for a paper for school about what she wanted to be when she grew up, she was thoughtful. Then, she stated, “A lightbulb.” She grew up to be NC’s nursing rookie of the year and a great friend.
Nice metaphor!
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When my son was in 2nd grade the teacher asked them draw their dream house. My son of course drew his like a baseball, but my good friend’s son drew a picture of his own house. When his mother asked him about it, he said he was already living in his dream house. It was nice to know a child who already realized how good his life was.
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I still wanna be an astronaut when I grow up.
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Awwww. Many years ago one of my sisters friends declared she wanted to be a shoe when she grew up.
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I am a flower. Smell me! –Paatos
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When my niece was 3 she said, “I wanna be a snowman when I grow up!”
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I knew a little boy who once answered, “A fire hydrant!” I thought that was awesome.
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