The Warmth That Cannot Return

This image is not mine. Still, it reflects how I remember seeing the world as a child. The sky, the sunlight, the atmosphere—everything felt different. It was as if the world back then had a certain “color” that no longer exists today—not in a literal sense, but in how the world itself felt. Childhood often feels like the purest and warmest stage of life, when everything was still simple and we were not yet burdened by the heavy concerns we carry now.

For some reason, my memories truly begin around 2004, even though I was born in 2000. That was the year my oldest younger brother was born. I have no memory at all of the moment when my older sister and I took photos in the living room while I was still a baby. I only know of that moment from old photographs that no longer exist. I also have very little personal documentation of my childhood, because even from a young age, I rarely appeared in photos.

One memory that still lingers is of my mother holding my hand as she led me to a medical checkup. This happened around 2005 or 2006. That day, she was carrying my younger sibling, and I remember that I never really attended kindergarten—I enrolled, but only for a few days. I was known as a rather mischievous child.

The day was bright, the sky a clear blue, and for reasons I cannot quite explain, the atmosphere felt profoundly different. The air felt clean. My small hand was held tightly in my mother’s. The world was still innocent then, untouched by adult anxieties. Colors seemed more vivid, sounds softer, and happiness came from the simplest things: an ice cream or jelly.

Sitting in a kindergarten classroom feels as though it happened just yesterday, even though it was twenty years ago. Yet when I try to imagine twenty years ahead, I find myself unable to do so. A distant past feels strangely close, while a future at the same distance feels unreachable. Perhaps, twenty years from now, today will feel like “yesterday” as well.

I often wake up in the early hours of the morning for no clear reason. In those moments, the same thought always returns: time feels as if it moves incredibly fast. I fall asleep, sleep again, and suddenly wake up in a different stage of life. The number of my age keeps increasing, while the time left grows shorter. One by one, people will leave—drifting away, or leaving forever. Then comes the quietest question of all: how can I live without the people I love? That thought often runs so deep that I struggle to fall back asleep.

In those moments, memories do not appear as images, but as feelings: warmth, loss, and a gentle longing that is also painful.

Perhaps the most heartbreaking part of being human is the awareness that no person and no moment we love will last forever. We grow, the world changes, and one by one, the faces that once filled our lives slowly fade into the horizon of time. Yet it is precisely because of this impermanence that every small moment—a mother’s smile, a sibling’s laughter, the glow of the afternoon light.

Childhood memories are always illuminated by a warmth that can never be recreated. In truth, memory is not only about the beauty of the past, but also about the sorrow of knowing that time cannot be turned back. We do not live to avoid loss; we live to love honestly, even when we know that loss will inevitably come.