The Wonder Years still makes me wonder

As I was surfing thru TV channels, I saw the familiar cute face of Kevin Arnold (in photo, third from left). It was surprising to see him in full color, since the last time I remember, he was all in grayscale.

Rewind to 1988 to 1993: After school, my family would round up the wooden framed black-and-white TV set to watch "The Wonder Years." It was a show about Kevin, the youngest of three siblings and on the verge of starting junior high. The "Wonder Years" as the old Kevin narrates it, was his years of discovering the important lessons in life, about family, friendship, school and first love.

This is the time when awe and wonder can be found in a clover leaf sent as a Christmas present, when the whole family gets drenched but manages to laugh in the rain, when friends ran along the beach and play, when there is no cellphone or Internet yet, and how people appreciate buying their very first "colored TV", and I will never leave this out...the magic of the first kiss.

Childhood is perhaps the best phase in a person's journey - when you are busy in the simplicity of life and find happiness in the humblest of things.

I remember my own "wonder years." Growing up in the province of Bulacan, spending my Saturdays in my grandparent's farm, swimming out in the river with childhood friends when rivers are still clean and pristine, selling tomatoes and banana snacks with my bestfriends, having a first crush in grade one, playing hide-and-seek under the moonlight, and spending the breaking dawn of Christmas with my four sisters opening up our presents.

There is so much wonder in childhood. And if I have the chance to go back, I will and won't change anything.

Kevin says in the final episode:

"Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day you're in diapers, the next day you're gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul. I remember a place, a town, a house, like a lot of houses. A yard like a lot of other yards. On a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is, after all these years, I still look back...with wonder."

I do too.