This year I'll be entering my senior year of college. It will mark four years since I've lived the majority of my year, not in my childhood home. Since going to college, my entertainment preferences have changed. I am inclined to watch television shows with complex storylines and listen to music that contains a deeper meaning. However, quarantine has forced me to spend a prolonged amount of time at home, and specifically in my childhood bedroom. And as the weeks have gone on, I've noticed my choices seem to be slowly reverting back to those of my younger self - I'm Benjamin Buttoning if you will. I want to take the time to analyze this mental regression and ask myself whether or not I should see it as a positive.

In these past weeks, my taste in music has begun to lean towards the bands I fell in love with when I was younger. I've found myself pushing play on One Direction albums, or playlists consisting of Marina and the Diamonds, and The Cheetah Girls. I like music that makes me want to dance and brings me joy. I want songs that contain surface level meanings and unnoticeably play on a loop. And this isn't a knock on these bands at all if anything it's a compliment. Their music has freed me from the anxiety of the outside world, offering me a happy escape.

This joy I've found in my old music has become infectious in inciting my old love for a good dance party. I've come to realize something. Kids dance whenever and wherever they want, at what age does that stop? Being in quarantine has taught me to appreciate the act of a good dance party - and there is no better feeling. Since starting my routine of blasting music (most likely in headphones since my family members work from home) and busting out my favorite dance moves, I've simply been in a better mood. I was on a walk the other day, and while my mom stopped to tie her shoe, I found myself shaking my hips and humming to myself in the middle of the street. Normally I'd be mortified if someone caught me zoned out and shaking my hips, but this time I didn't care. If my dancing puts a smile on a bystander's face, I have no shame about it.

I've come to believe that the pre-pandemic creation of Disney Plus was absolutely an act of fate. There is something so incredible about watching a movie you saw for the first time when your age was still a single digit. Those movies always seem just a little bit more magical. I was thrilled when I found out Disney Plus offered their early 2000s DCOMs (Disney Channel Original Movies). I first made a list of everything I needed to watch again, and then every night before bed put one on. I started with classics like Stuck in the Suburbs and Get a Clue, then moved on to more sophisticated films like Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen. The movies became something to look forward to, and every night was like I was watching them for the first time. I felt like a kid again.

Nowadays, it's so common to feel an overwhelming pressure to constantly move forward. This feeling was the main reason the "stay in place" orders of quarantine came as such a shock. We're not used to staying stagnant. But maybe, in times like these specifically, looking back isn't such a bad thing. I believe finding new comfort in my old ways might have to do with a longing for better days and simpler times. We are living through a pandemic some have compared to a horror movie. For these past few months, life has been very scary. Maybe my inclination to "Benjamin Button" was my mind's way of falling back into the blissful innocence of childhood. For that reason, I don't mind my new/old list of preferences, actually, I now welcome it.