Million Years Ago

The speaker looks back on youth as a time of freedom and possibility, when she followed her feelings and expected life to be fun. Now she feels regret, loneliness, and sadness about how quickly time has passed. The emotional movement is from remembering youthful confidence to grieving what has changed, including relationships and her sense of herself.

“Learning to fly” suggests discovering independence and taking risks, while “earn my stripes” means gaining experience or proving oneself, often through difficulty. The image of looking “up to the sky, not just the floor” contrasts hope and openness with feeling weighed down or focused only on immediate troubles. Saying life is “flashing by” conveys that time seems to pass too quickly to control.

The repeated phrase “a million years ago” is likely an exaggeration: the past may not literally be so distant, but it feels unreachable. The speaker also describes returning to familiar streets where people seem not to recognize her, suggesting that both she and her surroundings have changed. This may reflect guilt or estrangement, but the lyrics do not explain exactly what caused it. Her longing is for a past sense of belonging as much as for particular people.