"Why can't you remain like this for ever!" OR "How did you get so tall?"

“All children, except one, grow up. They soon know that they will grow up, and the way Wendy knew was this. One day when she was two years old she was playing in a garden, and she plucked another flower and ran with it to her mother. I suppose she must have looked rather delightful, for Mrs Darling put her hand to her heart and cried, ‘Oh, why can’t you remain like this for ever!’ This was all that passed between them on the subject, but henceforth Wendy knew that she must grow up. You always know after you are two. Two is the beginning of the end.”
― J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

My older son had a band concert last week, and once again, I was struck dumb by his look, his manner, the way he is around his friends as seen from across the gymnasium seats. While I don't agree with Barrie and his idea that "two is the beginning of the end," I very much identify now with Wendy at the end of the book, saying goodbye to her daughter as the girl runs off with ever-young Peter. It's a rite of passage that our children separate from us, and just as it should be. Like Wendy, though, acceptance of this fact is twined with awe, sadness and remembering my son's tiny face transposed against the teenager he is becoming.

Did he have to look so sharp and tall in his red dress shirt and black tie?