Currently Reading: Children of the Mind
by Orson Scott Card
"Let me tell you the most beautiful story I know.
A man was given a dog, which he loved very much.
The dog went with him everywhere,
but the man could not teach it to do anything useful.
The dog would not fetch or point,
it would not race or protect or stand watch.
Instead the dog sat near him and regarded him,
always with the same inscrutable expression.
'That's not a dog, it's a wolf,' said the man's wife.
'He alone is faithful to me,' said the man,
and his wife never discussed it with him again.
One day the man took his dog with him into his private airplane
and as they flew over high winter mountains,
the engines failed
and the airplane was torn to shreds among the trees.
The man lay bleeding,
his belly torn open by blades of sheared metal,
steam rising from his organs in the cold air,
but all he could think of was his faithful dog.
Was he alive? Was he hurt?
Imagine his relief when the dog came padding up
and regarded him with that same steady gaze.
After an hour, the dog nosed the man's gaping abdomen,
then began pulling out intestines and spleen and liver
and gnawing on them,
all the while studying the man's face.
'Thank God,' said the man.
'At least one of use will not starve.'"
from The God Whispers of Han Qing-jao


so after being home this weekend, i can't help but think that i totally made the wrong decision. i'm not ready to live at home. in fact, i don't think i ever will be..

then it made me think.. i need to stop running away from home. how will i ever learn to love my family when i choose to avoid them? of course i fought with every member of my household at least once. (remember, it's only been a weekend). but with some of my family members.. it was an argument more than it was me trying to look out for them. of course i'm speaking of my little sister. was i really that dumb when i was younger? seriously, every time my parents or my older sister told me not to do something and i went and did it anyway.. it ALWAYS ended up badly. i hope that doesn't happen to her. i hope she comes out of all this ok, but i also hope she realizes that i only mean the best. xP i guess i coulda been nicer about it.. but honestly. i just don't know how. i've never been taught to be nice to my family. i can be nice to strangers.. but to my family, i can't. it's something that i've never been quite proud of.. but something that i can't hide. anyone who has seen my family and i interact can attest to how mean we are to each other. why? i don't know... that's how it's always been. i can't really remember a time when it was ever different.

it's going to be a tumultuous 2 years.

God please don't let me go.