Change is inevitable.

Most of last night I spent laying in my bed, just thinking. Thinking about what needed to be done in my life, thinking about the direction my life taking, and thinking about where my life would be in about a decade. I wasn't able to come up with any concrete plans for my future, or come to any great revelations, but I decided that perhaps my life was ready for another change.

---

If one were to sit down and truly ponder about it, one would come to conclude that change occurs everyday. Every hour. Every minute. You get the idea, but really, it's true. Change is happening at every moment of time, whether we choose to accept this alteration or not. It's almost disturbing.

I've changed before - there is no doubt in my mind about that. My philosophies and personality traits have evolved quite a few times as I progressed with my life, something that I'm quite happy about. I don't think I'd still like to be the awfully mean kid that I was several years ago.

I think I can recall the first time I decided that I needed to make a change in my life. Ever since my younger siblings were born, I can only recall being a terrible, terrible brother, always picking on them, hitting them when no one was looking, doing things that horrid older brothers do. Then I remember going over to my friends house down the street one fateful day. She was a younger sister herself (the youngest child in her family), and I remember telling her how cool it must be to have an older brother or sister. She usually just smiled at me, but never made any big comments about my statement. And it still didn't hit me.

So there we were, two kids playing in a backyard on a sunny fall afternoon. The red and yellow leaves were falling all around us, and in a spontaneous game of tag we started throwing around the piles of leaves that had apparently been racked up only a few hours earlier. Well, my friend's older brother did not approve. It happened in a quick blur. He walked out while we were playing, yelled at us for messing with the leaves, then yelled at her some more, and then smacked her across the face. Without another word he walked back into the house while my friend began to sob quietly. I asked her why she just didn't tell her parents, but she informed me that they probably wouldn't believe her. After all, he was the valedictorian of his class.

To this day I have no idea what happened to her and her family, as we moved away a few months after that event. But that afternoon still bothers me. It didn't hit me until a few days after what had happened, but I came to realize that I was practically the same way with my younger sisters, and if I didn't make a change about the way I treated them, I'd probably end up the same way.

I'd like to think that I'm a better brother and person now. It's been many years since I've ever thought about being mean to my sisters (besides the occasional teasing and such) and for that I'm thankful.

---

As dawn approached, I had come to a decision. Two weeks ago I had told Jonathan and Gerald (the two fine gentleman that I have been living with for the past few weeks) that there was a possibility of me having to move out. And today I confirmed it. They said that this was unfortunate (in their words: "dude, that sucks"), but if I ever decided to move back with them, a room was always available. I was never really close friends with Jon and Gerry, but now they are definitely good friends.

I'm still going to be in school, although now I'm going to have to wake up a lot earlier. But I need to do this. To go back home and simply be there for my father. I had to do a similar thing last year, but this time me coming home means a lot to my dad. And a lot to me.

So I'll be leaving Locust St. this friday. I hope this was a good decision. I'd better start packing soon. I don't have many things, so I think I'll start friday morning. Yeah, that should be enough time.

It was good talking to you.

P.S. School was tedious as usual. That's why I didn't talk about it at all. Heh.



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