because this is not the after-school special version of life, in which i open up to you and you calm my fears and i leave here fixed. what you want, what red rock wants, is to turn me into some obedient automaton, who'll never disagree with my stepmother, talk out of line to dad, or do 'rebellious' stuff like play music or dye my hair. what you don't get, what my dad doesn't seem to get anymore, is that i'm not rebellious at all. i was raised this way. 'always march to your own drummer,' my mom used to tell me. those were her words to live by. so it's not like i switched course. everyone else did. that's why i'm here.

it's just that we'd like to think that craziness and sanity are on opposite ends of an ocean, but really they're more like neighboring islands.

that's all we can do, brit. take steps. take enough of them and suddenly, you're somewhere.