Head full of doubt, road full of promise.

I'm tired. Somehow, suddenly, everything feels extremely tired. Maybe it's because I just realized I'm leaving in 10 days, and still have so much to do... and to buy... and to practice... And maybe it's because I know that, the day after I fly back into LAX, college life begins. Maybe it's because, when I think about it, I realize that's really all that will be happening for the next four years. And sometimes, when I think about it more, it feels like life shouldn't go on at the same pragmatic pace day after day and year after year. I wish there was something I could do to just pause life: for me, but mostly for my parents. They need a break. I wish there was something I could do to just make all our problems go away.

Also, people are silly. But we knew that.

Mom and I watched "Up" a few nights ago. Now, I often cry in movies, but I've never actually felt the tears quite as much as I did during that movie. By far the best Pixar movie to date; at the very least, the most poetic. And it seemed so personal, like the writers had meant it specifically for individuals who had recently lost people they loved. I don't know how to say it better than that it handled the ordeal of 'letting go' more beautifully than any movie I've seen. Neither of us said it but I knew that Mom and I were both thinking of Papa throughout.

I don't like this business of growing up. And the older I get, the more I realize that I don't even know what 'growing up' means, much less how to do it. I always assumed that one day I'd just wake up and be "old enough" to understand... but now I'm beginning to think that growing up is a matter of faking it until you believe it.