The weather is changing to a closer resemblance of November. I've been spending a lot of my days reading in bed with the windows open. It feels really refreshing. I'm reveling in the opportunity to layer up and breathe some crisp, cool air.

The change has also sparked the realization that Christmas is actually nearing, and being the anal retentive I am, I'm starting to plan my Christmas road trip to the tri-state region. The idea of going home for the holidays always summons warm sentiment and childhood flashbacks. Maybe not even of my actual childhood, but more like the Wonder Years. The concept of holidays and familiar comforts easily blurs my vision, distorting the truth and inevitable disappointments. I haven't lived at my parent's house much since high school, and I foolishly and perhaps selfishly, forget that while I've curbed some of my inherited habits, my family will remain stuck in their ways. I don't know why I'm still frustrated by their stubborn adherence.

It's hard to accept that the only person you can ever change is yourself, and even that's an exhaustive test in self-discipline. A friend of mine once told me that each characteristic is either in acceptance or rejection to that which we learn from our parents. I agree, though the awareness of this process is nearly impossible. My family is loud, stubborn and dramatic and I guess I've gone to great lengths to detach and break those habits. I'll probably always be loud and obnoxious, but I'm trying to take it easy with the theatrics.

I spent a week with my family while I was home in August/September. After the first week of the trip with weddings, birthdays and tri-state trekking, it seemed like family time would be a relaxing break. We paint such peaceful pictures in our dreams, I suppose. I don't know much about psychology, but it seems people go to exhaustive extremes in avoidance of communication. I know my compulsion to communicate clearly is born from my parent's dysfunction. That's obvious. I just don't understand why it's so hard for some people to be honest with themselves. My mother is an amazing and strong woman whom I watched spend the better part of two days sulking and picking fights with me. I expect that from my father, but not her. I can only assume her behavior was some warped defense strategy. I know it's hard on her that I'm so far away. It's hard for me too. But it seems like a terrible waste of time to throw a hissy-fit during the brief time I was able to spend home rather than embrace the opportunity. Sometimes we fall victim to such childish and destructive urges.

I'm trying to learn to be unaffected. Not so much indifferent, but to understand the flaws of humanity and not dwell in their occurrence. I used to try so hard to inspire change in my parent's behavior. I was full of self pity and couldn't understand their ignorance. When your young your world is so small and black and white. I guess the gray is built with age and experience. I see that fire now in my fifteen year old cousin. She's smart and cynical beyond her years. She hasn't got a clue, but she thinks she knows everything. I felt old and exhausted listening to her, thinking of the years I spent rattling off the same sad stories. It's not my place to tell her to stop fighting. I just wish she would embrace her childhood rather than dwell on her sorrows and worry about saving the world. I guess thats my own desire to revert. We always want what's beyond our reach. Maybe I should buy her a camera so she can turn her pain into art like every other teenage girl.

As a pseudo-depressed teenager I read a lot of Jim Carroll's poems after Leonardo DiCaprio portrayed him in The Basketball Diaries. I appreciate the balance of black and white, good and bad. Honesty. You have to have rain to see a rainbow.