For A Long Time I Wanted To

Because, Ten-year-olds Of The World, You Shouldn't Believe What Your Teachers Tell You About The Beauty And Specialness And Uniqueness Of You. Or, Believe It, Little Snowflake, But Know It Won't Make A Bit Of Difference Until After Puberty. It's Newton's Lost Law: Anything That Makes You Unique Later Will Get Your Chocolate Milk Stolen And Your Eye Blackened As A Kid. Won't It, Sebastian? Oh, Yes, It Will, My Little Mandarin Chinese-learning, Poe-reciting, High-top-wearing Friend. God Bless You, Wherever You Are.

Like Most Citizens Of Popular And International Urban Centres, I Don't Take Advantage Of The Cultural Opportunities. Perhaps This Comes From Growing Up In Suburbia. Home Is Where You Eat, Sleep, Read, Watch Television And Ignore Your Parents. It Is Not Where You Go To The Ballet And Then Attend A Heated Panel Discussion About It Afterwards.

Alaska Is What Happens When Willy Wonka And The Witch From Hansel And Gretel Elope, Buy A Place Together Upstate, Renounce Their Sweet Teeth, And Turn Into Health Fanatics.

I Now Know My Right From My Left And My Up From My Down. Unluckily, My Terrible Sense Of Direction Remains. For Me, To Live In New York City Is To Never Be Able To Meet Someone On The Northeast Corner. It Is To Never Ever Make A Smooth Entrance, Always To Get Caught Looking Lost On The Street.

But Now My Problems Had Been Set Loose. They Could Be Anywhere At Any Time And I Was Just Like Everyone Else I Knew: Almost Positive That There Was Something Profoundly And Undiagnosably Wrong With Me.