The day after tomorrow could be the best day ever.

You wake up but not really. In the bedroom you grew up in. It's the only place on this entire planet that is yours. The only place on the planet that understands you. It understands the way your nerves flare everytime you think about talking to anyone, scared into shyness at the thought of opening your mouth but the way you are the best hypocrite around when you're in front of a microphone. It knows what turns that switch on and off and on again. It understands the way when you don't have a smile on your face everyone only spits: "what's wrong"s and "you look tired"s. So the way you keep it on your face just wide enough to avoid questions. It understands how neurotic you have become, the way you treat your flaws like old friends. The way you look in the mirror and think of yourself as "Mr. Misery"...

Growing up on a ranch, we worked hard every day.

As a kid growing up in the little city of Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, I dreamed of one day playing in the NHL, but never did I expect it to be as much fun as it turned out to be.

Growing up happens in a heartbeat. One day you're in diapers; the next day you're gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul.

And though I had misgiving--obvious ones, too--one overwhelming thing drove me on: on the borderlands, my father would need me as much as I'd need him. That's what made me so blindly ready to go off with him. What boy doesn't wait his whole childhood to walk alongside his father on equal terms?