Then I yelled through his door, "It's an anniversary gift for you, asshole. Two whole weeks early. FIFTEEN YEARS IS BIG METAL CHICKENS.

But really, what else are you going to talk about in line at the liquor store? Childhood trauma seems like the natural choice, since it’s the reason why most of us are in line there to begin with.

If you enjoyed high school, you were probably a psychopath or a cheerleader. Or possibly both.

So many of us feel like we're misfits until we finally find our tribe - the other people who are are strange in the same way - and suddenly everything clicks.

That night I looked up at those same stars, but I didn't want any of those things. I didn't want Egypt, or France, or far-flung destinations. I just wanted to go back to my life from my childhood, just to visit it, and touch it, and to convince myself that yes, it had been real.

It's funny because the most sane women I've ever met are my mom and my grandmothers. I think you have to be incredibly sane and self-aware to function in relatively insane environments.

When I was young, my family didn't go on outings to the circus or trips to Disneyland. We couldn't afford them. Instead, we stayed in our small rural West Texas town, and my parents took us to cemeteries.