What happens in the band room stays in the band room.

The urge to make art or contemplate philosophy does not go away when you are sick. Those urges just become transfigured by illness.

And as paralyzing and upsetting as all the never agains were, the final leaving felt perfect. Pure. The most distilled possible form of liberation. Everything that mattered except one lousy picture was in the trash, but it felt so great. I started jogging, wanting to put even more distance between myself and school. It is so hard to leave—until you leave. And then it is the easiest goddamned thing in the world.

But it is the nature of stars to cross, and never was Shakespeare more wrong than when he has Cassius note, ‘The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars / But in ourselves.

At some point, you just pull off the Band-Aid, and it hurts, but then it's over and you're relieved.

Such is life. We grow up. Planets like Tiny get new moons. Moons like me get new planets.

Isaac out of surgery. It went well. He's officially NEC. NEC meant "no evidence of cancer." A second text came a few seconds later. I mean, he's blind. So that's unfortunate.