Prologue

During my stay in the hospital, it occurred to me. Life comes in doses. In the hospital, the day is broken up by med distribution and meals. That is your day. Now, outside, I realize life everywhere is much the same. I wake up, have breakfast, and take my morning meds. I don't have mid-morning, noon, and afternoon meds anymore. I still have evening and nighttime meds. The time in between is still well scheduled, however. One has to work, run errands, eat, etc. On a larger scale, we have weeks...one will say they've had a good week or a bad week...it's the same with months and even years. Bad times, those are just the bad doses...that's your nasty cough syrup, the Zoloft you hate admitting you take, or the Ritalin you can't seem to shake. The good times, that's the Nyquil so you can sleep well, the Depakote that keeps you sane, the multivitamin that keeps you strong. It's all just doses. It's all bound to happen, and it's all bound to pass.

So that's my life. That's where I am and where I'm coming from. I'm about to embark on one of the biggest journeys a person ever goes on: the one to adulthood. In the upcoming months I'll be preparing to start a career and move away, I'll be putting an entire state between myself and my parents, in fact. This chapter is ending and a new one is coming in the story of my life.

And this time, I'll have it written down.