reflection_on_choice_perhaps Version E I am alone and on my own. At 15 years old, after months of threats by my loving mother and her boyfriend, whom I was secretly attracted to and in truth, loved seeing around the house, I was kicked out. I don't know why, but she didn't like me much. I had an attitude problem that she didn't like, and that had only grown since I was 12 years old and deepened as I realized how close to the same intelligence level we really both were. When I was 13, she would sometimes cry in the car on the way to school, after we'd had a morning fight but we both knew she still had to drive me to school, as angry and bitter we both felt toward each other. While she cried in the car, she would tell me that she didn't feel appreciated our family, that she sometimes just wanted to leave. It was scary when she kept talking and crying like that after the light turned green. I stayed silent during those episodes because they made my anger recede, slowly replaced by sadness and regret and pity. When I was 15, she had divorced my dad and brought in a concubine. He was her age, but I always had schoolgirl fasinations with older men - I was in love with most of my male teachers. I wasn't in love with him, but I felt a rush of excitement when I was in the same room with him. Even when I was angry at him, I still held onto my crush. Seeing him and my mom kiss in front of me didn't anger me so much as it annoyed me - it shattered the illusion I had replayed and continued to perfect in my head ... various situations in which he would approach me when we were alone in the house, running his fingers down my back, and we would kiss in my room, anxious and knowing what we were doing was risky, but that the connection was just too strong. I knew it would never happen. I'm 24 now. My mother was a good person - she just couldn't handle a child as young as I was challenging her every day. I lived with family, then friends, then more friends, then boyfriends and still more friends, and now I live on my own. I've had so many sinks and refridgerators and carpets and couches in my life that I've never really stopped to consider that it was a little abnormal. Well, I'm not entirely on my own. I have a boyfriend who is a little older than I am. He is in the process of getting a divorce; he has been for quite some time. When I force myself to think about it, a subject which I'd rather avoid altogether, I am able to come to terms with the fact that he doesn't want to leave his wife, that he probably still somewhat loves her. For some reason it doesn't really bother me; I don't mind not being able to claim him as my own ... thoughts like these make me wonder if I'm really in love. He says he loves me, to him I am a rare and wondrous jewel, intricate mysteries that he wants to solve, layers of youthful ideals that he wants to wrap around his mind and body like a young, soft, nubile blanket. Sometimes I look at him at night and wonder what his wife is thinking. I wonder if she knows he is with me, or someone like me. I feel bad that she feels infinitely worse about the situation than I do. I wonder if she cries in anguish at night while I only ponder. There are many times when I look back at moments or weeks or months in my life when things could have gone a little differently, and I wonder what would be different if they had. Would I be in college? Would I live at home? Would I be in love? Would I look different or have different skills or even be younger or older? I could go to a bed every night that felt cold and comfortable like a high school night when boys aren't allowed upstairs. I could be writing an entirely different blathe. 040109 what's it to you? who go blather from