"Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the watcher turns his eyes away in resignation, his dreams mocked to death by time" -- Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God. The picture was taken last year at Venice Beach with Chris.

I started the summer with the simple goal of reading 10 books and I'm proud to say that a few days ago, I finally met it. The list is:

1. The Kite Runner -- Khaled Hosseini
2. The Family Man -- Elinor Lipman
3. The Life of Pi -- Yann Martel
4. Catcher in the Rye -- J. D. Salinger
5. Crime and Punishment -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
6. Eat, Pray, Love -- Elizabeth Gilbert
7. The Glass Castle -- Jeanette Walls
8. On The Road -- Jack Kerouac
9. Love The One You're With -- Emily Griffin
10. A Thousand Splendid Suns -- Khaled Hosseini

While I'm glad I met the goal, having one at all kind of sucked the purity out of reading, if that makes sense. I believe reading should be organic, should be for the soul and I suppose that's why being an English major became such a struggle. I wasn't doing it out of love anymore and how aimless my days are when I lose sight of that.

I was just talking - or rather hopelessly rambling - to someone about the wonders of LA, its nuance, its colors, its soul and while spilling on about all the things I miss about it, I had the gut wrenching realization that I never went back to any of it this summer. Two and half months at my disposal and nothing. I never saw a single play. Never went to a single museum. Saw a single jazz band. Took a single photo for myself. And what gets me is not that I never did any of this but that I never even THOUGHT about it! Who have I become? I refuse to let med school and its toxic people suck the personality and values out of me.