Oh, There Was Harm Indeed For A

... For Home Is A Magnet That Lures Back Even Its Most Abstracted Children.

There Were Two Now Where They Had Been Three. David's Death Had Dismantled The Triangle, And An Enclosed Space Was Now Open. Two Points Are Unreliable; With Nothing To Anchor Them, There Is Nothing To Stop Them Drifting In Opposite Directions. If It Is String That Binds, It Will Eventually Snap And The Points Will Separate; If Elastic, They Will Continue To Part, Further And Further, Until The Strain Reaches Its Limit And They Are Pulled Back With Such Speed That They Cannot Help But Collide With Devastating Force.

I Probably Coughed Self-pityingly In Response, Little Aware That I Was About To Cross A Tremendous Threshold Beyond Which There Would Be No Return, That In My Hands I Held An Object Whose Simple Appearance Belied Its Profound Power. All True Readers Have A Book, A Moment, Like The One I Describe, And When Mum Offered Me That Much-read Library Copy Mine Was Upon Me.

I Want To Be Independent. To Meet Interesting People. ... I Just Mean New People With Clever Things To Say. Things I've Never Heard Before. I Want To Be Free. Open To Whatever Adventure Comes Along And Sweeps Me Off My Feet.

Wars Make History Seem Deceptively Simple. They Provide Clear Turning Points, Easy Distinctions.: Before And After, Winner And Loser, Right And Wrong. True History, The Past, Is Not Like That. It Isn't Flat Or Linear. It Has No Outline. It Is Slippery, Like Liquid; Infinite And Unknowable, Like Space. And It Is Changeable: Just When You Think You See A Pattern, Perspective Shifts, An Alternate Version Is Proffered, A Long-forgotten Memory Resurfaces.