Sometimes one of the hardest things in the world for me is to stop “living” for a second, and ask myself if I’m really taking in everything around me.

Last night, I couldn’t sleep ( I later realized that my pillow was missing – oh, the dependency on pillows!) , but there really wasn’t anything I could do other than just shut my eyes and try and count sheep. However, after a valiant effort, I still couldn’t get to sleep. So what did I do? I walked over to the balcony, and lay down and looked up at stars..

No really, I did.

What made the experience more fulfilling, was that beside me lay not the man of my dreams (haha joke), but my dog, Judo. And for once, he lay down quietly by my side, without getting up every two seconds to investigate some strange sounds ( even though I could hear some dog barking in the distance, which is usually enough to trigger him off into an answering volley of barks).

So we lay there, for I don’t exactly know how long, but enough to really make me feel.. something. I’m not a big believer in spiritual or religious things, and so I rarely take the time to actually sit and “be at peace with myself” . but this time I felt like doing this.

I realized that by staring fixedly at one star, it looked like it was moving , and that if I stared long enough, I stopped seeing the ugly cable that runs across from one end of the compound to the next, marring the view of the sky. I realized, lying there looking up at the stars with my ferocious, “biter” dog sleeping like a baby next to me, that my life ( contrary to the typical 17-year-old point of view) really isn’t so bad after all =)