I had written a lengthly essay on How I Spent My Weekend, but I'll spare myself. It was too long, it was boring, and it was not clarifying.

I'll just say it left my mind in a whirl. Seeing too much of family (yours or anyone's) will do that to you.

Coke, Belendor's mom, left yesterday. It was good to have her here, but there was so little time, we didn't have time to talk properly, even though we stayed up and barely slept. Sigh.

I will throw a couple of questions into the dark sweet night, though, because they're kind of killing me.

1. Is there anyone reliable in anyone's life? I do think life's about making mistakes and learning from them, but it's kind of discouraging to find out sooner or later that you've made a mistake with every single person you've ever opened to in your life. Are we condemned to regret everything for gods' sake? I used to be quite content with my past; I thought I indeed had made more wrongs than rights, but that there were a couple of things, a couple of people that remained after the years. This certainty disappeared over the weekend. The one person I hadn't ever regretted opening to in my younger years, that I didn't mind having opened my mind and my heart to him, has turned out to be a monster. And maybe he hurt me worse than all the rest of my previous mistakes, because years had gone by and I remembered him fondly, and I didn't expect to be hurt and attacked by him. I was paralysed by his attack; I couldn't defend myself because it was so unexpected. Now I'm facing the fact that I never did anything right in my teeneage years, that there was nothing good in them. As the years went by, I closed door after door to my past, because as I grew older I came to realize many of the things that happened were actually ugly, and I forgot them or dismissed them as learning experiences. But, as the number of open doors diminished I came to cherish them, because even though I don't think I mispent my stupid years and I indeed learned a lot about human behaviour and myself, they were also unpleasant memories to which I didn't want to return once the learning was over. So this few remaining doors were the only ones I could go back to and open without being splashed by mud, without finding all your memories smashed into pieces and realizing nothing works anymore. More time went by and these few remaining doors slammed themselves shut one after the other, forever, until only one was left. A door that opened to warm nights, long conversation, moon on the window, secret spots, rapture till dawn. It was my only cherished oasis in years that only showed me how in the wrong I was, but I could go there and enjoy an untainted memory for as long as I wanted, for there was nothing wrong, nothing dirty, nothing to regret about it.

Now I do. I regret it. All the doors are shut. I'll never look back again. Nothing from back then will ever hurt me again, nothing can hurt me again, but it saddens me all the same. Is it the same for everyone? Does everybody must live their lives locking doors behind them and never looking back? I have still another fear: Is it forever? Will it come a time when I'll regret Arwen, when I'll regret my brother, when I'll regret Belendor? Will the excellent memories I'm now storing with Belendor be destroyed at some point? Do we ever get to do something right in our lives?

2. This derives from my previous point. People are poisonous. Or some people are poison, for no good reason. Or maybe some people turn into poison. I can understand that. Snakes are poisonous and there's nothing wrong with that, and they are poisonous for a reason: they hunt and defend themselves with poison. But snakes (in spite of what many people think) do not go around trying to find someone to bite, except when they're hungry or when they feel threatened. People, on the other hand, actively seek to pour their poison on anyone, even if the other doesn't wish them any wrong, or maybe precisely because of that. I sat at the table with someone I considered a friend, a part of my family and my life and my history, and he opened his mouth and poured out a gush of acid poison just to hurt me. I can endure the hurt, I'm a big girl, but I still can't understand why on earth anyone would want to do that to a person, and that's what's driving me insane. Why would anyone want to hurt someone who is fond of you? Just for the mere pleasure of it? Where is the pleasure in that?

3. And completely unrelated to the previous two points, or maybe totally related, I haven't quite figured it out: Love and fairness. Are they mutually exclusive concepts, or is it just me? Can love be fair? Is there room for love in justice? It seems to me that in a perfect world it should be so, but this ain't no such world, is it? Claiming unfairness in a love relationship is irrelevant. Either you love or you don't, right? I'm specifically talking about parental love here. Couple love, it's more difficult for me to analyze it, and maybe fairness has a bigger role in it, but not in parental love. Parents give, children take. Isn't that the natural order? Or am I being incredibly selfish in claiming my mother has no right to feel in any way about how I am just because she loves me? That her love doesn't give her any rights on me? Her love and all the things (material and othernatured) that come with it? Does she have the right to claim I'm unfair to her just because I am not the way she wished I was or do the things the way she wished I'd do them just because she is my mother and she loves me and gives me so much? Does she have a right to expect for a payment?

I think not. If you love and you give, you shouldn't expect anything in return. Love isn't a business. It is no enterprise, either. Profit should not be a part of the equation. And here 'profit' becomes a dangerous word because, in the painful, warped, intrincated paths of love, profit in a situation like this is of an apparently selfless nature. At least in my case. My mother really feels like a personal affront that I'm not different, but that's because she truly loves me and wishes the best for me. That her concept of what's best and mine differ so much is totally irrelevant to her, but her desires are true. All of which makes it still more difficult and painful for both of us. But I still feel it's more her fault than mine. I didn't ask to be the way I am, I just am the way I am (redundant but true). I didn't ask her to give me all that she's given me, and I don't think they confer her any right over what I should feel or do. Yes, she gave me life, but I didn't ask for that either, not that I remember. So I've come to a karma standoff: Parents give to children, children take from parents. My mom took everything my grandma had to give, and she gives me everything she has to give. I'll take from my parents and not feel burdened by it, nor I will bend to her wishes even if they're goodnatured because I am a different person, separated from her since the very moment the umbilical cord was cut, and I should be able to make my own choices even if they turn out to be wrong and make my life however I see fit. When the time comes, I'll give everything to my children and try to remember that they are also different people from me and Belendor, they are not just the sum of our genes but complete and independent beings, I'll try to bear that in mind. They will also take everything from me and hopefully I will truly expect nothing in return for my love, nor they will be everburdened with an invisible debt that grows and grows forever.

That mantra should work out for awhile.