Blood is thicker than water, my mother had always said when I was growing up, a sentiment I'd often disputed. But it turned out that it didn't matter… - Cheryl Strayed

Maybe you have to know the darkness before you can appreciate the light,” I

It had been so silent in the wake of that commotion, a kind of potent silence that seemed to contain everything. The songs of the birds and the creak of the trees. The dying snow and the unseen gurgling water. The glimmering sun. The certain sky. The gun that didn't have a bullet in its chamber. And the mother. Always the mother. The one who would never come to me.

The narratives we create in order to justify our actions and choices become in so many ways who we are.