Another Bit of Awesome Prose (Not Mine) For Your Morning Pleasure

Don't know if this will become a regular thing.  Suppose I'll do it when the mood strikes, which pretty much defines my whole blogging philosophy anyway...

So how did I miss this all these years?  Who knows? It was never assigned in my school, and thereafter it was always one of those books people told me I should read, and I just never got around to it.  Wish someone had assigned it back in the day.   That's probably why the only thing I'm truly passionate about in my teaching gig is making sure kids read as many books as I can shove down their throats....

Tell Dally?  It was too late to tell Dally.  Would he have listened?  I doubt it.  Suddenly it wasn't only a personal thing to me.  I could picture hundreds and hundreds of boys living on the wrong sides of cities, boys with black eyes who jumped at their own shadows.  Hundreds of boys who maybe watched sunsets and looked at stars and ached for something better.  I could see boys going down under street lights because they were mean and tough and hated the world, and it was too late to tell them that there was still good in it, and they wouldn't believe you if you did.  It was too vast a problem to be a personal thing.  There should be some help, someone should tell them before it was too late.  Someone should tell their side of the story, and maybe people would understand....

Buy it.