02/18/07 - 3:33 p.m.

Sometimes I'll remember something bratty I did, and feel embarrassed. I told myself recently that I was still a person, with a right to be on this planet -- and I was the sum of a lot of social forces that were (or weren't) reflected in me.

I think I was part of the social mileu of the people around me in that sense, too. And I think all people have a basic regard for other people, down inside, whether they know it or not. I think they discover it in time, over their life.

I like to think that the people who saw me being bratty also saw me, beyond that. That whether I had the intuition to understand myself, they did -- they saw a young, unsure person. Sometimes they went easy on me -- which may have made me more bratty. But maybe they were doing it for the right reason. There was a right reason. To give me a chance to come to self-respect on my own.

I probably could've used a little more guiding. But I got there. Or am getting there.