There was only one way to do things in the Statton house.

That one way was to do exactly what the

father, Charlie, demanded. He made the decisions and everyone else followed without question. That
was until today.

How had she been so wrong? All her instincts and intuition completely failed her for the first time in her
life. She had so heavily relied on both when making decisions up until this moment and she felt a seismic
shift take place in her self-confidence. If she could be so completely wrong about something so simple as
this, how could she make decisions about really important things taking place in her life? She wasn't
sure what she should do next.

I guess we could discuss the implications of the phrase "meant to be." That is if we wanted to drown
ourselves in a sea of backwardly referential semantics and other mumbo-jumbo. Maybe such a
discussion would result in the determination that "meant to be" is exactly as meaningless a phrase as it
seems to be, and that none of us is actually meant to be doing anything at all. But that's my existential
underpants underpinnings showing. It's the way the cookie crumbles. And now I want a cookie.

Stranded. Yes, she was now the first person ever to land on Venus, but that was of little consequence.
Her name would be read by millions in school as the first to land here, but that celebrity would never
actually be seen by her. She looked at the control panel and knew there was nothing that would ever get
it back into working order. She was the first and it was not clear this would also be her last.

Twenty-five hours had passed since the incident. It seemed to be a lot longer than that. That twenty-five
hours seemed more like a week in her mind. The fact that she still was having trouble comprehending
exactly what took place wasn't helping the matter. She thought if she could just get a little rest the
entire incident might make a little more sense.

Greg understood that this situation would make Michael terribly uncomfortable. Michael simply had no
idea what was about to come and even though Greg could prevent it from happening, he opted to let it
happen. It was quite ironic, really. It was something Greg had said he would never wish upon anyone a
million times, yet here he was knowingly letting it happen to one of his best friends. He rationalized that
it would ultimately make Michael a better person and that no matter how uncomfortable, everyone
should experience racism at least once in their lifetime.

The bowl was filled with fruit. It seemed to be an overabundance of strawberries, but it also included
blueberries, raspberries, grapes, and banana slices. This was the meal Sarah had every morning to start
her day since she could remember. Why she decided to add chocolate as an option today was still a bit
of a surprise, but she had been in the process of deciding she wanted to change her routine. This was a
baby step to begin that start.

It probably seemed trivial to most people, but it mattered to Tracey. She wasn't sure why it mattered so
much to her, but she understood deep within her being that it mattered to her. So for the 365th day in a
row, Tracey sat down to eat pancakes for breakfast.