If only I listened to my own rhythm, and tried to live in accordance with it. Much of what I do is mere imitation, springs from a sense of duty or from pre-conceived notions of how people should behave. The only certainties about what is right and wrong are those which spring from sources deep inside oneself. And I say it humbly and gratefully and I mean every word of it right now, though I know I shall again grow rebellious and irritable. 'Oh God, I thank you for the sense of fulfillment I sometimes have, that fulfillment is after all nothing but being filled with you. I promise yet to strive my whole life long for beauty and harmony and also humility and true love, whispers of which I hear inside me during my best moments.'
Both of our families had ben crippled to some degree by prejudice, personal trauma, and tragedy, but in the most important ways both ranches had endured. So it wasn't what we did for a living that counted, nor what kind of china we dined on, nor what our houses looked like. Nor, in this one sense, did our skin color even matter very much. What counted most through the generations far more than any other factor, was how we treated those we loved and how well we loved That seemed the transcendent lesson or moral my search had revealed
