When I was 14, my father decided to send me to a boarding school in another state. Although my older brother had gone the year before me and enjoyed the studious environment and Quaker background, I was a furry of rage and resentment. In my young mind, bad kids went to boarding school and I just couldn't figure what I had done to deserve this fate. There is not much I remember about the first few weeks of my stay, but I remember feeling intent to prove my badness, to confirm my place in this new life.
To no one's benefit, I did fail to acclimate to the school and a year and a half later I was asked to leave. During my stay there, however, I found myself falling in love with the place and a boy who lived in the town, with all the angst of a young heart.
It wasn't until the last month of my stay that I found Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes. Every word of every song he wrote seemed to parallel the intensity of my emotions from that point until I had completed my emotionally turbulent path through high school.
I will sometime think of the boy my heart ached for, and recently learned of a tragedy that brought his life to an unexpected and early end. Conor Oberst's quivering voice is so entwined with his memory that I have a hard time separating the two much of the time.