Our Iranian new year is tomorrow. I don’t know whether I should be happy or not. I really don’t know. Everything changed suddenly. I mean the war with Iraq. I don’t like watching the news, I don’t like hearing about it. It just breaks my heart. I don’t like war, I like peace. Peace is what everybody wants, I know. But it’s almost never around is it?
There is another reason that I don’t know how I should feel. It’s my family. For the 4th time we won’t have a celebration with my sister and brother. They are there, we are here. Oh sometimes I just hate to think of the unfairness of life.

I hate rain, though not today. Today I didn’t hate it. I enjoyed every drop. I walked from school to home with my friend in the rain. We didn’t have to walk but we didn’t know it was gonna rain. So when it did, we thought oh great, we’ll get wet. But it wasn’t much. We did get wet but I liked it. For the first time I didn’t mind getting wet. It’s funny because when I was little I always wanted to walk in the rain.
Now I don’t. But today I did. I don’t really know why, I guess it was the fresh air and nice Spring odor. Yeah, I think that’s why.

The year is almost gone, yet I think I have time. Time to enjoy the month of March, the Spring, and the beauty of nature. I think that even though the year is almost gone, there is still a chance for me to find myself. To really find my soul. To make a difference in my life. The life I lead everyday, every morning, every night, every minute. I have to be honest, I enjoy my life the way it is, although I wish for some changes. Changes that would make it even better.
My sister and I, though miles and miles apart, are very close. She is fourteen years older than me, I love her just the same. She is my role model and truly inspires me. I always thought it would be nice to have a younger sister, since I was the last child. But later I realized that for me, having an older sister and two older brothers was way better. They are simply the best and I cannot ask for anyone better.
I feel lonely a lot of times, since not many people are around. Although by now, I am pretty much used to not having all my family around, it is still hard. I’ve had to deal with this since the second grade, when my dad left us for the first time. It was tough, it was weird and strange. It was hard to get used to it. See I’m a family girl, I cannot live without them. It’s just the way I am.
They mean everything to me, every single one of them. Every day I pray that one day we’ll all be together. One day we will and that day will be special. Sometimes thinking about it too much, exhausts me. Tears can’t even replace it. Only silence, where I can think about other things, laugh not cry and smile to what I have and not cry over what is not there. That’s the way I deal with life.

It’s saturday night already. Which means the day is already gone and the night has just begun. Although that will end too, pretty soon.
Today was another day, time gave no mercy. It just took my day away. I am sitting in my room, typing these words without even knowing why. Some nights I just think of things that make me angry and just mad. And the more I think about them, the worse it gets. So then I would have to think of good things and just try to fall asleep. Right now I don’t know exactly how I feel. I only wish I could talk to somebody.

I’ve been stuck at home for five days. I have gotten plenty of rest. But yet again am bored. My only choices are the following: Reading,writing, playing the violin, and t.v. That’s about all. You see even these things become boring when you have to do them every day with nothing else to do.
We had an ample of snow this time! Boy it was a lot. Everything now is covered by its whiteness. It is beautiful, but beauty sometimes means danger. Beauty is not everything. Having it is not all wonderful. Having a brain is wonderful. Beauty fools us so easily.

Who is the smartest of all? Who is the prettiest of all?
Oh please! Be serious! Does this really matter? Isn’t having individual differences enough?
Why can’t we accept who we are instead of trying so hard to be like others?
We are individuals seeking uniqueness. We are not competing, we are not racing, we are simply looking for our true identity. We cannot change our brains, we cannot change anything that has already been decided by God. We HAVE to accept ourselves otherwise we’ll never be satisfied. Never. We can change our minds though, think deeper, but we are still we. All of us have different talents, different ideas, that makes us unique. And accepting ourselves is a challenge and there is simply no other choice.

Are you an optimist-one who sees life beautifully with the acception of its ugly sides and with a positive outlook?, or a pessimist-one who sees life just as a big disaster with no way to get out?
Well if you are an optimist good for you! Life is not just a big disaster which you have fallen into. It can be so good if you keep that good and positive atitude. It will be difficult at times but let’s face it, nothing is easy.
Now if you are a pessimist, you need to look on the positive side. If you can learn how to ignore the ugly sides of life or can deal with it, you’ll be fine. The thing about being a pessimist is you won’t get to enjoy what you have for as long as you breath. We only get to live once in this so called disaster of yours, only once and that’s it. Trust me you don’t want to be like this until you’re 80.
Now if you think there is an after life… then I don’t know!

When a new year arrives, we tend to pretend we want to change things, ourselves and our lives. But then we forget again and leave it off to the next year. We make plans to do good things and get out of our bad habits, eat more healthy food rather than junk food, help more people, and all sorts of things. Some of them we might actually do, but others are forgotten as always. Whenever we can, we try to find different excuses to do things later rather than now. We don’t know that later is really right now!

One of the things I like about America is diversity. When poeple from all over the world walk around us everyday we get a good feeling.
A feeling of being different but yet important. We get to know their feelings and they get to know ours. We try to help them recover from their pasts and they try to help us understand how they have suffered among millions of others. If there was no diversity we would be trapped in stupidity and selfishness. We would feel too good, having a lot of freedom while others don’t even no what freedom means. Most of us have had those feelings before coming to this society, we must not forget them, if we do, we won’t know how the other part of the world suffers.

What is hidden beneath those eyes who watch me every day? What is hidden beneath those faces? Is there a secret? A question?
An answer? Do I see them or their faces? Is there more beneath a person’s eye?
I don’t know any of them and they don’t know me. But I know that every one of them has a story and every one of them is searching for their identity.