My mom was in the courtroom that day. She had greeted me right before court and I barely recognized her. It was her voice I recognized first, I had heard it over the phone several times over the last few years. She gave me a hug and told me she would do her best to take care of everything.

"Why was she even here?" I thought, "there is nothing she can do for me, they are going to send me away for a long time and there is nothing anyone can say or do to stop it."

Someone came to the door and told us it was time to come into the courtroom. My lawyer spoke to me before the judge came up and told me what to plea guilty for and what to plead not guilty for. He had spoken to the judge earlier that day and had made a deal with him to relax the charges on me.

It was confusing. The judge spoke and told me how lucky I was to be 13 years old facing these kinds of charges, he told me how many years I would be in jail if I were 18 and how they would throw the book at me if circumstances where any different.

I wanted so bad to be able to explain why I did the things I did. I wasn't a bad kid really, I just wanted to escape, I wanted out of the house that made me want to kill myself. The step mother that seemed to hate me, the step sisters that did hate me, the dad that always sided with them in an attempt to keep the peace. I wanted to escape from the hell that I felt I was living in. I wanted to scream at the judge and tell him it was Ok to send me away, that is what I wanted to begin with. Anything but where I was now.

Then my mother had a chance to speak and begged the judge to let me stay with her, she claimed that things would be different if I were simply allowed to be with my mother. The judge asked me what I thought, and as my father stared me down scoffing at the words of my mom, I said I would not like to live with her. She sat down quietly. I was scared. I've never been comfortable telling people the truth if it meant going against what they believed to be right, and I think that may have been where it started.

The only reason she had came was because I had called her and begged her to help me.

It wasn't that I did not love my dad, I did. I just couldn't stand the thought of spending another minute in the dump that had become our home the day we moved in with his new wife. And my mom, I had been down that road before. The abuse and neglect drove me to steal to eat. My younger brothers were the same way. We were just kids, none of us old enough to play any substantial "provider" figure for the other. We were just three kids trying to make it alone, but thats a story for another day.

That is when my dad stood up. He talked about this new place, this place that had been for years helping "troubled teens" like myself recover from our mistakes and become productive members of society. From the way he talked about it you couldn't go into that place without becoming a model citizen for all to look up to.

If you've gotten this far, your probably thinking my dad is not such a great guy. And believe me, he has made more than his fair share of mistakes. He had a temper that couldn't be stopped and a stubbornness that had no equal. He would stick to his original path long after he knew it was wrong. In a lot of ways I am identical to him, and if my brothers would be willing to admit it, they are too. But he loved me. He would do anything for me, I know that for a fact.

The Judge didn't give it much thought at all, my sentence had been decided long before I entered that courtroom. I was to be sent to this "Home for troubled teens" in upstate NY for no less than 1 year.

I didn't cry, I wasn't scared. I don't think I can even remember the rest of that day if I tried. It is all a blur. I was leaving for what I thought would be a better place. A place where sure, all the screwed up kids ended up, but at least I wouldn't be where I was.

The next few years would be an adventure. One that right now, I am not sure if I would be willing to repeat. But it is what it is.

the title to this post is a little presumptuous, but it works.

All I want to do with this post is pose a question, how hard do you think it would be dating someone who makes a LOT more money than you?

I met this really cool girl tonight but she's a doctor in her first year of residency. Super cool chick, but honestly on a whole different level of financial stability than I am.

I'm a guy, I really enjoy being in some kind of controll, I think it's just the way we are built. And honestly, even thinking about dating a girl who makes more than ten times what I do scares me a little.

Who knows? What do you think?