Farewell Note

Sherrie Glover of Evans wishes her son, Richard, could have been helped in the community rather than a youth prison. The 15-year-old, jailed at the time for vandalizing a ballpark concession stand, breaking into a church storage building and shooting a Coke machine with a stolen gun, committed suicide in December 2001.
“There were things in the community that could have helped Richard and the other boy he was with, but nobody told me about them,” said Glover. “They just said he did this wrong, and he's got to spend this much time in the detention center. I think Richard and the other boy could have learned a valuable lesson had they given them a toothbrush and made them clean up the ballpark instead of locking them away and putting them in a place where they felt so lost."
Only last week did Glover finally get her son's belongings back from the state. Among them, she discovered a poem that Richard wrote before he died and placed in an envelope to mail to his pastor. In the poem, Richard warns teens against following his example.
Richard wrote:

I learned the hard way.
Now, I'm paying the hard way ...
'Cause now I'm in a 6 x 9 cell,
going through a living hell.
Now, I lie awake at night
with tears rolling down my face.

http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/0304/22juvie.html

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A youth of Shouling in the state of Yan studied the proper way of walking in Handan, the capital of Zhao. He failed to learn the distinguished gait of Handan. Moreover, he unlearned his original way of walking. So he came crawling back home on all fours.
                                                     — Chuang Tzu (1779)

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At least once a day
Do something entirely different.

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Truth

... it is often the case with some of the things we know that they are highly esteemed, not because they are right, but because they have been gained at a cost. We do not care for truth at bargain price.
                                                               — Immanuel Kant
                                       An Attempt at some Reflections on Optimism, p.29

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Youth Philosophy 101

                                                 — Acknowledgements to Bill Waterson

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Terrible tragedies are inflicted on many children during the early developmental years which plant time bombs that go off later in life.

                                                               — J.F. Masterson

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On volunteers: Children and youth in residential care require contact with individuals who are going to maintain their link to the community, provide them with opportunities to use their leisure time, and enhance their personal skills.

                                                              — Gerald Mykytiuk
                                                   The Child and Youth Care Administrator