It's no matter if you're born
To play the King or pawn
For the line is thinly drawn ‘tween joy and sorrow,
So my fantasy
Becomes reality,
And I must be what I must be and face tomorrow.

– Simon and Garfunkel Flowers Never Bend with the Rainfall

In my continual pursuit of observing life, I find we all have personas that we apply in particular group settings and although it can be a "fantasy of personality" at what point does it indeed become "reality", or at least reality as much as one can interpret for himself?

We are creatures of a repetitious nature and I wonder if our habits are molded by those repetitions and our habits influence who we are. For example upon a small scale, I have one double door metal cabinet which requires me each morning to give it a swift kick to close it. Though my intentions were only to give that cabinet in particular a kick each time to shut it, I find myself doing the same to my other cabinet at home along with my inventory cabinet at work. Do I now approach closing cabinet doors more aggressively? It seems as though the general trend has been for me to kick every one I see shut, though they shut fine under their own ability. I have to consciously think not to kick the doors into place.

So if we pursue various habits, does the external mold the internal? Do we let our environment mold who we are? What are we then, nothing much more than a walking representation of the places we have been, influenced by what we want to retain from the perspective we held?

What you don't have you don't need it now What you don't know you can feel it somehow What you don't have you don't need it now Don't need it now Was a beautiful day

-U2 Beautiful Day

Long ago, I had first heard the above song with the friends I had hung out with weekend after weekend from 18-22. The song had yet to be released as a single, yet it impacted me significantly. Time would pass and there would be reasons for me to leave those guys and that lifestyle in particular. Upon another time, the love of my life would break away from me and during those months of resolution, I would hear those words of U2 again, as a call to freedom.

I find myself at another waypoint in my life and the familiar tune plays again. It is a different time for me, yet, so very similar to those times of ago. This upcoming weekend will mark the first week that I have lived away from home, which is a significant mark considering I did not jump the bandwagon with everyone else during that late teens, early 20's era. John and Nic have been great roommates, friends, and ultimately brothers to me. Although the Mug is on the way home from work, this past week I have been skipping it because I had a room to organize and our house is more fun. When we do wrap up our moving procedures, it should be the most technological advanced place for bachelors that I have seen (ie. multiple TV's that share the same picture of computer-generated visualizations to the music being played).

It is a new era in my life, one that requires a degree of self-reliance, but ultimately requires full reliance upon God.

I hear it falling in the night
And filling up my mind
All the heaven's rivers come to light
And I see it all unwind
I hear it talking through the trees
And on the window pane
And when I hear it
I just can't believe I never liked the rain

-Clint Black Like the Rain

I found simple pleasures in my driving through the rain this morning on my merry way to work. I would have found it to be a more enjoyable experience if I did not have to contend with the typical rush hour traffic.

Without going into the details as of yet, I am finding myself within an era of change, a time which I will fondly remember these times as another golden period of my life. Holding attributes of both the simple and the complex, life holds decisions which are simple enough at this time, but hold momentous results with the passage of time. It is a good time to be alive.

I have been searching for a place to move out and I've considered both buying a house and renting an apartment. After some thought, I've realized that just renting a house is the worse of both worlds: throwing money into a black pit of nothingness for a place which you have to upkeep yourself. Sure, the less sound restrictions are great, but for someone who does not wish to be particularly loud, it does not weigh heavily upon the decision. I have the option to move out with the same couple of guys that I have aforementioned in one of my journals, but into a three bedroom house, but I do not believe I will for I was burned the last go around, my whole house rental viewpoint, and I have a desire to live alone and be able to live beyond the confines of a 12X10 room. I am heavily considering moving into a two bedroom apartment at the 19-story Exchange Building in downtown Memphis. It would be a great opportunity to live in an aesthetically pleasing environment, a place for poets with the grand Mississippi in view along with the bridge as a gateway to the West. I weighed the option of buying a house, but I think it would be wise for me to live in an apartment for a year, as I established my vocational stability, pay off both my credit card and truck debts, and save for a sizeable down payment.