The men we'll be...

Great men are not born, they are created. They are molded from the world that surrounds them, taking shape as time progresses. They experience every experience, expose themselves to every exposure...Their heightened sense of awareness and belonging makes them in tune with the world spinning around them. They are critical of the masses, and know that they know not...these are great men, these are great women...

At first glance, the above may sound like the mother of all rhetorical flurishes and nothing more than pretenious words spoken to nobody. However, I urge that this is not the case. They are the by-product of a moving conversation between myself and a friend who is more like my brother.

What makes great men, or even simplier, successful people flurish while others are struggling to find their way? Some people have money, and all of the benefits that comes with having a network of friends in high places. They finish highschool with perfect marks, practically breeze through the university of their choice, and go on to fulfill dreams found only in make-believe, or Hollywood.

Some people blossum at different times, my friend says. They have a goal from early on, and stop at nothing until they have reached it... or they have help. Maybe their roads aren't lined with as many complications as some, they had love and support to back them. They had a place where, even in failure, they could come back to and hide.

Being one semester away from completing my degree, I have devoted much time and energy to, well to be frank, to being nervous about my future prospects. So much that once I wrote to Dr. Noam Chomsky in search of some inspiration to cure my discouragement. What he said was simple, but very effective. He told me that even the greatest men, himself included, had gone through times in their lives where they were scared or unsure about what their futures would bring them. Laughter or saidness, successes or failures, even those with the most meraculous of accomplishments had experienced them all, and managed to save face.

So it's not all tragedy and tears...which is good for me because being painfully average, I kid myself alot. Truthfully, it's too soon to tell, my grandpa would say I'm still wet behind the ears. When I write the next chapter of my life, I hope they are good pages, that take my to exciting places, taking from them something to charish and savour.

A champion on the field, when he wins, who always wants to stay trapped in the moment, hanging on to it like it's his last. For that moment his was great, and he will be remembered for it, even if his endevours never take him their again...