CHOICES

Life is but a cobweb of choices. My friend once quipped we are what we chose to be. Or take it from Ally MacBeal -- I am a victim of my decisions. Ah, after 31 years of exitence the existential dilemma is far from softening. On the contrary, the dilemma presses deeper, as if a wound being rubbed by a handful of salt. On one hand, there is practicality, on the other idealism. You have a Richard Gordon saying you cannot eat sovereignity (during the US Bases debate of the early 90's) and you have Sandwich screaming for Food for the Soul. You have success measured in terms of how society defines it, and you have success that satisfies your inner self, your piece of mind, your happiness. You have contentment through extending relatively financial stability for your family by providing the basic needs and, where possible, the whims of commercialism, you have contentment by exemplifying silmplenes in life. You have to be a slave for money or a master for yourself. YOU HAVE TO BE, But how? YOU HAVE TO BE, but at what cost. Life is but a single travel, you do not have the luxury of going back to things that have gone past. The main characte in Milan Kundera's Unbearable Lightness of Being rued about this. If life can be rearranged in such a fashion that we deem it to be, if we have time capsule so we can prevent bad decisions......

Ahh but when one is so accustomed to his relatively routine life, can change peep though the hardened layers of apathy? When one is in his "comfort" shell with friends and collegues, can brevity beamed though the dark alley of fear? When one is thrust to the grim reality of being the sole breadwinner of a family, can idealism survive the onslaught of practicality?