I am content. - John Quincey Adams, Last Words

As crazy as things get around here dealing with school and work it's easy to complain about life. This week though I'm pulling up on a bit of a milestone. In 6 days I'll be 22 years old. Because of issues I'm not going to get into, I was lucky to make it to my first birthday, lucky to make it out of high school alive (long story), and sometimes you just have to wonder how you made it through 2 decades. Last year, upon reaching 21, I purchased a particular coin that remains unique and distinct within my collection to try and mark the event. I'm not your average college student, I'm not big on drinking and parties, but I still felt the need to mark the occasion in some meaningful way. That coin traveled with me for most of year thereafter. I've been wondering if I might come up with something similar for this year. A job transition and the short-term budget crunch that's caused would make that a little hard though. Maybe I'm just being silly; I'm 22, not 52. Losing a childhood friend about 2 months ago and now hearing about Michael's son reminds me again that not everyone gets so far.

My first niece is about 14 months old now. I'm holding on to some coins that I'll give to her when the time seems right (God knows when that will be). They're Jefferson dollars with the FD label, released from the mint within about a week of her birth. Sometimes I wonder if she'll even like me. I look enough like my brother that the first time she saw me she got confused and started crying. Such a look of consternation I've never seen on a baby's face. Maybe I should shave more so we won't both have beards...

I've never considered myself particularly eloquent, so I hope everyone will forgive me for using quotes from much better writers.

"And so I'm happy, tonight.

I'm not worried about anything.

I'm not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!"

-Martin Luther King Jr, one day before he was killed. Sometimes I wonder if somehow he knew.

"Between the desire, And the spasm

Between the potency, And the existence

Between the essence, And the descent

Falls the Shadow

For Thine is the Kingdom

For Thine is, Life is, For Thine is the

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang but a whimper."

?T.S. Eliot, "The Hollow Men" (1925)