A New Journey I start anew. Thesafety rails of academia's steady support and income is gone. I am left with my own devices again. A close friend once quipped: "I am not worried. You have always managed to survive yourtransitions." The gift of articulatingwit and wisdom graces our keyboard hacking; I hope to survive simply out of theassets of genetics and wordsmithing since my social net are hardly existing. Newspaper opinion writing is hardly a living. In every journey, it is a virtue to know what one is turningone's back from, as it is getting familiar with the arena and scope of what oneis going to face. As once said by Lolo PepeRizal: "ang hindi lilingon sapinanggalingan, ay hindi makakarating sa paroroonan" (ze who fails toknow where ze comes from will not reach where ze is going). I just left for good the geography of North America as wellas my social relations and kin there. Ialso left behind half a century of engagement in the affairs of a nation that Iwill continue to relate to in a tenuous relationship as a resident of its CNMIin Saipan, and Honolulu of its Pacific naval station. But more than the departure of body and soul,I also leave behind a mind familiar with the mental maps that chartedcivilizational courses beginning in Greece and Rome, and culminating in theWestside of Chicago and the Bay area of San Francisco. There is a rich throve of metaphors I am giving up that hadserved me deal with the fundamental human questions of identity, vocation andlifestyle. My identity once was labeledas being "the child of the living YHWH, God, Allah"; my vocation wasunconditional expenditure of one's life beyond one's self, in the liberatingways of Moses, the redeeming task of Jesus, and the prophetic lucidity ofMohammed; and the lifestyle of one who does not shrink from the challenge andresponsibility of freedom - a Holy (wholesome) spirit. In the scientific, secular, and urban surroundings of mycurrent journey, I may or may not rephrase the life questions in similarfashion as the above, though the not doing so is more to avoid pat answers tostandard questions. Authentic lifeawaits to be lived, nonetheless. What I do know given the current state of knowledge about theuniverse and my place in it is that the 14.5 billion years journey of my knownuniverse and the 4.3 billion years of my planet makes a less than a century ofmy lifetime look petty and insignificant. As a child of the universe where the carbon, nitrogen and hydrogen in mybody preceded the big bang of my solar system, I am but a recycled NOBODY. The odds, however, of my one, unique, unrepeatable gift oflife happening to create me is in trillions. The 200 million sperms alone that my father unleashed in one exchange offluids with my mother, after several attempts, that brought me in being, isalready considerable. The permission ofmy mother's ovum to penetrate a shield to union is purely an indiscerniblechoice. Created was a segment of timeand a particular space where I can leave my footprints and hang the syllablesof my name. Statistical probability leadsme to think that I am responsible for 86 years of existence for this body,heart, mind and soul, a SOMEBODY by choice. Longevity is not the issue, quality of life is. The NOBODY-SOMEBODY who walks this earth with my name doesso from the practice and perspective of freedom. Yes, sheer freedom. There is no supernatural power that determinedor works my 86 years. There is nobody toblame; to whine is to waste energy. Ihave no way of returning to what is already done, and the beginning of thefifth phase of this journey in 2014 in increments of 17, is now a decidedperiod of gracious aging. Old. Forget the cosmetics of youth. I wish to live the natural wilted-ness of myage! The arrival point of life is birth; my departure isestimated at 2031. Today, my life is notdetermined by what has transpired before, nor am I hung up in the despair ordelight of failures and accomplishments. I do not waste time regretting the first, nor engrossed in gloating overthe second. I have the here-and-now; myresponsibility is simply to make choices and innovate on chosen options ifpossible, or to decide to create the path I travel every step of the way! Before someone dubs my view as that of an ingrate, my fealtyis not about the cult of rugged individualism, or urbane sophisticatedself-centeredness without regard of the infinite mystery that is at the core ofmy existence. I do take comfort on the simplenature of things: that life begets life when used and invested. I know that life, when unconditionally given away, managesto be significant. I do not plan,factor, or expect anything from a return, yet, I am eternally grateful. I am detached but with compassion on materialwealth and spiritual poverty; totally engaged in meeting the unknown headlongsingle-mindedly with care; obedient to the way life is, not manipulating it norbeing subdued by it. If you arecontinually moving on, you have company on your side. j'aime la vie pinoypanda2031@aol.com yesterday, appreciate; tomorrow, anticipate; today. participate. In all, celebrate!