Dirty Hands
I think I'm on my way to understanding the essence of some of those questions I set out to answer the summer before I went away to college. I feel so much more balanced now than I did then.

But it still bothers me that despite my exuberance and drive to experience life, I'm still afraid to get my hands dirty. I'm afraid to lose what I have and dive in... I'd much rather watch and try to learn in a sort of omniscient detachment. It's just that... up close, everything is so... dirty, so... imperfect. That's life for you. That's work and pain and grime and sorrow. And that's even love and passion.

I'm an idealist, even if a pessimistic one. I still have so much hope for the world. I still want to see everything. But I know that when the day comes and I'm a well-seasoned traveler, I still won't be able to engrain myself in the places I see because they'll be too profound, too uncomfortable for me to become part of them. I'll anchor myself with the stability of a whitebread, upper-middle-class American upbringing, a place I don't even know well enough to call home, a place I sometimes despise because I have no choice but to be engrained in.

I'll keep looking for something better, something pure that I hope I'll never find. A complete contradiction? Yes. But then, that's the quest for knowledge.