Birthdays and such

Today is my birthday. I have officially turned 22, although I've stopped counting at 21. What is the point of being older than 21? Senior citizen discounts, I guess. Although, is that really worth getting older?

Regardless, it happens to us all. Here I am, on the threshold of a new year in my life, and as I stare at the vast marble notebook before me, I am curious as to what exactly will happen. I know that I have a rather exciting year ahead of me, what with teaching et al. Who knows what will, in fact, happen. Maybe I'll find riches, being able to settle down and read/write for the rest of my life. Actually, I wouldn't want that. If I come into great wealth, I think I'll get a doctorate first, and then teach college, and then retire and read and write.
Maybe I'll find love, or it will find me, or let me catch it, or something. Maybe I'll save someone's life without realizing it. Maybe I'll win awards and honors and have my name be something grand.
Maybe I should do what is best for me right now, that is, live every second of my life like it was my last, like at any second I could meet Him who made me, He who is the eternal judge and knows what will happen to me.
It is amazing what freedom can do to one's head.

So I enter this life. Maybe I'll get published in a journal, or maybe I'll have my students listen to me. Maybe I'll write the Great American novel, or maybe I'll read it myself, penned by the hands of my friends. I know that something great is coming. As Mr. Akers, one of my professors during my semester in Rome (the original purpose for this blog, if I'm not mistaken), wisely stated, this generation is bound to produce great things. When there is the slaughter of the innocent, particularly the infants and the unborn, in otherwords, when life is cut short by the hands of men, great things come about and great men arise. God uses tragedy to shine his light through his instruments. Moses was the product of this. Jesus, the Light of the World, came from this background of horror (think slaughter of the Holy Innocents at the hand of King Herod). The Holocaust produced great heros, Saints, and Martyrs. We can only hope to follow in their footsteps, and yet it seems like we are doing just that. We are the next generation of the Church. We are the immediate successors in the world. We hold in our grasps the salvation of the world, torn apart by death and violence, infidelity and promuscuity, lies and betrayals.

This is what I face this year. This is what awaits me this coming year.

However, as mentioned before, I have a sign.

In Hoc Signum Vinces. In this Sign, Conquer.