"all my life i had been looking for something, and everywhere i turned someone tried to tell me what it was. i accepted their answers too, though they were often in contradiction and even self-contradictory. i was naïve. i was looking for myself and asking everyone except myself questions which i, and only i, could answer. it took me a long time and much painful boomerang ing of my expectations to achieve a realization everyone else appears to have been born with: that i am nobody but myself. ~ ralph ellison - battle royal