You know it'd be great if years from now we learned the song was either straight foward or had no meaing just like the case typically is with highly debated pieces or art. The beatles' lyrics never what people though, Robert Frost's The Path not taken (Probably got the title wrong.) ended up having no real meaning other than it was what it was. *shrug* just speculating, I don't think this thread serves anymore purpose because nobody is going to change their mind about wether or not we should take the song for its personal meaning or wether we should try to find some impossible way to figure out what Maynard himself meant.