When I went up to Manchester it was to be a student at the Polytechnic in the first year of its’ existence In those days there were no halls of residence for Poly students so we had to find our own accommodation and in the first term a friend and I shared the attic rooms of an old Victorian villa, 44, Palatine Road in Withington. It was unbelievable primitive, just two beds, a table a chair a food cupboard and a Baby Belling electric cooker. There must have been somewhere to put our clothes, but I don’t remember that. We had to share a bathroom with the other residents… goodness knows who they were we never saw them!
We used to catch a bus into college and the bus stop was just opposite a church. It was one of those churches which put posters up with meaningful words, however quite often we were puzzled as to what they meant as they were somewhat enigmatic.
One in particular puzzled me; it had no punctuation and although it is many, many years ago I can remember it vividly, and have often wondered what it actually meant. I think I know now, or at least I know what it means to me!
Lois Elsden 
I think correctly punctuated it would be: “You are not what you think you are, but what you think: you are”.
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Here’s another take:
You are not what you think. You are but what you think you are.
(this is true but appears to be a contradiction)
Here is another take:
You are what you think you are, but you are not what you think.
What am I then? A useful creation of my human animal?
Is it that human societies could not exist without names?
Is all I have to do is make decisions?
Is A the name of the “a” sound?
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Thank you, Marvin… thank you very much.
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Or… “You are not, but what you think you are, you are.”
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One of my workmates has a church on her bus route that puts up ‘messages’ like this. She often says she wants to get off the bus and punctuate them 🙂
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Or write a funny answer!
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