On That Freedom

Is freedom anything else than the power of living as we choose? Nothing else. Tell me then, you men, do you wish to live in error? We do not. No one who lives in error is free. Do you wish to live in fear? Do you wish to live in sorrow? Do you wish to live in tension? By no means. No one who is in a state of fear or sorrow or tension is free, but whoever is delivered from sorrows or fears or anxieties, he is at the same time also delivered from servitude. - Epictetus

Yes, I'm out... and Unspeakable gratitude to those of you who sent books: Breakfast at Tiffany's (thanks Michael G in the Big Schmapple), Learn Indonesian (nice refresher), The Glass Bead Game, To Kill a Mockingbird, 100 Years of Solitude (OMG, wow, Michael G), Merchant of Venice (Folger edition, nice), The Children of Men, Gertrude, All Quiet on the Western Front, Angela's Ashes (NYC MG again!), The Sound and the Fury, Turgenev-Short Stories (thanks Yale Mark xo), Walden (OMG, so dangerous to read in jail), and Civil Disobedience, Jane Eyre (of course), Love in the Time of Cholera (holy God thnx), Notes from Underground (Fyodor, ugh), Crime and Punishment (touche!, ugh, enough of this lunatic Russian though), Widow For One Year, Setting Free the Bears, David Copperfield (of course JM), 1779 (oh yeah!, xo), Dream of the Ridiculous Man (okay Yale Mark, stop with the Doestoyevsky ;)), Mencken's 35 Years of Newspaper Work (heaven), Mencken's Chrestomathy (FL!), Pinker's How the Mind Works (wow), The Life of Birds (okay, why not), 2005 Almanac (hallelujah), The Elegant Universe (thnx Doc), Just Six Numbers, World at Arms, Atlas Shrugged (okay Yale Mark - you are a god - and I forgive you for Fyodor), History of India, Masterplots, Sup Ct. Decisions, Dictionary of Popes (huh?), The Last Three Minutes, Holidays in Hell (hilarious - xo JF), Heloise & Abelard, Wuthering Heights (Modern Library ed.), Classical Myth & Religion (thnx MS), Random House Word Menu (thnx Car), Heathen Days, Happy Days (both Mencken - thnx jules - xo), Herod (thnx KP), Benedict Arnold (xo MRT), His Excellency George Washington (thnx CL), Mark Twain (xo Christopher), and the countless letters. I fucking love you bibliophiles. xoxoxox