And of course these days I feel like there is a nation of us - displaced southerners and children of the working class. We listen to Steve Earle, Mary J. Blige, and k.d. lang. We devour paperback novels and tell evil mean stories, value stubbornness above patience and a sense of humor more than a college education. We claim our heritage with a full appreciation of how often it has been disdained. And let me promise you, you do not want to make us angry.

When you realize the value of all life, you dwell less on what is past and concentrate more on the preservation of the future.

Reactionary: a man walking backwards with his face to the future.

BRAIN, n. An apparatus with which we think that we think. That which distinguishes the man who is content to be something from the man who wishes to do something. A man of great wealth, or one who has been pitchforked into high station, has commonly such a headful of brain that his neighbors cannot keep their hats on. In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, brain is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office.

The longest tyranny that ever sway'd_x000D_ _x000D_ Was that wherein our ancestors betray'd_x000D_ _x000D_ Their free-born reason to the Stagirite [Aristotle],_x000D_ _x000D_ And made his torch their universal light._x000D_ _x000D_ So truth, while only one suppli'd the state,_x000D_ _x000D_ Grew scarce, and dear, and yet sophisticate.

Your body is the ground and metaphor of your life, the expression of your existence. It is your Bible, your encyclopedia, your life story. Everything that happens to you is stored and reflected in your body. In the marriage of flesh and spirit divorce is impossible.