Quote of the Day

When I was in Northampton I read a book about an ill-fated Everest ascent called Into Thin Air. Our favorite Bronx teacher recommended the author's first book, Into the Wild, which is about a man who gave up everything he owned to roam the Alaskan wilderness. Along the way, the man wrote letters to friends. One of his letters had a passage that actually made me gasp when I read it, like he was speaking directly to me:

So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future. The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun.