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"Walden" by Henry David Thoreau. Truly did change the way I think about the world, the fundamentals of what is required for a free life, and how humankind so of

"Walden" by Henry David Thoreau. Truly did change the way I think about the world, the fundamentals of what is required for a free life, and how humankind so often tethers itself to a life of misery. Consider, for example, this quote: "The farmer is endeavoring to solve the problem of a livelihood by a formula more complicated than the problem itself. To get his shoestrings he speculates in herds of cattle. With consummate skill he has set his trap with a hair spring to catch comfort and independence, and then, as he turned away, got his own leg into it." Or perhaps this: "I see young men, my townsmen, whose misfortune it is to have inherited farms, houses, barns, cattle, and farming tools; for these are more easily acquired than got rid of. Better if they had been born in the open pasture and suckled by a wolf [...] Why should they eat their sixty acres, when man is condemned to eat only his peck of dirt? Why should they begin digging their graves as soon as they are born? They have got to live a man's life, pushing all these things before them, and get on as well as they can. How many a poor immortal soul have I met well-nigh crushed and smothered under its load, creeping down the road of life, pushing before it a barn seventy-five feet by forty, its Augean stables never cleansed, and one hundred acres of land, tillage, mowing, pasture, and woodlot!" I loved it, and I thank him constantly for reminding me of what it is to be born free.

lcall 10y ago
In defense of those ~"poor ignorant slaving farmers": I'm descended from some poor dirt farmers who are revered and admired by their multi-generational families, and were admired by their fellow townspeople (largely of a different culture and language), for the start they gave the children and the influence they had on everyone around them. Everyone knew they were honest, people liked the free seasonal watermelons, and enjoyed their humor (back in the days of poetry recitations etc). Though passed on for many years, they impact me and others to this day. Extended family reunions still talk about them (there's one in a couple of weeks, in fact, full of people I'm connected to but don't know them all). I think they chose their life more than Thoreau thought, and what kind of legacy they wanted to leave, and to whom. Many hundreds are grateful they did not live self-centeredly.
- lcall 10y ago
  One example of many comes from the family in Mexico, about the 1940s: "13 hijos!? y todos vivos??" ("13 children?? and all living??" [one mother]) "Unos mas vivos que otros, pero todos comen." (A play on words, where I failed to add the right marks, but: "Some more lively [same word as living] than others, but they all eat.") And they all (but one who died in childhood) had happy families of their own, spread across North America. I'm a grandchild of that one.
- rak00n 10y ago
  Thoreau didn't condemn being a farmer. He pointed out how it doesn't go along with his values. Like an empty room you can fill in with thousand different things, we all have the liberty of choosing different values to fill our lives with. Bear in mind Thoreau never got married or had sex, which probably is almost everyone's recipe for a happy fulfilled life.

lcall 10y ago

In defense of those ~"poor ignorant slaving farmers": I'm descended from some poor dirt farmers who are revered and admired by their multi-generational families, and were admired by their fellow townspeople (largely of a different culture and language), for the start they gave the children and the influence they had on everyone around them. Everyone knew they were honest, people liked the free seasonal watermelons, and enjoyed their humor (back in the days of poetry recitations etc). Though passed on for many years, they impact me and others to this day. Extended family reunions still talk about them (there's one in a couple of weeks, in fact, full of people I'm connected to but don't know them all). I think they chose their life more than Thoreau thought, and what kind of legacy they wanted to leave, and to whom. Many hundreds are grateful they did not live self-centeredly.

lcall 10y ago
One example of many comes from the family in Mexico, about the 1940s: "13 hijos!? y todos vivos??" ("13 children?? and all living??" [one mother]) "Unos mas vivos que otros, pero todos comen." (A play on words, where I failed to add the right marks, but: "Some more lively [same word as living] than others, but they all eat.") And they all (but one who died in childhood) had happy families of their own, spread across North America. I'm a grandchild of that one.
rak00n 10y ago
Thoreau didn't condemn being a farmer. He pointed out how it doesn't go along with his values. Like an empty room you can fill in with thousand different things, we all have the liberty of choosing different values to fill our lives with. Bear in mind Thoreau never got married or had sex, which probably is almost everyone's recipe for a happy fulfilled life.