

Walden, by Henry David Thoreau - nonrecursive
http://thoreau.eserver.org/walden1a.html

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Jun8
I love _Walden_ , and whenever I'm stuck in yet another time sucking corporate
meeting I dream of going off, building my own cabin, and living alone for a
bit (see this cautionary tale, though:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Into_the_wild>).

My esteem for the self sufficiency of Thoreau, as described there, was just a
bit dented though, when I learned that every week he would take his laundry to
his mom and sisters to have them washed
([http://books.google.com/books?id=_73o98V6s7cC&pg=PR20...](http://books.google.com/books?id=_73o98V6s7cC&pg=PR20&lpg=PR20&dq=thoreau+laundry+sister&source=bl&ots=DV5KoCiVL5&sig=i0VuuvTFn0VhzRKcwfZce-
qNfTE&hl=en&ei=GgzATcvZN-P50gGq3vGuBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false)).

~~~
nonrecursive
Ha! I never knew that about his laundry. I imagine the attitude was different
then. The idea of a grown man asking his mother and sisters to do his laundry
nowadays seems downright pathetic.

But yes, I love Walden too. Often, I'll use parts of it as placeholder text. I
feel like it's good to remind myself that my work has no point if I am not
able to be cultivate tranquility and contentedness now, with what I have, and
that it does no good to turn into the kind of person he describes: "The twelve
labors of Hercules were trifling in comparison with those which my neighbors
have undertaken; for they were only twelve, and had an end; but I could never
see that these men slew or captured any monster or finished any labor. They
have no friend Iolaus to burn with a hot iron the root of the hydra's head,
but as soon as one head is crushed, two spring up."

