I Come From A Great Family. I've

The Journey Has Been Incredible From Its Beginning.

I Would Like To Grow Less Afraid Of Dying. I Am Infinitely Less Afraid Today Than I Was 15 Or 25 Years Ago. I Was Most Afraid Of Dying When I Was 33, Because I Come From A Catholic Family.

I Know How Easy It Is For One To Stay Well Within Moral, Ethical, And Legal Bounds Through The Skillful Use Of Words - And To Thereby Spin, Sidestep, Circumvent, Or Bend A Truth Completely Out Of Shape. To That Extent, We Are All Liars On Numerous Occasions.

But Perhaps More Important, As Someone Wishing To Make A Comment Or Two About Contemporary Life And Values, I Don't Have To Dig Through Libraries Or Travel To Exotic Lands To Arrive At A View Of Our Modern Situation Refracted Through The Lens Of The Preindustrial World, Or The Uncommercialized, Unfranchised, Perhaps Unsanitized-and Therefore Supposedly More "authentic"-perspective Ofthe Third World. Very Simply, This Is Because That "other" World, As Alien As If Separated By Centuries In Time, Is The One From Which I Came

In America, It Is Difficult To Be Your Own Man.