]<en,

Thank you for your kind words in response to my posting on choices and
intuition. I had not intended to post something so personal on BP, and
afterwards I thought I had made a mistake in doing so. However, a reply
such as yours helps a great deal. Often I wonder if there is anyone else
out there who would even think the same things are important--BP helps in
this respect. I was faced with a choice which made me uncomfortable, but
which I felt I could not reasonably refuse. Having refused it, I am still
not sure I was reasonable. Many people would say I was not. But then, they
haven't spent most of their lives besotted with history as I have, and
working at all sorts of things other than what I most wanted to do, or felt
was the best use of my abilities. I believe we all have a purpose in life,
and if we're fortunate we discover what it is, and if we're really
fortunate we actually get to do something about it. 

My path through education was irregular, resulting in attending college for
six years but never finishing my degree. I wasted good opportunities there,
though I certainly learned a lot too. But most of what I have learned that
I really found worthwhile I taught myself. I learned to read when I was
four years old, and have been reading everything I could ever since. Much
of what I read is so obscure that I don't have anyone to talk with about
it. Fortunately some of my family read some of the same things, which
helps. And I have always been interested in or cared about stuff that most
people thought was uninteresting. At the same time, most of what they do
find interesting doesn't interest me, so we're even. And sometimes I'm
ahead of the curve, interested in something before it becomes trendy. 

And most of the time, I just take myself much too seriously!

Don