A Birthday By Any Other Name

So . . .

Today I can say that I have lived upon this Earth for 71 years,

This is not, of course, a laudatory accomplishment but merely a statement of fact.

And that's quite enough about that.


I have lately been reading some of George Orwell's writings. In one of his essays titled Why I Write he stated:

"Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it."

How can I reconcile that statement with my own admittedly radical beliefs? I cannot.

So I won't.


Mr. Orwell, in another piece, also wrote:

A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus:

1. What am I trying to say?

2. What words will express it?

3. What image or idiom will make it clearer?

4. Is this image fresh enough to have an effect?

And in yet another essay he wrote:

All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery.


And, once again, that's quite enough about that.