And the I'm going to be. Welcome to his newscast, the podcast designed to help you fall asleep.

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Tonight, we'll be reading another snoozy excerpt from Walden, Chapter 9, The Ponds, by transcendentalist Henry

David Thoreau.

Originally published in 1854, it's a reflection upon simple living and natural surroundings.

The work is part personal declaration of independence,

social experiment, voyage of self-discovery,

satire, and to some degree,

a manual for self-reliance. Let's get cozy. Close your eyes. Relax your body into the softness of your bed.

Now, take a few deep breaths. The ponds, sometimes, having had a surfeit of human society and gossip, and worn out all my village friends. I rambled still farther westward

than I habitually dwell into yet more unfrequented parts of the town to fresh woods and pastures new.

Or, while the sun was setting, made my supper of huckleberries and blueberries on Fair Haven Hill, and laid

up a store for several days.

The fruits do not yield their true flavor to the purchaser of them, nor to him who raises them for the market.

There is but one way to obtain it, yet few take that way.

If you would know the flavor of huckleberries, ask the cowboy or the Partridge. It is a vulgar error to suppose that you have

tasted huckleberries who never plucked them. A huckleberry never reaches Boston. They have not been known there since they grew on her three hills.

The ambrosial and essential part of the fruit is lost with the bloom which is rubbed off in the market cart and they become mere provenor.

As long as eternal justice reigns, not one innocent huckleberry can be transported thither from the country's hills.

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