I spent most of the afternoon in a long meeting. When I came out, it was already past four-thirty. I was in the office since six-thirty in the morning, though. I was rushing home, and I burst into my room in search of papers to take with me. As soon as I entered, I noticed a pile of boxes my secretary had brought to my office in my absence. I ripped the top box open. Sure enough, these were the promised fifty copies of my book just published by Ashgate. I expected the delivery sometime this week, but I made sure I was not waiting for it. As always, it was wonderful to grab hold of a book of your own. I was rushing home, and I thus quickly decided to take a copy with me to show my mother. Well, I wanted to leaf through it myself, as well. But then I surprised myself. Without much thought—in fact, without any thought whatsoever—I grabbed a padded envelope leaning against my desk, stuffed the first book I took out of the box into it, sealed the envelope closed, and wrote on it the name and address of my dissertation supervisor at MIT, Karen Polenske. I knew the address by heart. A moment later, the book was with my secretary, to start on its journey before five. The book begins with my doctoral dissertation, defended in 1975, and proceeds to its development and elaboration over a quarter of a century. The first book out of the box was for my old teacher whom I have not seen or heard from for at least four years.