Van Gogh might be an unlikely role model for some, but his serious attention to human suffering, as well as to beauty around him, gave this author a different vision. Cox writes about her own experiences, sometimes imprudent, sometimes profound: weeks spent living in a homeless shelter in New York City, a trip to the Mid-East where she visited Yasser Arafat in his compound, an impacting Alaskan adventure, working with abused/neglected children, and the explorations of the mind through reading.