As a teen, I was genuinely inspired by the songs of John Denver and various folk singers, and by the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson and my reading--well, slogging through--Thoreau's "Walden." I was entranced--simply because I saw and breathed and felt and lived, so much of what these fellows sang and wrote about. I'd thought I was alone in my feelings and contemplations, but through my often accidental explorations, I was not. And it felt--really really good--I mean, there I was, thinking this or that--and then turn a page, or hear a lyric, and the singer or writer is saying nearly the same thing as I'd been thinking--that sometimes knocked my socks off.

Here's some narrated excerpts from "Walden", filmed on location at Walden Pond, near Concord Mass.