It takes courage to turn a new leaf, a passion for self-discovery, and a sense of fun This wise book, filled with surprises, describes a life lived on its own terms. Jim Gold touches our passions, fears, and hopes in ways that reveal us to ourselves with humor and insight. Comfortable in contradiction, its free spirit makes us sing, laugh, dance, and often leap. Jim Gold brings a love of people, music, languages, humor, old cultures, and new discoveries to his life's work. His adventures as author, musician, folk dance teacher, tour leader, and entrepreneur form the basis of this, his fifth book. After graduating from the High School of Music and Art in New York City, he studied violin at the Eastman School of Music and spent a year at the University of Aix-en-Provence in Southern France. He returned to earn a B.A. in history from the University of Chicago and, later, an M.A. in music from New York University. A classical and folk guitarist, he has brought his World of Guitar concert program to schools, colleges, and community concerts throughout the United States. He founded the classic guitar department at Montclair State University, has appeared on radio and television, and recorded three classical and folk guitar records. He heads his own company, Jim Gold International, teaching folk dance classes, and organizing folk music and dance weekends. Through his Mad Shoe Tours, Mr. Gold leads travel groups to exotic countries such as Bulgaria, Greece, Hungary, Spain, Romania, Israel, Egypt, Turkey, Croatia, and Tunisia to experience history, culture, and folklore. Jim is an avid student of languages, yoga, running, history, the Bulgarian bagpipe (gaida), and mysteries of the human mind-especially his own. In the whirlwind of vicissitudes, he struggles daily to start fresh, turn over a new leaf, and live a New Leaf life.