Philosophy is a way to ask why. Why this and why that. Why does it have to be this way? Why not? Not just why, though. To philosophize is to ask a question and then to seek the answer. To me that is seeking the truth. Seeking truth can be a grueling and time consuming task. One could spend his entire life or many lifetimes just trying to answer a few questions. If one looks at the past, however, one can maybe see what truths others have found in their lifetime. One such a person to look back on is Simone de Beauvior.

Simone de Beauvior was born January 9, 1908, in Paris and died on April 14, 1986. She was the first child of George Bertrand and Francoise de Beauvior. Their second child came two and a half years later when Helene was born. Both of the children where girls, and as a result, Simone was given much of the attention that a son would have been given. She liked this attention and the feeling of superiority.

Simone was a very intelligent person and for this reason she excelled in studying and had her own ideas of philosophy. Even though she was very intelligent, she loved her sister Helene, nicknamed Poupette, very much and loved playing with her. As she grew up, she read many books, but her mother was an extremely religious woman and believed that she must hide some things from her daughter. So she would read the book before Simone got to it and take out the parts she thought she needed to. Simone could not understand why she would do such a thing. She found that it was illogical and she did not like the illogical, so, when her parents where out for the night, she would go to the library and read all the books that her mother had deemed inappropriate for her.

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