What does freedom mean to you?

We asked hundreds of Virginians to share their thoughts on this holiday. Here's a sampling of their responses:

For Michelle Lingus, freedom is a bright yellow hot-dog cart.

Laid off from her job as a certified public accountant and with little savings left after caring for her sick father, Lingus re-evaluated her future. She thought about opening a restaurant, but after some investigating, she started with "The Grateful Dog" mobile hot-dog stand.

Lingus parked the cart in front of Virginia Commonwealth University's library and hasn't looked back.

"Some of us have been forced to look at how our livelihood will move forward," she said, under the shade of a red umbrella that serves as a potato-chip holder. "Now I'm in control of my own destiny."

-- Olympia Meola

Soudabeh Tazh, 47, a dental assistant from Henrico County, left Iran in 1994 because she wanted a better -- and free -- life for her two sons, who are now students at James Madison University:

"Freedom means freedom of speech, freedom for life and freedom of thoughts.

"Freedom is what my people in Iran are dying for now. It is what they don't have. It is what they have been screaming and shouting for 30 years under the dictatorship regime of the Islamic Republic. And hopefully they are going to get that.

"It is a value. And I will die for it, if I have to have it.

"I have it here. I am sure if I was in my country in Iran, I wouldn't have it."

-- Gregory J. Gilligan

Virginia L. Dalton, 90, is from Culpeper but now lives in Richmond. She is a retired teacher who also worked for the Virginia Education Association.

"Three factors come into what freedom really means to me. First of all, freedom of speech and strictly by truth. Whatever you say should be the truth. [Also], freedom of religion and religious beliefs and of political choices without any fear of retaliation. [Finally] freedom of action, and that is action that does not endanger others. We should treasure our freedom."

-- Mark Gormus

Jimmy McMillan, 34, of Glen Allen works as a stone mason but lives as a mountain biker.

"I go up in the mountains and ride my bike, get up there and it's 20 miles from anybody -- that to me is ultimate freedom," he said.

Sometimes, McMillan works at Crossroads Coffee & Ice Cream on Forest Hill Avenue. Recently, he's been building a stone wall and steps at a home in Woodland Heights. He loves the work, but he'd prefer to be riding his mountain bike.

"It's about being free," he said. "The mountain bike can go anywhere. If you're a freedom-loving person, you can exploit the mountain bike to its fullest potential."

-- Michael Martz

With freedom comes responsibility, and John Maderia has embraced his freedom and takes responsibility for his choices.

Maderia, 42 and a resident of Goochland County, works by day as a mortgage loan officer for Bank of America. By night, he works part-time at Ukrop's Village store as a cashier. John and his wife, Cristi, have six children.

"Freedom is the ability to make choices as I wish," Maderia said. "It also comes with the responsibility for the choices I make. The choices I make are the choices that affect not only myself but my family, my community, my nation and the world.

"Your choices come with a price."

-- Paul Woody

Lucy Yang, 53, of Richmond got her first job in America as a waitress at Mandarin Palace restaurant.

Now, 23 years later, she is co-owner of the 50-year-old South Richmond institution.

"Freedom means nobody bothers me," said Yang, who came to the United States from Shanghai, China, in 1986. "In China, you don't have freedom. You come to America because in America you have some choice, you have freedom."

One freedom Yang values most is the opportunity for education. Her daughter is attending the University of Richmond, while her son is a student at Maggie Walker Regional Governor's School.

"They love school," she said. "They like America. They think they are Americans. They're not Chinese."

-- Michael Martz

For Jordan Smith, 13, of Midlothian, "freedom is a privilege to do anything that you really want to do. Like play baseball."

-- Steve Trosky

Claudia McClung, 65, who is retired and lives in Goochland County, said, "My husband and I just went on a trip to Saudi Arabia where he had business with the university there, King Saud University.

"We were there about 10 days and I was able to be out among the people going about their daily lives and recognize how much I should appreciate my freedom here in the U.S., seeing the limited lifestyle that the women over there have.

"They can't drive, they're not allowed to work in most jobs, and their lifestyle is very limited. They have to wear black clothes all the time, and it's just very different, so it made me appreciate what we have over here."

-- Reed Williams

For Lissy Campbell of Richmond, freedom has special meaning now while her daughter, Abi, and son, Johnny, are on active duty in the Navy and Marine Corps.

"I welcome the opportunity for my children to defend America. Our freedom does not come without sacrifice," she said. "Our nation depends on all of us to make the decision to serve."

Campbell, an ESL instructor at Douglas Freeman High School in Henrico County, makes an annual July 4 pilgrimage to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.

Strolling pastoral fields and meadows once flayed by cannon and rifle fire, she said, is an experience she never tires of. "It's there, at Gettysburg, walking upon that hallowed ground, where America's freedom truly comes alive for me."

-- Vic Dorr

Robert Cox plans to take his family to Washington "to appreciate all the generations of people who sacrificed to have a Fourth of July."

Cox, 47, a UPS driver who lives in Chesterfield County, intends to spend the holiday with his wife and three children "walking around the White House and checking out some of the museums. I enjoy spending time on the Mall and [seeing the] surrounding landmarks."

Cox said Americans may not always appreciate the freedoms they enjoy.

"When you look at what's going on in Iran and places like that, you see how blessed we are to be free and to have a country that is free," he said. "We have the right to quote our opinions without being persecuted or killed.

"My main thing is to choose who we like. . . . A lot of people have one person to choose and that's it. We live in a country where we always have different candidates, Democrat and Republican, and you've got the right, regardless or your race, to be Republican or Democrat. And then you've got the choice to be neutral."

-- Tim Pearrell

Jordan Starbuck, 26, of Richmond is an assistant green coordinator for Virginia Commonwealth University. What does freedom mean to her?

"I guess in light of what's going on in Iran, singing in public would definitely be one. I know there was a woman there who was shot, and she had been taking lessons underground and she wasn't able to sing in public."

She also values being able to wear whatever she wants, drive a car, work any job she wants and have as many children as she'd like to.

"Freedom is being able to choose, basically being able to have choices. And we have men and women out there right now protecting our freedom, and they may not necessarily agree with what I say, but they will fight until their death to allow me to say it."

-- Eva Russo

As an election supervisor in Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo and Moldova in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Barbara Cockrell saw people voting for the first time.

Now deputy secretary of the State Board of Elections, the veteran elections official worked for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

"Voting is something we take for granted and don't realize what we have until we've been somewhere where they don't," she said. "To see the value that people put there on voting that they would walk for hours to get to a polling place so they truly for the first time had some control over the course of their lives."

While supervising a municipal election in Bosnia in 2000, Cockrell said, she had the embarrassing experience of trying to explain what was going on in the presidential election in Florida, which prompted the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene.

-- Tyler Whitley

Millard Thomas Sr. strolls through his Cary Street neighborhood to learn his way around.

Thomas, 55, who moved to Richmond about a year ago, works as a management trainee for a marketing firm. While growing up in Oakland, Ca., Thomas said, his parents and grandparents taught him the true meaning of freedom.

"Freedom means being able to make your own choices," he said. "Freedom to me means opportunity for all. Freedom to me means being loved and loving your family."

Thomas said his family also helped him develop a sense of personal freedom.

"I've always felt free because my parents taught me to think independently . . . and they always taught me that God made us all equal. I've felt free since birth. I've always felt that way."

-- Sundra Hominik

Shirelle Philip, 42, is a special-education teacher who lives in Chester.

To her, freedom means "the opportunity for me to make my own choices. Freedom for me is happiness, excitement, [being] able to extend myself to whomever I feel has the right. Freedom to me is hard work, contributing to my community and leaving a piece of legacy behind. That's what freedom is to me.

-- Lindy Keast Rodman