I don’t think I would be very good at killing,” Merla said. “To be honest, nor do I. But you may have to.” A disturbing thought came to Merla. “Faye,” she asked, “have you killed a person?” There was a moment’s silence. “Let’s j...
So what are you doing around here?" I ask, feeling all jittery, but this time it's in a good way. "Oh, I was just in the area." he says vaguely. "I thought I'd take Welly for a walk..." He trails off and stuffs his hands in his pockets. Those butterf...
But it is no use to justify yourself. It is no good to explain. It is weak to be anecdotal. It is wise to conceal the past even if there is nothing to conceal. A man's power is in the half-light, in the half-seen movements of his hand and the unguess...
I solved world hunger.” “Yeah, right.” “Oh, ye of little faith.” “You realize that solving world hunger would mean you’d be doing something good for a change?” “Ah, but there’s the kicker: I destroyed my solutions.” ...
A truly good book is something as natural, and as unexpectedly and unaccountably fair and perfect, as a wild-flower discovered on the prairies of the West or in the jungles of the East. Genius is a light which makes the darkness visible, like the lig...
When I was young I was depressed all the time. But suicide no longer seemed a possibility in my life. At my age there was very little left to kill. It was good to be old, no matter what they said. It was reasonable that a man had to be at least 50 ye...
When someone tells a man to be a man, they mean that there is a way to be a man. A man is not just a thing to be—it is also a way to be, a path to follow and a way to walk. Some try to make manhood mean everything. Others believe that it means noth...
The places we visited were always richer and always more intricate than one could imagine. I loved to find out about the world, the good and the bad, in this way. For me, observing things with my own eyes was the only way. My wanderlust was also a wo...
Perception of one's life journey does not, always or necessarily, have to be judged as good or bad. It certainly demands that one take responsibility for all aspects of it, however.
Looking back ten years, knowing how I feel today, I appreciate the now because in ten years I will look back and remember these days as the good days.
Life, Rose well knew, could throw some hard punches at you, but nothing hurt as much as losing a child, or seeing one of your children hurt and suffering. Becoming a parent changed you forever, as nothing else could. Not good or bad fortune. Not frie...
Great fiction shows us not how to conduct our behavior but how to feel. Eventually, it may show us how to face our feelings and face our actions and to have new inklings about what they mean. A good novel of any year can initiate us into our own new ...
If she has six good points and you have one semigood little point, place all of the emphasis on your one semigood little point.
Zachary smiles, and I wonder if he's felling different. Because standing out here waist deep in Gossimer Lake, next to my best friend, I'm feeling different-light and good and maybe even holy.
And Wolfram knows about cellular automata?” “Oh, my goodness, yes,” said Anna. “He wrote a book you could kill a man with—twelve hundred pages—called A New Kind of Science. It’s all about them.” “We should totally ask him what he th...
I had a dream about you. You were a test-tube salesman, and I was the world’s first test-tube baby. You were excited to meet me, and you asked me what I was doing with myself. I said I was a uterus salesman, and that life was good.
I believe the shortest path between two points involves an elaborate maze as the only option of travel, entry and exit fees, and forms and applications that must be approved before the journey can even begin. Oh yes, I’d make a good politician.
I finally accept that not only do I not understand the death of my relationship, but I do not need to. These men were good and kind to me, they loved me and I loved them back and the shock at the finish holds no wisdom. The revelation is not that I l...
[D]on’t cling to your self-righteous suffering, let it go. . . . Nothing is too good to be true, let yourself be forgiven. To the degree you insist that you must suffer, you insist on the suffering of others as well. (90)
After the woman left, Gran, staring out back at the Zebra Forest, said to me, 'I'm a liar, I'll admit. But I pride myself on being a really good liar. That's part of my educational philosophy, too, Annie B. Mark that down. Lesson one: If you're going...
My spiritual life is... sometimes I have access to it and sometimes I don't. When I do have access to it, it's usually a sense of my understanding what the best course of action or the best thing for me to do. By best, I mean when I have a real sense...
