He cursed himself for having assumed the weather would be sunny. Perhaps it was the result of evolution, he thought--some adaptive gene that allowed the English to go on making blithe outdoor plans in the face of almost certain rain.
He opened his mouth to say that she looked extremely beautiful and deserved armfuls of roses, but the words were lost in committee somewhere, shuffled aside by the parts of his head that worked full-time at avoiding ridicule.
Volnaka ... did a remarkable job of getting anyone drunk with alacrity. It also worked well as a combustible in lamps, as paint remover, was a marvelous antiseptic and was singularly effective at erasing any memory of ever having imbibed it
Biographer diagnoses reaction to restriction as a tell of true character. Some use even prison as a time of reflection and planning. Others, like Churchill, quickly chafe at missing interaction and opportunity.
Intent and dreaming is nice but its not, will never be enough. If you want something bad enough in life then you must fight for it or go after it. Life doesn't just come to you.
Polarities of the 'authentic' vs. the 'inauthentic' are easily discernible in recreational modes. The criteria of authenticity are not necessarily objective but rather have to do with the rules by which the self allows or disallows its own experience...
You live in a deranged age - more deranged than usual, because despite great scientific and technological advances, man has not the faintest idea of who he is or what he is doing.
He was so stark and male and beautiful that she hungered for him. Physically, to be sure. But also from someplace even more intimate, someplace where heart and soul melded into a yearning so strong, that she wanted to weep from it.
It might be high summer all about but inside me everything is fall. The lonesomeness of a sad, slow closing of days, knowing frost is nigh and wind needling through the cabin chinks is just around the bend. That's me, right now.
I've come to realize that you can fight a lot of things in life, but you can't help who you love. You can't change who your heart chooses. I'm afraid that very fact will be the greatest tragedy of my life.
Fagan hated what his father was, but he still loved him. I reckon that's the way God is. Loving us enough to send Jesus but hating the way we live. Hating the sin, not the sinner.
This pool is a triumph of imagination. That's how you win at life, Gin. You have to imagine your way through. Never say something can't be done. There's always a solution, even if it's weird.
For it was through books that she felt her life to be unjudged Look at all of the great mix-ups, messes, confinement, and double-dealings in Shakespeare, she thought.Identities disguised continually, in a combative dance of illusion and discovery.
Maryse: I am fighting for a better world for myself and my son. Magnus: I have no interest in the world you want or in your doubteless repellent brat, I might add.
I was hugely impressed... was the ultimate example of a man who knew what he didn't know, was perfectly willing to admit it, and didn't want to leave until he understood. That's heroic to me. I wish every grad student had that attitude.
It's not about how to achieve your dreams, it's about how to lead your life, ... If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself, the dreams will come to you.
Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted...It's a phrase worth considering at every brick wall we encounter, and at every disappointment. It's also a reminder that failure is not just acceptable, it's often essential.
But there were certain moments in life that forever defined one as a person - in one's own estimation, anyway. And one's own self esteem, when all was said and done, was of far more importance than the fickle esteem of one's peers.
The novice in the military art flew from point to point, retarding his own preparations by the excess of his violent and somewhat distempered zeal; while the more practiced veteran made his arrangements with a deliberation that scorned every appearan...
Percy," my father said, "what exactly do you mean?" "Kronos couldn't have risen if it hadn't been for a lot of demigods who felt abandoned by their parents," I said. "They felt angry, resentful, and unloved, and they had a good reason.
I stared at her. Maybe I wasn't the brightest guy in the world when it came to girls, but I was pretty sure Rachel had just dumped me, which was lame considering we'd never even been together.