I was trying to be 27 at age 47, but God had to get rid of my vanity. I had trouble letting go of the old Lex physically. My human fleshly nature didn't want to let go of what had come to be billed as 'The Total Package.' I guess God had to help me g...
It's pathetic, but I don't really remember my first time reading 'The Great Gatsby.' I must have read it in high school. I'm pretty sure I remember it being assigned, and I generally did the reading. But I don't remember having a reaction to the book...
The last thing a young artist should do in poetry or any other field is think about what's in style, what's current, what are the trends. Think instead of what you like to read, what do you admire, what you like to listen to in music. What do you lik...
When I think something nice is going to happen I seem to fly right up on the wings of anticipation; and then the first thing I realize I drop down to earth with a thud. But really, Marilla, the flying part glorious as long as it lasts...it's like soa...
And soon afterwards this manuscript will appear, my final book... There will be outrage and disgust and people will turn on me at the last, they will hate me, my reputation will for ever be destroyed, my punishment earned, self-inflicted like this gu...
I just wouldn’t want to hook up with a guy unless I really, really like him, and in my experience all boys can be classified as either assholes or bores, unless they’re both. Maybe it’s a blessing, because the last thing I need is relationship ...
In this century, the Australian Century, Australia will also have an opportunity to achieve extraordinary feats. Just as the United States dominates world affairs with less than five per cent of the global population, Australia too can make a lasting...
This was not uncommon in government-run operations, where a request that someone do their job often induced a catatonic state that might last anywhere from a couple of minutes to an hour.
It was not yet known how the Revolution would develop. But Upton supposed that the arguments of the philosophical anarchists were most convincing: society would fragmentise into independent, self-governing communities of mutually congenial individual...
Well, we’ll have to agree to disagree.” I hated that phrase. It was code for, “I know you’re too obtuse to ever see how I right I am, so to get any satisfaction out of this discussion, I’m going to pretend to be more reasonable than you. Oh...
Last week I placed a hand-written sign in front of my neighborhood that read, “Lost Mustache. Please do not feed. If found, contact Mouth,” and I left my phone number. Nobody’s called. Perhaps the neighborhood cat lady took it in and is petting...
I can feel myself gently slipping away into a light trance by the quarter moon light as the candles are blown out, and my last thought is that we have gone back to the jungle, back to the great green womb—we have returned full circle from whence we...
[T]hat old September feeling, left over from school days, of summer passing, vacation nearly done, obligations gathering, books and football in the air ... Another fall, another turned page: there was something of jubilee in that annual autumnal begi...
Carnal embrace is sexual congress, which is the insertion of the male genital organ into the female genital organ for purposes of procreation and pleasure. Fermat’s last theorem, by contrast, asserts that when x, y and z are whole numbers each rais...
Judge that boy if you must; for debauchery, for objectifying innocence... but before you finalize your verdict, oh innocent reader, I beg you to scan again that last stanza. What you and I overlooked in our cloud of perversion and nasty objectificati...
At last, giving me the boat's sail for a bed, he stretched himself out on the jagged rocks, and slept soundly as the unsanctified in a comfortable pew of a church; --I wish the benches were softer, and the cushions higher, as then more people might b...
He paused, twisting his goatee, considering the law in Deuteronomy that forbade clothes with mixed fibers. A problematic bit of Scripture. A matter that required thought. "Only the devil wants man to have a wide range of lightweight and comfortable s...
Writer's block is just a symptom of feeling like you have nothing to say, combined with the rather weird idea that you should feel the need to say something. Why? If you have something to say, then say it. If not, enjoy the silence while it lasts. Th...
I've always wanted to be a journalist, but what am I going to do? Write articles about which movie star had the fat sucked from her ass and injected into her face? Which professional athlete just confessed to shooting steroids? The last celebrity bab...
The river and the garden have been the foundations of my economy here. Of the two I have liked the river best. It is wonderful to have the duty of being on the river the first and last thing every day. I have loved it even in the rain. Sometimes I ha...
Now for the hitch in Jane's character,' he said at last, speaking more calmly than from his look I had expected him to speak. 'The reel of silk has run smoothly enough so far; but I always knew there would come a knot and a puzzle: here it is. Now fo...
