Never talk to waiters like that," Kit said. "Can I help it," he said, "if I only went one year to finishing school?" "It isn't manners," she said like a sensible schoolteacher quietly disciplining a small boy, "it just isn't smart." I thought of the ...
If the difference between guys and men is still unclear, here are a few examples that apply to dating: A guy uses women to build his self-esteem. A man already has it. A guy likes to "hang out" with a woman he's interested in. A man asks her out. A g...
She remembered one of her boyfriends asking, offhandedly, how many books she read in a year. "A few hundred," she said. "How do you have the time?" he asked, gobsmacked. She narrowed her eyes and considered the array of potential answers in front of ...
Have you ever plunged into the immensity of space and time by reading the geological treatises of Cuvier? Borne away on the wings of his genius, have you hovered over the illimitable abyss of the past as if a magician's hand were holding you aloft? A...
Let's say that the God the Christians pray to is real. He actually exists. But this God is the same as the one that the Jews pray to and the same as the one that the Muslims pray to and whatever other religions are praying to a God, He is the one. On...
Oh, God, Francesca,Now there’s a good one.Why?Why? Why?” He gave each one a different tenor, as if he were testing out the word, asking it to different people. “Why?” he asked again, this time with increased volume as he turned around to face...
Relationships, like all human experiences, are transient; they change every day and are meant to be enjoyed in the present. When I hear people say you need to "work" at a relationship, what that often really means is just seeing through the day-to-da...
They were worried about keeping military families strong. They were worried about the stress and strain of prolonged military service and how it would affect our military readiness the next time a Hitler-wannabe reared his ugly head. As they made a l...
The unfailing rhythm of the seasons, the ever-turning wheel of life, the four facets of the earth which are lit in turn by the sun, the passing of life--all these filled me once more with a feeling of oppression. Once more there sounded within me, to...
I love going out of my way, beyond what I know, and finding my way back a few extra miles, by another trail, with a compass that argues with the map…nights alone in motels in remote western towns where I know no one and no one I know knows where I ...
We hear a great deal about the rudeness of the ris- ing generation. I am an oldster myself and might be expected to take the oldsters' side, but in fact I have been far more impressed by the bad manners of par- ents to children than by those of child...
O youth! youth! you go your way heedless, uncaring – as if you owned all the treasures of the world; even grief elates you, even sorrow sits well upon your brow. You are self-confident and insolent and you say, 'I alone am alive – behold!' even w...
Black-and-white thinking is the addict's mentality, which can be a bar to recovery when one is still active. But an addict who finds the willingness can then rely on the same trait to stay clean: "Just don't drink," they say in AA. How's that going t...
Once you familiarize yourself with your tools, you should forget about them. It will only throw you off-balance. In all these ‘rolling shit into little balls’ types who spend hours of time and reams of paper saying nothing, literary masturbators,...
You're not paying attention to me, are you?" "Eh? What's that? Sorry, love, I didn't hear you. Wasn't paying attention. I had my eyes on your perfectly formed arse." Catherine fixed him with a glare worthy of a Scottish schoolmaster. "This is serious...
This was to be my last trip. Sailing great distances was dangerous, and not very profitable in today's world. I walked down the worn wooden step to the captain's cabin, the creaking of the ship keeping time with my steps. Opening the door I found him...
13. A Buddha In Tokyo in th Meiji era there lived two prominent teachers of opposite characteristics. One, Unsho, an instructor in Shingon, kept Buddha's precepts scrupulously. He never drank intoxicants, nor did he eat after eleven o'clock in the mo...
I will act now. I will act now. I will act now. Henceforth, I will repeat these words each hour, each day, everyday, until the words become as much a habit as my breathing, and the action which follows becomes as instinctive as the blinking of my eye...
Stories don’t teach us to be good; it isn’t as simple as that. They show us what it feels like to be good, or to be bad. They show us people like ourselves doing right things and wrong things, acting bravely or acting meanly, being cruel or being...
I read the paragraph again. A peculiar feeling it gave me. I don't know if you have ever experienced the sensation of seeing the announcement of the engagement of a pal of yours to a girl whom you were only saved from marrying yourself by the skin of...
