I did want adventure. I didn’t want to prescribe Ritalin to ADHD kids and tell fat old men to get more exercise. I wanted to go to the heart of Africa. Cradling villages of starving, disease-ridden children. Reserving no luxuries for myself. We wou...
Nature offers us a thousand simple pleasers- Plays of light and color, fragrance in the air, the sun's warmth on skin and muscle, the audible rhythm of life's stir and push- for the price of merely paying attention. What joy! But how unwilling or una...
Great. He was a hottie, a good kisser, and a literature buff. God really must have had a sense of humor, because if I had to name my biggest turn-on, it was literature. And he had just recommended a book that I didn’t know, that wasn’t taught in ...
The chairs - turned towards one another in groups of twos and threes - seemed like the seats of ghosts in close conversation with one another. There were sets of two chairs - very close to one another - in the far corners of the room, which spoke of ...
Well, as I see it, the only way to win is to play the game and beat everyone at it. And I mean, who’s to say you can’t make your own rules?” I say. “Spoken like a true outlaw,” Nicholas retorts. I smirk, a little guiltily. “I suppose. Tha...
Up and down," Meera would sigh sometimes as they walked, "then down and up. Then up and down again. I hate these stupid mountains of yours, Prince Bran." "Yesterday you said you loved them." "Oh, I do. My lord father told me about mountains, but I ne...
You expect me to believe you're a witch? A broom riding, cauldron stirring, poison apple witch? Witches are Fae, Angelina," Dasan mocked. "No, you creeper, witches are not Fae. Maybe some are, but there are mortals who practice witchcraft, and I'm on...
To seek the self, one must first have a clear idea of what one is looking for. Thus, some meditation manuals advise actively cultivating the sense of self, despite the fact that this sense is the target of the analysis. Our sense of identity is often...
Everyone asks me how I got started into writing. I wish I had some cool story to tell, but the truth is pretty lame. My wife and I were having a drink on our back porch and I mentioned a concept I'd been mulling over. She suggested that I write it do...
The click of the seat belt securing into the buckle is the only sound to break the awkward silence. I feel his warm breath on my neck as he reaches and I take a deep nervous inhale. His scent fills my nose, it is clean and warm, just like in the coff...
Why do you do that?” Torrin’s voice echoes in the empty hall. His hand is holding my arm gently, not at all like Derek does. I can’t have this. I can’t. I shouldn’t have ever come here with him. I draw in a shaky breath and pull my arm away...
Could any State on Earth Immortall be, Venice by Her rare Goverment is She; Venice Great Neptunes Minion, still a Mayd, Though by the warrlikst Potentats assayed; Yet She retaines Her Virgin-waters pure, Nor any Forren mixtures can endure; Though, Sy...
There would therefore have been all the more delight at the birth of the first son William within less than a year of Margaret's death, tinged with more than a little anxiety, in view of the fateful words , 'here began plague', in the burial part of ...
I'm going on a diet. (Crud, I know) I am going to be cranky. I am going to be irritable. I am going to be moody and sad and mean. And, yes, I am going to be hungry. Please don't feed me, even if I try to bite you. Please don't tease me, I m...
Could you bring me to Rita’s house before we go to the airport?” I ask. “There’s one last thing I need to ask her to do.” “That is on the other side of the river,” says Ethan.“I know. But I need to see her. Please, I’ll be eternally...
There is quite enough sorrow and shame and suffering and baseness in real life and there is no need for meeting it unnecessarily in fiction. As Police Commissioner it was my duty to deal with all kinds of squalid misery and hideous and unspeakable in...
I know it’s hard when other children are called home but we can find purpose and good in all things when we can see things from the Lord’s perspective. There is goodness to be found and lives are still touched and changed for the good when little...
But we are the same, yes, but were not. We are three completely different people, we play three completely different instruments and all epically fail when trying to play each other’s" he said as Daniel and I nodded slowly. That was far to true. "I...
I squinted at the western sky behind Thaddeus, a blood-red smear melting into blackness. Twisting my neck, I glanced the opposite direction. My teeth clenched at a magnified, round moon nearly as scarlet as the portending sunset, its luminous face ha...
He wished he understood where they come from: all the terrorists, religious revolutionists and hate-criminals. Did terrorizing entire communities of people help them sleep sound at night? Did it make them happy? Or are they just in for the attention?...
I have previously reduced the whole science of logic to two facts. The first is that our perceptions being every thing for us, we are perfectly, completely, and necessarily sure of whatever we actually feel. The second is that consequently none of o...