Reading alters the appearance of a book. Once it has been read, it never looks the same again, and people leave their individual imprint on a book they have read. Once of the pleasures of reading is seeing this alteration on the pages, and the way, b...
More than likely you’ll do well enough alone by the engines of your own fate until you either hit a few really nasty bumps in the road or grow old enough to realize that there may be a diamond or two in what you thought was your old man’s bucket.
Dream young. Don't settle for old - for to be old is to be superstitious and without curiosity and always questioning your faith. And be ferocious in your dreaming - run like a sun's explosion, and skip across bluing waves, and dance upon tips of swa...
On my solemn oath, Edmund, I'd gladly face not having an acre of land to call my own, nor a penny in the bank, I'd be willing to have no home but the poorhouse in my old age, if I could look back now on having been the fine artist I might have been.
Mothers of America let your kids go to the movies! get them out of the house so they won't know what you're up to it's true that fresh air is good for the body but what about the soul that grows in darkness, embossed by silvery images and when you gr...
My reading and studying and retellings of old stories didn't do anything except help me think better. I was at least thoughtful. Too thoughtful, my friends said. And all I thought about was myths and old paintings that made me feel drunk on wine or s...
Old age. All the facial detail is visible; all the traces life has left there are to be seen. The face is furrowed, wrinkled, sagging, ravaged by time. But the eyes are bright and, if not young, then somehow transcend the time that otherwise marks th...
I have no churlish objection to the circumnavigation of the globe, for the purposes of art, of study, and benevolence, so that the man is first domesticated, or does not go abroad with the hope of finding somewhat greater than he knows. He who travel...
Dying is beautiful- even the first time around, at the ripe old age of 20. It’s not easy most of the time, but there is real beauty to be found in knowing that your end is going to catch up with you faster than you had expected, and that you have t...
I remember, when I was about ten years old, working out that I would be thirty-six in the year 2000. It seemed so far away, so old, so unreal. And here I am, a fucked, crazy, anorexic-alcoholic-childless beautiful woman. I never dreamed it would be l...
Long marriages have ended in ruin over tiny and insignificant grievances that were never properly aired and instead grew into a brittle barnacle of hatred.
This is what you should know about losing someone you love. They do not travel alone. You go with them.
I remember watching an old Dracula movie once with Alphonse and having him laugh himself sick at the sight of a vamp only a few days out of the grave supposedly raising another one.He'd been impossible for weeks afterwards,mercilessly teasing all the...
As the sun disappeared below the horizon and its glare no longer reflected off a glassy sea, I thought of how beautiful the sunsets always were in the Pacific. They were even more beautiful than over Mobile Bay. Suddenly a thought hit me like a thund...
I think LOVE. Love is what brings families together, and love is often what drives them apart. Love can act as both a fuel and an exterminator for fire, a cause of war, but also of peace. Love brings new souls to the family and removes old ones. Love...
Hail Mary full of Grace the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.' Then he added, 'Blessed Virgin, pray for t...
You're in a rather odd mood today." I'm soaking wet, Eloise." No need to snap at me about it, I didn't force you to walk across town in the rain." It wasn't raining when I left,". There was something about a sibling that brought out the eight-year-ol...
As much as Jefferson loved France residence abroad gave him greater appreciation for his own nation. He was a tireless advocate for things American while abroad, and a promoter of things European while at home. Moving between two worlds, translating ...
(On having being just proposed to) 'Have you been thinking of this for long?' she managed jerkily, praying for the shock to recede so that she could behave a little more normally. 'Let's say it crept up on me,' he suggested lightly. That didn't sound...
M'sieur, I am as a slave to my wife." He kissed the tips of his fingers. "I am as the dirt beneath her feet." He clasped his hands. "I must bestow on her all that she desires, or die!" "Pray make use of my sword, " invited his Grace. "It is in the co...
A majority of young people seem to develop mental arteriosclerosis forty years before they get the physical kind. Another question: why do some people remain open and elastic into extreme old age, whereas others become rigid and unproductive before t...