It was only too bad that to gossip and support mean ideas was easier and more enjoyable, really, than to keep quiet and know in silence that the true story can never be told, articulated in a way that will tell the whole truth. Even if it is better t...
Then I wondered if that was what this was, like a Brokeback Mountain thing. We’d sleep in the same bed for a year, and finally we’d do it, but we’d never talk about it, ever, and then Ben would get married and I’d be killed in Texas. Probably...
Americans were happy to celebrate their super-rich and, at least sometimes, worry about their poor. But putting those two conversations together and talking about economic inequality was pretty much taboo.
Stupid deer," I said, embarrassed about being startled. "We need a ladder." "I think they're easier to shoot with a rifle." "I'm not talking about the deer," I said, hitting Milo on the back of his shoulder. "We need a ladder to look over the wall." ...
Cold up there, huh?” Yeah, it kind of was. “Stupid down there, huh?” Seth’s brows flew up. “For one in such a precarious position, you sure don’t know how to talk yourself out of it.” “That’s because it’s hard to reason with idiot...
Seriously, Palta…” He was honestly puzzled, “I haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about. What about your ears is supposed to be so bizarre?” “Um…You’d have to be blind to miss them,” I replied sarcastically. “If you’re not...
But when the group is literally capable of changing our perceptions, and when to stand alone is to activate primitive, powerful, and unconscious feelings of rejection, then the health of these institutions seems far more vulnerable than we think.
So the next time you see a person with a compose face and a soft voice, remember that inside her mind she might be solving an equation, composing a sonnet, designing a hat. She might, that is, be deploying the powers of quiet.
Purification and redemption are such recurrent themes in ritual because there is a clear and ubiquitous need for them: we all do regrettable things as a result of our own circumstances, and new rituals are frequently invented in response to new circu...
In one of his puckish moods Saul talked the president of a university into letting him anonymously take an examination being administered to candidates for a doctorate in community organization. "Three of the questions were on the philosophy of and m...
A brick, with its rigid conformity, could be used as a model for how the government wants its citizens to be treated. Every brick in this country is equal, and as such they should be identical, and line up in a straight line and keep quiet. And they ...
I guess I just couldn't see standing there -- alive, talking, thinking, breathing, being -- one second, and dead the next. It really bothered me. Death by violence isn't the same as dying any other way, accident or disease or old age. It just ain't t...
If you remember your past too well you start blaming your present for it. Look what they did to me, that's what caused me to be like this, it's not my fault. Permit me to correct you: it probably is your fault. And kindly spare me the details.
Gradually, after being the target a few times of a similar capriciousness, which he discerned as default behavior for most people, and not liking it, Paul learned to not be more generous or enthusiastic or attentive that he could sustain regardless o...
There are billions of conversations happening every second, and it’s too bad I can’t listen to more than about half of them at one time. Most are just he said she said chatter, and I want to tell them to go sip on gossip and leave the coffee talk...
I found a hair in my Campbell’s soup, and I’d love to talk to them about advancement opportunities for bald people. My love is as bald as an eagle, only not symbolic of the largest prison system in history. Freedom Soup sounds like a good name fo...
I haven’t trusted my car since I bought a horse. I just can’t talk to my car like I can Mr. Needles. Cowboys make better lovers. Or so I hear—not that I’d know from personal experience.
If I knew sign language, and I saw someone rocking an air guitar solo, I’d shout, “Stop talking to me!” An I love you disguised as "Stairway to Heaven" isn’t more romantic. Not unless you're Helen Keller and I'm a slinky.
It's not that I feel alone because I have no friends because I have lots of friends. I know that I have people who can hold me and reassure me and talk to ne and care for me and think of me but they can't be inside my head with me all the time - for ...
Live your truth. Express your love. Share your enthusiasm. Take action towards your dreams. Walk your talk. Dance and sing to your music. Embrace your blessings. Make today worth remembering.
We’re a society that creates super heroes who aren’t really super heroes. They are just regular people who live in alignment with their goals and dreams. They don’t just talk about it, the LIVE it. You can choose to do the same.
