My mother buys a handful of wishing beans, which just seem to be white, dry beans with no specific magickal import. She will parse these out over the months when she feels her family members most need a wish. She can believe in wishes, since it is th...
So you believe in fate,” I say. Dr. Mann pauses thoughtfully before answering. “I believe each of us was uniquely created for a specific purpose designed by the Creator, and that, because of that, there are certain things in our lives that we are...
If there was one thing I learned from all my research, it was that the majority of the early pioneers didn’t dwell on the hard times; they indeed related every aspect of their lives to their relationship with God, specifically in regards to this di...
Now death is uncool, old-fashioned. To my mind the defining characteristic of our era is spin, everything tailored to vanishing point by market research, brands and bands manufactured to precise specifications; we are so used to things transmuting in...
The Idea of Ghost, like the Idea of North. A mere looped whisper, in darkness or in light. And no matter what this person may have been like before he or she died, no matter what they--specifically--might have wanted, ghosts only really want one thin...
Americans tend to use "nation" as a synonym for "country." But political scientists and historians, as well as many Europeans, tend to use the term for a much more specific phenomenon: a group of people who feel they belong together, whether they hav...
You try to make the most of each day. I'm not big into setting real specific goals. I think, really, if you just focus on every day - and I know that's the oldest cliche in the book, but it really is true. Day 1 of camp means just as much as Day 17 o...
The Gospel is a harsh document; the Gospel is ruthless and specific in what it says; the Gospel is not meant to be re-worded, watered down and brought to the level of either our understanding or our taste. The Gospel is proclaiming something which is...
I really liked the idea of creating a journal myself. It's like the way I clear my throat. I write a page every day, maybe 500 words. It could be about something I'm specifically worried about in the new novel; it could be a question I want answered;...
His touch was simple, but specific, meant to show me he could be like a lover, gentle, intimate, but also that he was a man unaccustomed to hearing the word no. Yes. I understood. He was a man, and I? I was nothing but a girl, not even a woman. I was...
…there is also an underlying, less specific fear - what some might call an ontological or existential anxiety - that shrouds our days and seeps into our dreams. We feel empty and seek meaning. We feel empty and seek meaning. We yearn and know not w...
all believers should “submit to each other out of reverence for Christ.” In many ways, wives should submit to their husbands in the same way any believer should submit to other believers, specifically by living according to the lifestyle the apos...
My religious convictions and scientific views cannot at present be more specifically defined than as those of a believer in creative evolution. I desire that no public monument or work of art or inscription or sermon or ritual service commemorating m...
Few scientists acquainted with the chemistry of biological systems at the molecular level can avoid being inspired. Evolution has produced chemical compounds exquisitely organized to accomplish the most complicated and delicate of tasks. Many organic...
it’s the way he uses language—which is nothing like the way fantasists used language before him. There’s no sense of nostalgia. There’s no medieval floridness. There’s no fairy tale condescension to the child reader. It’s very straight, a...
Braithwaite: Mr. Lee, I've come to talk to you about a tournament of martial arts. A tournament to which you've already received an invitation. Specifically, the tournament organized by Mr. Han. Lee: [nodding thoughtfully] Han's tournament. Braithewa...
Butch: [driving back to his apartment after Fabienne forgot to get his watch] [shouts] Butch: Shit! Of all the fucking things she could forget, she forgets my father's watch! [normal voice] Butch: I specifically reminded her - bedside table! On the K...
Sgt. Lyman: Sir, the Cerebro device has been completed according to your specifications. William Stryker: Good. [Lyman looks at the monitor showing the room where the mutant children are being held prisoner] Sgt. Lyman: If I may ask, sir, why are we ...
Jesse: Do you believe in reincarnation? Celine: Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting. Jesse: Yeah, right. Well, most people, you know, a lot of people talk about past lives and things like that, you know? And even if they don't believe it in some specific wa...
Look at a coin from your pocket. On one side is "heads" - the symbol of the political authority which minted the coin; on the other side is "tails" - the precise specification of the amount the coin is worth as payment in exchange. One side reminds u...
Like the absence of gender-specific terms such as glyany and androcracy from the vocabulary of historians, the systematic omission of women from accounts of our past serves to maintain a system founded on male-female thinking. It reinforces the centr...
