Quotes Myself (page 57)
I lost the conviction that lights would always turn green for me, the pleasant certainty that those rather passive virtues which had won me approval as a child automatically guaranteed me not only Phi Beta Kappa keys but happiness, honor, and the love of a good man; lost a certain touching faith in the totem power of good manners, clean hair, and a proven competence on the Stanford-Binet scale. To such doubtful amulets had my self-respect been pinned, and I faced myself that day with the...
Joan Didion
may my heart always be open to littlebirds who are the secrets of livingwhatever they sing is better than to knowand if men should not hear them men are oldmay my mind stroll about hungryand fearless and thirsty and suppleand even if it's sunday may i be wrongfor whenever men are right they are not youngand may myself do nothing usefullyand love yourself so more than trulythere's never been quite such a fool who could failpulling all the sky over him with one smile
E. E. Cummings
I think it takes an amazing amount of energy to convince oneself that the Forever Person isn't just around the corner. In the end I believe we never do convince ourselves. I know that I found it increasingly hard to maintain the pose of emotional self-sufficiency lying on my bed and sitting at my desk, watching the gulls cartwheeling in the clouds over the bridges, cradling myself in my own arms, breathing warm chocolate-and-vodka breath on a rose I had found on a street corner, trying to...
Doug Coupland
In the mirrors of the many judgments, my hands are the color of blood. I sometimes fancy myself an evil which exists to oppose other evils; and on that great Day of which the prophets speak but in which they do not truly believe, on the day the world is utterly cleansed of evil, then I too will go down into darkness, swallowing curses. Until then, I will not wash my hands nor let them hang useless.
Roger Zelazny