Been There For You Quotes & Sayings

For a long while the past drops away from you easily and it would seem automatically, properly. Its scenes don't vanish so much as become irrelevant. And then there's a switchback, what's been all over and done with sprouting up fresh, wanting attention, even wanting you to do something about it, though it's plain there is not on this earth a thing to be done. — Alice Munro

But I can be alone without Yoko, but I just have no wish to be. There's no reason on earth why I should be alone without Yoko. There's nothing more important than our relationship, nothing. And we dig being together all the time. Both of us could survive apart but what for? I'm not going to sacrifice love, real love for any whore or any friend or any business, because in the end you're alone at night and neither of us want to be. And you can't fill a bed with groupies. It doesn't work. I don't want to be a swinger. I've been through it all and nothing works better than to have someone you love hold you. — John Lennon

It might not have been the destiny you would have asked for, Fennrys," she said quietly. "But I'm starting to think that the only destiny there is ... is the one we make for ourselves. — Lesley Livingston

I've been 15 years in the nut ward, for trying to stop the trees from being cut down, from trying to rearrange the lifestyle of a bunch of people who don't want to change. But they're gonna change because a cold wind is blowing. You're gonna change or else there's going to be no life left on the planet Earth. — Charles Manson

There's about to be a shift in your life. Get ready for your blessings. You've been through enough and a breakthrough is on the way. Don't doubt it, just claim it! — Tony Gaskins

Her father said, "You know, my dears, the world has been abnormal for so long that we've forgotten what it's like to live in a peaceful and reasonable climate. If there is to be any peace or reason, we have to create it in our own hearts and homes." "Even at a time like this?" Meg asked. The call from Calvin, the sound of her husband's voice, had nearly broken her control. "Especially at a time like this," her mother said gently. — Madeleine L'Engle

What the feck?" Dani snapped when I answered. "You sleep like the fecking dead up there! I been calling you for five fecking minutes! — Karen Marie Moning

I know you told me you'd wait for me, but I don't want either of us to wait anymore. Especially when I knew from the first moment I saw you that you were special. I feel like I've been running my whole life, speeding from small town into a big city, jumping from one place to the next for years until they all blurred together. And right when I decided it was time to finally stop running and set down some roots, there you were. My new beginning." Her eyes filled with tears as she smiled up at him and slid her arms around his neck to pull him closer. "My love."
Jack sank down onto the couch with Mary, her curves soft beneath his muscles. "I'll always be yours, Angel. Forever. — Bella Andre

We are in this world for one goal and one goal only: to achieve Heaven. It is the only measure of success there is. Merit Heaven and your life has been a success, regardless of whatever failures you experienced during your earthly life. Be damned, and your life has been a failure, regardless of what heights you rose to or successes you enjoyed on earth. — Michael Voris

Facts and Observations #1 If people think you're dishonored, it's no different from actually having been dishonored, except you still don't know anything. #2 When you've been ruined, there are only two options: death or marriage. #3 Since I am gravely healthy, the first option isn't likely. #4 On the other hand, ritual self-sacrifice in Iceland cannot be ruled out. #5 Lady Berwick advises marriage and says Lord St. Vincent is "bred to the bill." Since she once made the same remark about a stud horse she and Lord Berwick bought for their stable, I have to wonder if she's looked in his mouth. #6 Lord St. Vincent reportedly has a mistress. #7 The word "mistress" sounds like a cross between mistake and mattress. "We've — Lisa Kleypas

For shit's sake, it wasn't like there was a twelve-step for being the Scribe Virgin's kid:
Hi, I'm Vishous. I'm her son and I've been her son for three hundred years.
HI, VISHOUS.
She's done a head job on me again, and I'm trying not to go to the Other Side and scream bloody murder at her.
WE UNDERSTAND, VISHOUS.
And on the bloody note, I'd like to dig up my father and kill him all over again, but I can't. So I'm just going to try to keep my sister alive even though she's paralyzed, and attempt to fight the urge to find some pain so I can deal with this Payne.
YOU'RE A STRAIGHT-UP PUSSY, VISHOUS, BUT WE SUPPORT YOUR SORRY ASS. — J.R. Ward

Valerie Jennings had clearly searched deep within her wardrobe for something suitably flattering, only to retrieve a frock of utter indifference to fashion. There had been an attempt to tame her hair, which seemed to have been abandoned, and the fuzzy results were clipped to the back of her head.
"You look nice," said Hebe Jones. — Julia Stuart

When you have been writing for a lot of years, you have to make an effort not to start repeating yourself. It occurred to me that I tended to tread certain ground automatically, because it was comfortable, but that there were areas I avoided automatically because they made me nervous. — Merrill Markoe

A public library is the most democratic thing in the world. What can be found there has undone dictators and tyrants: demagogues can persecute writers and tell them what to write as much as they like, but they cannot vanish what has been written in the past, though they try often enough ... People who love literature have at least part of their minds immune from indoctrination. If you read, you can learn to think for yourself. — Doris Lessing

You know the typical crowd, Wow, it's Friday night, what are you going to do? Just sit there? Well, yeah. Because there's nothing out there. It's stupidity. Stupid people mingling with stupid people. Let them stupidify themselves. I've never been bothered with the need to rush out into the night. That's all. Sorry for all the millions, but I've never been lonely. I like myself. I'm the best form of entertainment I have. — Charles Bukowski

Well, start waving and yelling, because it is the so-called Oxford comma and it is a lot more dangerous than its exclusive, ivory-tower moniker might suggest. There are people who embrace the Oxford comma and people who don't, and I'll just say this: never get between these people when drink has been taken. Oh, the Oxford comma. Here, in case you don't know what it is yet, is the perennial example, as espoused by Harold Ross: "The flag is red, white, and blue." So what do you think of it? Are you for or against it? Do you hover in between? — Lynne Truss

Poor one, Estella." "What do you mean? I didn't know there had been any." "Estella," said I, "do look at that fellow in the corner yonder, who is looking over here at us." "Why should I look at him?" returned Estella, with her eyes on me instead. "What is there in that fellow in the corner yonder,
to use your words,
that I need look at?" "Indeed, that is the very question I want to ask you," said I. "For he has been hovering about you all night." "Moths, and all sorts of ugly creatures," replied Estella, with — Charles Dickens

It's interesting when you're doing signing sessions with other writers and you look at the queues at each table and you can see definite human types gathering there ... My queue is always full of, you know, wild-eyed sleazebags and people who stare at me very intensely, as if I have some particular message for them. As if I must know that they've been reading me, that this dyad or symbiosis of reader and writer has been so intense that I must somehow know about it. — Martin Amis

It may have been a comedy, or it may have been a tragedy. It cost one man his reason, it cost me a blood-letting, and it cost yet another man the penalties of the law. Yet there was certainly an element of comedy. Well, you shall judge for yourselves. — Arthur Conan Doyle

The head of the sledgehammer was cold, icy cold, and it touched his forehead as gently as a kiss.
'Pock! There,' said Czernobog. 'Is done.' There was a smile on his face that Shadow had never seen before, an easy, comfortable smile, like sunshine on a summer's day. The old man walked over to the case, and he put the hammer away, and closed the bag, and pushed it back under the sideboard.
'Czernobog?' asked Shadow. Then, 'Are you Czernobog?'
'Yes. For today,' said the old man. 'By tomorrow, it will all be Bielebog. But today, is still Czernobog.'
'Then why? Why didn't you kill me when you could?'
The old man took out an unfiltered cigarette from a pack in his pocket. He took a large box of matches from the mantelpiece and lit the cigarette with a match. He seemed deep in thought. 'Because,' said the old man, after some time, 'there is blood. But there is also gratitude. And it has been a long, long winter. — Neil Gaiman

If we lived for ever, what you say would be true. But we have to die, we have to leave life presently. Injustice and greed would be the real thing if we lived for ever. As it is, we must hold to other things, because Death is coming. I love death - not morbidly, but because He explains. He shows me the emptiness of Money. Death and Money are the eternal foes. Not Death and Life. . . . Death destroys a man: the idea of Death saves him. Behind the coffins and the skeletons that stay the vulgar mind lies something so immense that all that is great in us responds to it. Men of the world may recoil from the charnel-house that they will one day enter, but Love knows better. Death is his foe, but his peer, and in their age-long struggle the thews of Love have been strengthened, and his vision cleared, until there is no one who can stand against him. — E. M. Forster

Barrons Books and Baubles had been ransacked!

Tables were overturned, books torn from shelves and strewn everywhere, baubles broken. Even my little TV behind the counter had been destroyed.

"Barrons?" I called warily. It was night and the lights were on. My illusory Alina had told me more than an hour had passed. Was it the same night, nearly dawn? Or was it the night following our theft attempt? Had Barrons come back from Wales yet? Or was he still there, searching for me? When I'd been so rudely ripped from reality, who or what had come through those basement doors?

I heard footsteps, boots on hardwood, and turned expectantly toward the connecting doors.

Barrons was framed in the doorway. His eyes were black ice. He stared at me a moment, raking me from head to toe. "Nice tan, Ms. Lane. So, where the fuck have you been for the past month? — Karen Marie Moning

Also, unless you critique moralism, many irreligious people won't know the difference between moralism and what you're offering. The way to get antinomians to move away from lawlessness is to distinguish the gospel from legalism. Why? Because modern and post-modern people have been rejecting Christianity for years thinking that it was indistinguishable from moralism. Non-Christians will always automatically hear gospel presentations as appeals to become moral and religious, unless in your preaching you use the good news of grace to deconstruct legalism. Only if you show them there's a difference - that what they really rejected wasn't real Christianity at all - will they even begin to consider Christianity.2 — Tullian Tchividjian

Walks the Fire is a good woman. She is white,but she has been among you for many years now.She was a good wife to Rides the Wind.She is a good mother to me.I remember your tales of how he hunted after she walked the fire to save Hears Not.When she was well, he held a banquet in her honor.You were all there to share his joy. — Stephanie Grace Whitson

There's something that just happens to you when you have a baby, and you look at their little eyes for the first time when you're holding them. They've been safe inside your belly for almost 10 months, and now they're in your arms. Intuition kicks in, where you will do anything for them and you have all the tools inside of you to take care of them. — Hilary Duff

Sooner or later your fingers close on that one moist-cold spud that the spade has accidentally sliced clean through, shining wetly white and giving off the most unearthly of earthly aromas. It's the smell of fresh soil in the spring, but fresh soil somehow distilled or improved upon, as if that wild, primordial scene has been refined and bottled: eau de pomme de terre. You can smell the cold inhuman earth in it, but there's the cozy kitchen to, for the smell of potatoes is, at least by now, to us, the smell of comfort itself, a smell as blankly welcoming as spud flesh, a whiteness that takes up memories and sentiments as easily as flavors. To smell a raw potato is to stand on the very threshold of the domestic and the wild. (241) — Michael Pollan

Some part of me ... had been waiting, since Kelp's death, for certainty that God ... was either dead or malicious. On the cot, now, in the rain-shadowed room with the medicine smells, I knew it was worse than that. They were a challenge, a dare: you must look at the horrors of the world and find a way back to faith in spite of what you saw. I had a glimpse of what the purer version of myself might be capable of: enduring the loss, keeping the rage and disgust down, finding meaning through suffering. But it was only a glimpse. There was so much shame, and the shame made me angry at the thought of getting better. — Glen Duncan

I missed you."
There was a pause. Then Tariq turned to her with a half-grinning, half-grimacing look of distaste. "What's the matter with you?"
How many times had she, Hasina, and Giti said those same three words to each other, Laila wondered, said it without hesitation, after only two or three days of not seeing each other? I missed you, Hasina. Oh, I missed you too. In Tariq's grimace, Laila learned that boys differed from girls in this regard. They didn't make a show of friendship. They felt no urge, no need, for this sort of talk. Laila imagined it had been this way for her brothers too. Boys, Laila came to see, treated friendship the way they treated the sun: its existence undisputed; its radiance best enjoyed, not beheld directly.
"I was trying to annoy you," she said.
He gave her a sidelong glance. "It worked."
But she thought his grimace softened. And she thought that maybe the sunburn on his cheeks deepened momentarily. — Khaled Hosseini

But you're so easy to sneak up on." He crossed his arms, leaning back against the wall. "You should be honored that I bother, since there's no challenge to it."
"Right," I said dryly.
Tybalt has never made a secret of his contempt for changelings in general and me in particular. Not even the years I spent missing could change that. If anything, it made things worse, because when I came back, I promptly removed myself from all the places he was accustomed to finding me. Hating me suddenly took effort - an effort he's proved annoying glad to make. On the other hand, it's actually been something of a relief, because it is something I can count on. Dawn comes, the moon rises and Tybalt hates me. — Seanan McGuire

It occurred to her, sadly, and not for the first time, that as you grew older you became busier, and time went faster and faster, the months pushing each other rudely out of the way, and the years slipping off the calendar and into the past. Once, there had been time. Time to stand, or sit, and just look at daffodils. Or to abandon housekeeping, on the spur of the moment, walk out of the back door and up the hill, into the lark-song emptiness of a summer morning. — Rosamunde Pilcher

You always say the right thing
I don't remember you saying wrong
You make me laugh
All the time

Always there for me you've never been gone
You make me feel like I belong
When I'm with you there's never
Anyone else

Hold me close when I'm feeling down
When I wake up you're still around
When I am cold
You warm me up

You always smile when I'm frowning
Hold my hand when I'm crying
Somehow you
cheer me up

I'm so lucky to have
A friend like you
But somehow
I want more
I'm afraid to lose you
But I can't stand to
Not tell you
I need you,
Just a little more

Perfect guy
Perfect friend
Why can't you be mine?
I just want
To be a little more than friends
Perfect guy
Perfect friend
Why can't you just
Be mine? — Alysha Speer

Paris is a city that might well be spoken of in the plural, as the Greeks used to speak of Athens, for there are many Parises, and the tourists' Paris is only superficially related to the Paris of the Parisians. The foreigner driving through Paris from one museum to another is quite oblivious to the presence of a world he brushes past without seeing. Until you have wasted time in a city, you cannot pretend to know it well. The soul of a big city is not to be grasped so easily; in order to make contact with it, you have to have been bored, you have to have suffered a bit in those places that contain it. Anyone can get hold of a guide and tick off all the monuments, but within the very confines of of Paris there is another city as difficult to access as Timbuktu once was. — Julien Green

I do the "I just got laid," walk for days after our trip to Los Angeles. It's more like a strut. It's pretty obvious when you're doing it. Your mind is clouded in an euphoric high. Your head held at an angle twenty degrees higher than normal. There's a continual smart-ass grin on your face. Your eyes twinkle, literally, as if stardust fell inside them. You walk taller. Prouder. Your back is held straighter. Shoulders wider. You know you're hot. It's been proven. You had sex. — Katie Kacvinsky

I think musically, there's always the stuff you're into that you've always been into but every once in a while there's a new band that kind of stokes you out a little, at least for me. — Dusty Redmon

There's been plenty of adversity, starting the moment he was born. He had a respiratory crisis, and it was touch and go for a week whether he would survive. I think ever since, you can feel this pulse in the guy, an almost physical enthusiasm. — James Taylor

You've been striking at her ghost, screaming, 'If you didn't want me to turn out like him, you should have stayed to stop me!'
As his throat worked convulsively, she covered his hands with hers. 'But she can't hear you. So all you're doing is trudging a path that isn't your own, growing more weary of it by the day, wanting more from your existence but believing you're cursed to having less. That is no sort of life for anyone ... '
'How can you have such faith in me?' he asked hoarsely. 'How can you believe in me when I've given you no reason?'
'You've given me plenty of reasons, but there's only one that matters. I love you, Oliver. I can't help myself. That is my reason. — Sabrina Jeffries

I stood there in the kitchen, watching her staring across the meadow still searching for her nemesis and I thought, suddenly, that this is all our lives - this is the one fact that applies to us all, that makes us what we are, our common mortality, our common humanity. One day someone is going to come and take us away: you don't need to have been a spy, I thought, to feel like this. — William Boyd

Ultimately, all I wanted was for players to feel like they were in the real world. I wanted them to be able to apply real world common sense to the problems confronting them, and I thought recreating real world locations would encourage that kind of thinking. There's also just a real power, a real thrill, when you fire up a game and see a place you've been or want to go, and then get to do all the stuff you WANT to do there but know you'll get arrested if you try! If that isn't the stuff of fantasy - far more than exploring some goofy dwarven mine or alien spaceship - I don't know what is! — Warren Spector

I fell in love with books. Some people find beauty in music, some in painting, some in landscape, but I find it in words. By beauty, I mean the feeling you have suddenly glimpsed another world, or looked into a portal that reveals a kind of magic or romance out of which the world has been constructed, a feeling there is something more than the mundane, and a reason for our plodding. — Donald Miller

You are not who you think you are. You are not your fears, your thoughts, or your body. You are not your insecurities, your career, or your memories. You're not what you're criticized for and you're not what you're praised for. You are a boundless wealth of potential. You are everything that's ever been. Don't sell yourself short. Every sunset, every mountain, every river, every passionate crowd, every concert, every drop of rain - that's you. So go find yourself. Go find your strength, find your beauty, find your purpose. Stop crafting your mask. Stop hiding. Stop lying to yourself and letting people lie to you. You're not lacking in anything except awareness. Everything you've ever wanted is already there, awaiting your attention, awaiting your time. — Vironika Tugaleva

For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be 22 And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake those days will be shortened (Matthew 24:21-22). 36 Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man. (Luke 21:36) — Bob Thiel

As part of our ongoing series of reports on the environment, 'America Goes Green,' we take on the question that can make otherwise competent adults quake with fear. We've all been there. You come to the end of the checkout line and then comes that question: 'Paper or plastic?' For that one brief moment, we grocery buyers are made to feel like the fate of the planet hinges on our decision. — Brian Williams

You've been in love with someone for a decade - someone who barely knows you're alive. You've done everything, tried everything to make this person see that you're a valuable, estimable person, and that your love is worth something. Then one day you open the paper and glance at the Personals column, and there you see that your loved one has placed an ad ... seeking someone worthwhile to love and be loved by. — Daniel Quinn

My stance has always been that there's no place in our sport for drug users. I've always said it's a ban for life if you come up positive. I stand by that. — Maurice Greene

Oh, dear." She let her head fall back to the pillow. "There it went. I've fallen in love with you now."
"Just now?" Chuckling, he came to a sitting position, resting his forearm on one bent knee. "Well, thank God for belated blessings." He ran a hand
through his hair. "It's been coming on rather longer than that for me."
"What?" She sat bolt upright. "What can you mean? Since when?"
"From the first, Amelia. From the very first. — Tessa Dare

Is there something I can do?"
"About what?" she snapped.
"About your problem," he persisted. "Does anybody's ass need kicking? I can take care of that for you. I kick good ass."
Her laughter rang out, sweet and bright and gorgeous. "Wow," she said. "You'd do that for me? After, what has it been now, a fifteen-minute acquaintance? Twenty, maybe, tops?"
He considered that, and opened his mouth, and the raw, uncut, uncensored truth just plopped right out. "Yeah," he said. "I would. — Shannon McKenna

You know that man's story already. He's just starting to believe what Day's been saying to him for years, but he's scared as fuck. If you hurt him in any way, Day will hurt you." Johnson stopped grinning and looked back at God. "I thought Day hated him?" "Day is complex, Johnson. He's crazy about Ronowski, that's why he rides the man so hard." "I get that," Johnson responded. "All right. I don't mind doing the slow thing. We'll start with wings and a game tonight." Johnson shrugged and started inching toward his car. "Next week, maybe dinner and a movie." "Sounds good, bro." God waved and climbed in his truck. Now that he was done playing Chuck Woolery and there were no more love connections to be made. He was going home to his sweetheart. — A.E. Via

Have you ever been reading a book and found yourself having to pause for a second and read a certain part again because the author has summed up in a few sentences exactly what you were feeling at a certain point in your life; a feeling you'd never been able to put into words before and there it suddenly is laid out before you, written by someone you've never even met? It's kind of a tragically wonderful feeling. — Emily May

People have been made fun of for too long, not because there is anything wrong with them, it's just the people, i have been bullied everyday, people speaking things that aren't even true about me when i turn my back, stop please, i have my rights, i'm not a loser, i'm just trying to blend in the world, and i'm still not good for you? i'm not pathetic, i'm just a guy. — Jericho Pasaoa Me

Daniel is asleep. A care assistant, a different one today is swishingaroundthe room with a mop that smells of pine cleaner.

Elisabeth wonders what's doing to happen to all the care assistants. She realizes she hasn't so far encountered a single care assistant here who isn't from somewhere else in the world. That morning on the radio she;d heard a spokesperson say, but it's not just that we;ve been rhetorically and practically encouraging the opposite of integration for immigrants to this country. It's that we've been rhetorically and practically encouraging ourselves not to integrate. We've been doing this as a matter of self-policing since Thatcher taught us to be selfish and not just to think but to believe that there's no such thing as society.

Then the other spokesperson in the dialogue said, well, you would say that. Get over it. Grow up. Your time's over. Democracy. You lost. — Ali Smith

I knew a sudden shyness. There was a look on his face, a stillness to his body that had never been there before. Though I couldn't give the emotion a name, I felt it, too. We had something special. Something hard to define. Something past friendship.

"I must go now," I said and rose up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek, marveling at its velvet skin. "Thank you for the book."

He drew me into his embrace and sighed. "Thank you for the stars. — Elizabeth Langston

I've been around a long time, and young men, if there is one thing I know, it is that the only way to kiss a girl for the first time is to look like you want to and intend do, and move in fast enough to seem eager but slow enough to give her a chance to say "So anyway ... " and look up as if she's trying to remember your name. — Roger Ebert

Diamonds are held under tons and tons of pressure, extremely high temperatures of fire and shuffled under shifting of tectonic plates, for a long, long time! Yet when they come out from there and are put on display for their beauty; does anybody stop to evaluate the diamond based upon all the shit it's been through and say "Remember that disgusting hole it used to be in? I bet it was hell in there!" No, people don't remember where a diamond has come from; they just see the beauty of it now. But it wouldn't have become so beautiful, you know, if not for all of that! So why should we look at other people, or at ourselves and evaluate them/ourselves based upon their/our pasts? Shouldn't we forget that? And only see the beauty that is in front of our eyes? Whatever it was, it made you beautiful! And that is what matters! — C. JoyBell C.

A couple months after school started that year, I just plain stopped going to see the Maje. I remember coming home one day and checking the answering machine in my bedroom. The first message was from the Maje. He was waiting for me to come over. He sounded feeble and desperate: "Steve, where are you? I need you? Are you coming? Please . . ." I deleted it. The next message was also from the Maje and said pretty much the same thing. Delete. There must have been a dozen messages on that machine from the Maje, all begging me, pleading with me, to come help him. I deleted every single one of them. To this day, I have no idea what happened to the Maje, no idea if he ever got that cataract surgery. That's how our relationship ended. It still makes me feel horrible to think about now: I just deleted the Maje. — Stephen "Steve-O" Glover

They say you start weaving clearer, sharper memories after you've been to a place at least twice. Because then the reflection is more of validation. Let the rush come to you and let your senses be flushed the first time. There will be time for reflection after you've had your fill. — Psyche Roxas-Mendoza

Zoroastrianism? Oh, there's never been but a few hundred thousand of them at any one time, mostly located in Iran and India, but that's it. The one true faith. If you're not a Zoroastrian, I'm afraid you are bound for Hell."
The man looked stunned and shocked. "It's not fair."
The demon gave a mirthful laugh. "Well, it was fair when you were sending all the Chinese to Hell who had never heard of Jesus. Wasn't it? — Steven L. Peck

When we encounter unexpected obstacles in finding out something which we wish to know, there are two possible courses to take. It may be that the right course is to treat the obstacle as a spur to further efforts; but there is a second possibility - that we have been trying to find something which does not exist. You will remember that that was how the relativity theory accounted for the apparent concealment of our velocity through the aether. — Arthur Stanley Eddington

It's complicated. I think when bad things happen - whether someone dies or people argue or split up - you get to a point where it's just too hard to go back. There's so much lost. So many versions of the truth. So many versions of how things might've turned out differently. We all long for what could have been. For some people, it's just easier to move forward and try to forget. — Sarah Ockler

There is no good way to confront a friend who is drinking too much, although doing it when you're not drunk is a good start. Anything you say will cause pain, because a woman who is drinking too much becomes terrified other people will notice. Every time I got an email like the one Charlotte sent, I felt like I'd been trailing toilet paper from my jeans. For, like, ten years. I also burned with anger, because I didn't like the fact that my closest friends had been murmuring behind cupped hands about me, and I told myself that if they loved me, they wouldn't care about this stuff. But that's the opposite of how friendships work. When someone loves you, they care enormously. — Sarah Hepola

We had the great depression, we had two world wars, we had the flu epidemic. We had oil shock. We had all these terrible things happen. But something about the American system unleashed more and of a potential to human beings over that hundred years so that we had a seven for one improvement in - there's never been any - I mean, you have centuries where if you've got a 1 percent improvement, then it's something. So we've got a great system. And we've got more productive capacity now than we ever have. — Howard Warren Buffett

I hadn't been there [Comic-Con] before. It's pretty eye-opening, when you haven't been there, just with the sheer amount of fans that are there for different shows and films. It's like a big fan symposium, in a way, as well a way for film studios and television studios to really promote their product to their loyal audience base. It was an experience. — Dustin Clare

Liall realized that this was the first time he had really been alone with Scarlet.
He stood up and held out his hand. The blanket dropped from his shoulders. "Come here."
Scarlet reached out to him tentatively and Liall quickly dragged him into his arms. He fits there perfectly, Liall thought, snug if not a little small. Scarlet did not respond at first, as if he would pull away, and for a moment Liall believed he had made a huge mistake. Then, surprisingly, Scarlet sighed and his arms went around Liall's back. Scarlet turned his head to rest his cheek against Liall's bare chest as hey listened to the rain batten on the roof.
"Thank you for saving my life." Liall murmured. — Kirby Crow

My whole adult life I've worked toward one goal - the success of our business. But I might as well have been chasing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. What I was looking for, striving for, wasn't really there. Meaning I've been measuring the value of my life all wrong. Then I met you and realized that being a somebody isn't nearly as wonderful as having a somebody. And being somebody to somebody else. — Ally Blake

Idle Jeffrey, when asking his cousin for money: "I fear I have not a mercenary tendency."

The Chancellor of the Exchequer and his cousin, Plantagenet Palliser: "Men must have mercenary tendencies or they would not have bred. The man who plows, so he may live, does so because, luckily, he has mercenary tendencies."

Jeffrey: "Just so, but you see I am less lucky than the plowman."

Palliser: "There is no vulgar error so vulgar, that is to say common or erroneous, as that by which men have been taught to say that mercenary tendencies are bad. The desire for wealth is the source of all progress. Civilization comes from what men call greed. Let your mercenary tendencies be combines with honesty, and they cannot take you astray. — Anthony Trollope

My dear child,' said the old gentleman, moved by the warmth of Oliver's sudden appeal, 'you need not be afraid of my deserting you, unless you give me cause.'
I never, never will, sir,' interposed Oliver.
I hope not,' rejoined the old gentleman; 'I do not think you ever will. I have been deceived before, in the objects whom I have endeavoured to benefit; but I feel strongly disposed to trust you, nevertheless, and more strongly interested in your behalf than I can well account for, even to myself. The persons on whom I have bestowed my dearest love lie deep in their graves; but, although the happiness and delight of my life lie buried there too, I have not made a coffin of my heart, and sealed it up for ever on my best affections. Deep affliction has only made them stronger; it ought, I think, for it should refine our nature. — Charles Dickens

The funny thing is that making a pilot is sort of an audition, at least for me. There's something psychological there, where you're sort of asking for the job while you're acting. And then when it's been picked up, it's a completely different psychological dynamic. — Justin Kirk

I haven't been in a position to have the luxury to pick roles for most of my career, so I'm not practiced in that. Usually, when you want to be an actor, you take whatever comes along. If there's an audition, you go for it. If you get the job, you do it - just to get experience, to act, to meet people. — Ken Leung

Kell had told his brother about the deals he struck in Grey London, and in White, and even on occasion in Red, about the various things he'd smuggled, and Rhy had stared at him, and listened, and when he spoke, it wasn't to lecture Kell on all the ways it was wrong, or illegal. It was to ask why.
"I don't know," said Kell, and it had been the truth.
Rhy had sat up, eyes bleary from drink. "Have we not provided?" he'd asked, visibly upset. "Is there anything you want for?"
"No," Kell had answered, and that had been a truth and a lie at the same time.
"Are you not loved?" whispered Rhy. "Are you not welcomed as family?"
"But I'm not family, Rhy," Kell had said. "I'm not truly a Maresh, for all that the king and queen have offered me that name. I feel more like a possession than a prince."
At that, Rhy had punched him in the face.
For a week after, Kell had two black eyes instead of one, and he'd never spoken like that again, but the damage was done. — Victoria Schwab

From the earliest ages of history to the present day there have never been thirteen millions of people associated in one political body who enjoyed so much freedom and happiness as the people of these United States. You have no longer any cause to fear dangers from abroad ... It is from within, among yourselves - from cupidity, from corruption, from disappointed ambition and inordinate thirst for power - that factions will be formed and liberty endangered ... — Andrew Jackson

Some of you may feel that if you don't do something soon to change your life, you will be left by the roadside, alone, homeless and in despair. But is the despair not there as you reach and grapple to create or manifest your desires through your own effort and will? What happens if or when those things appear in your life? Joy? Peace? Or a temporary sense of relief?

What if it is relief from the wanting you have been craving for so long, not the outcome, but the relief from the constant wanting. — Kelly Martin

He was watching me, and he chuckled.
"Do you know how a man tames a wolf?" he asked me.
"No," I said.
"You get some clothing that you've been wearing for a while, and you toss it in with her. In the cage or the cavern where she sleeps. That first one, she rips up, shreds it to nothing. The second one, she just mouths it a bit, gets a taste. Inhales, like you're doing there. The third but of clothing, she starts dragging it around, loving on it, sleeping with it. And then you've got her under your spell. She's got the scent of you, wants to keep it around. She'll follow you everywhere."
"Are you calling me a wolf?" I asked.
"Are you calling me a man?" he said. — Delilah S. Dawson

Do you mean to say," asked Caspian, "that you three come from a round world (round like a ball) and you've never told me! It's really too bad for you. Because we have fairy-tales in which there are round worlds and I have always loved them ... Have you ever been to the parts where people walk about upside-down?"
Edmund shook his head. "And it isn't like that," he added. "There's nothing particularly exciting about a round world when you're there. — C.S. Lewis

I discovered for myself and by myself that there is no self to realize
that's the realization I am talking about. It comes as a shattering blow. It hits you like a thunderbolt. You have invested everything in one basket, self-realization, and, in
the end, suddenly you discover that there is no self to discover, no self to realize
and you say to yourself "What the hell have I been doing all my life?!" That blasts you. — U.G. Krishnamurti

In the struggle to remain a complete person and to love from her fullness instead of her inadequacy a woman may appear hard. She may feel her early conditioning tugging her in the direction of surrender, but she ought to remember that she was originally loved for herself; she ought to hang on to herself and not find herself nagging, helpless, irritable and trapped. Perhaps I am not old enough yet to promise that the self-reliant woman is always loved, but she cannot be lonely as long as there are people in the world who need her joy and her strength, but certainly in my experience it has always been so. Lovers who are free to go when they are restless always come back; lovers who are free to change remain interesting. The bitter animosity and obscenity of divorce is unknown where individuals have not become Siamese twins. A lover who comes to your bed of his own accord is more likely to sleep with his arms around you all night than a lover who has nowhere else to sleep. — Germaine Greer

I think that there have been times, especially with writing songs, where you sit in a room with somebody, and they could be a very well-respected songwriter, but for whatever reason, the chemistry is just not right. — Dave Koz

It's true I've been hurt a few times after revealing myself. There are people who lie in wait for the vulnerable and pounce as a way to feel powerful. But God forgive them. I'm willing to take the occasional blow to find people I connect with. As long as you're willing to turn the other cheek with the mean ones, vulnerability can get you a wealth of friends. Can you imagine coming to the end of your life, being surrounded by people who loved you, only to realize they never fully knew you? Or having poems you never shared or injustices you said nothing about? Can you imagine realizing, then, it was too late? How can we be loved if we are always in hiding? — Donald Miller

People who have never been through any sort of shit always assume that they know how you should react to having your life destroyed. And the people who have been through shit think you're suppose to deal with it the exact same way they did. As if there's a playbook for surviving hell. — Katja Millay

Elend Venture," she said, standing up. "There is something I've been meaning to tell you for some time." She paused, blinking away her
tears. "You read too much. Especially in the presence of ladies. — Brandon Sanderson

Sirius looked out of the fire at Harry, a crease between his sunken eyes.
"You're less like your father than I thought," he said finally, a definite coolness in his voice. "The risk would've been what made it fun for James."
"Look - "
"Well, I'd better get going ... I'll write to tell you a time I can make it back into the fire, then, shall I? If you can stand to risk it?"
There was a tiny pop, and the place where Sirius's head had been was flickering flame once more. — J.K. Rowling

It would be like finding out that you'd drawn lots for dessert at the Factory and been only one number off, only it didn't matter because Pete already snuck in to steal the dessert, so nobody was going to get any anyway - not even Pete, because it turns out there had never been any dessert to begin with. — Brandon Sanderson

As he rose to his feet he noticed that he was neither dripping nor panting for breath as anyone would expect after being under water. His clothes were perfectly dry. He was standing by the edge of a small pool - not more than ten feet from side to side in a wood. The trees grew close together and were so leafy that he could get no glimpse of the sky. All the light was green light that came through the leaves: but there must have been a very strong sun overhead, for this green daylight was bright and warm. It was the quietest wood you could possibly imagine. There were no birds, no insects, no animals, and no wind. You could almost feel the trees growing. The pool he had just got out of was not the only pool. There were dozens of others - a pool every few yards as far as his eyes could reach. You could almost feel the trees drinking the water up with their roots. This wood was very much alive. — C.S. Lewis

We do not often get to declare victories, Natch, and most of them do not remain victories for very long. Ultimately when you reach my age you realize that victories are temporary, and in all the years of human history there is one final battle which nobody has ever won.Time has a way of changing the terms of your victories over the years, until you begin to wonder precisely what it was you fought for so viciously, so uncompromisingly. You begin to see that victory and defeat are but alternate reflections from the same prism.You see that the measure of a person really might be the integrity with which he fought his battles and not their ultimate dispensation, just like your elders have been telling you all along. — David Louis Edelman

You need to up your vocabulary, boy. You can't walk around letting people think you're stupid. Expand your horizons. Besides, it's fun to call people names they have to look up to realize they've been insulted. (Mark)
Yeah, that's a twofer there. You get away with it and then they're twice as mad when they realize how bad you really insulted them. Especially if they mistake it for a compliment when you say it and thank you for it. (Bubba) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Are you being a good boy for your mum?"
Conor's grandma pinched Conor's cheeks so hard he swore she was going to draw blood.
"He's been very good, Ma," Conor's mother said, winking at him from behind his grandma, her favorite blue scarf tied around her head. "So there's no need to inflict quite so much pain. — Patrick Ness

I have not been able to discover whether there exists a precise French equivalent for the common Anglo-American expression 'killing time.' It's a very crass and breezy expression, when you ponder it for a moment, considering that time, after all, is killing us. — Christopher Hitchens

There are no risk in Love, as you'll find out for yourself. People have been searching for and finding each other for thousands of years. Suddenly, he realised that the might be wrong. There was always a risk, a single risk: that one person might meet with more thatn one Soulmate in the same incarnation ... — Paulo Coelho

Cord softened his voice as he addressed Anne. "Thought I'd see if you want to come home with me, babe."
She crossed the room in two leaps and threw herself at him. Cord kept the rifle trained on Wells, but he caught Anne with his left arm and crushed her to him. He buried his mouth and nose in her hair and breathed deeply of her.
Until this moment there had been no room for any emotion but fear in Cord. Now, with Anne safe in his arms, rage seared through him. If they did not get out of here quickly, he would leave the room drenched in blood. — Ellen O'Connell

The idea that Sophie could die had always been there, ever since the first diagnosis, and yet it seemed like a bad place on a map, an Ivory Coast, somewhere not urgently frightening because fear itself kept you away from the place. You thought of it as somewhere braver people went, or at least as somewhere you'd have plenty of time to pack your bags for. — Chris Cleave

In romantic comedies there's a certain ceiling and a floor that you can't necessarily love as hard, or hate as hard, or have as much pain, because you sink the shop of the romantic comedy. But in a certain drama, like some of the ones I've been doing, the ceiling and the floor was my own. And in many ways, that was a higher ceiling and a lower floor, so that was more of a band-with for those emotions. — Matthew McConaughey

The radical rightwing pegs Hollywood as a leftist town, which is completely wrong. There are a lot of actors, writers, and directors who talk a liberal agenda ... but all the studio bosses, for as long as there have been studios, have all been as far rightwing as you can possibly imagine. — Paul Haggis

It is commonly said to my little friend Legion: Read the great writers for style. But I say to him: Read the great dead masters for ideas. Devour them, Fletcherize them, digest, assimilate, make them part of your blood; let the enriched blood visit your brain. The resultant activities will be fairly your own, and the little kinks and convolutions of your brain, which are entirely different from the kinks of any other brain, will furnish you all the style you will ever get.
There are no really fresh ideas; just as there is not any fresh air. Air and ideas are refreshed and refreshing, vitalized and vitalizing; but the thoughts have been thought before and the air has been breathed before. — Eugene Manlove Rhodes

I know enough about the moon to know how unpleasant and inhospitable it is ... I know enough about Mars to know that you can't live there, you can't settle it. Mars and the moon are two ugly islands. So then, you say, what's the point of going to them? The point is to be able to say I've been there, I've set foot on them, and I can go further to look for beautiful islands. — Wally Schirra

I've been moving a little to the music while I worked ... and then I realize I am actually dancing. It feels wonderful, though I can feel how stiff my muscles are, how rigidly I've been holding myself ... Mostly I've been moving cautiously, numbly, steeled because I know, at any moment, I may be ambushed by overwhelming grief. You never know when it's coming, the word or gesture or bit of memory that dissolved you entirely ... It happens every day at first, then not for a day or two, then there's a week when grief washes in every morning, every afternoon. — Mark Doty

I've had friends whose boyfriends I meet, then they break up and I end up staying buddies with the boyfriend. In this day and age with social media and Facebook, Twitter, it's really impossible to escape people that you've been involved with. In a weird way, it makes it easier for everyone to stay friends because you're just sort of stuck there. — Zachary Knighton

The three of us stood there for a minute. I don't know what Stew was thinking, and the filing cabinet wasn't thinking anything. But I was thinking, is this the world? Is this really the place in which you've ended up, Snicket? It was a question that struck me, as it might strike you, when something ridiculous was going on, or something sad. I wondered if this was really where I should be, or if there was another world someplace, less ridiculous and less sad. But I never knew the answer to the question. Perhaps I had been in another world before I was born, and did not remember it, or perhaps I would see another world when I died, which I was in no hurry to do. In the meantime, I was stuck in the police station, doing something so ridiculous it felt sad, and feeling so sad it was ridiculous. The world of the police station, the world of Stain'd-by-the-Sea and all of the wrong questions I was asking, was was the only world I could see. — Lemony Snicket

I know, for me, you know, my generation - I never would have known anything about Robert Preston's performance in 'The Music Man' if there hadn't been a film where he played the part. I just heard how great he was on Broadway way before my time. — John Lloyd Young

How do you greet a god? If there's an etiquette guide for that, I haven't read it. I'm never sure if I'm supposed to shake hands, kneel, or bow and shout, "We're not worthy!" I knew Hermes better than most of the Olympians. Over the years, he'd helped me out several times. Unfortunately last summer I'd also fought his demigod son Luke, who'd been corrupted by the Titan Kronos, in a mortal combat smack-down for the fate of the world. Luke's death hadn't been entirely my fault, but it still put a damper on my relationship with Hermes. I decided to start simple. "Hi. — Rick Riordan

I grew up watching Lindsay and it made me want to do what she does. Just the whole vibe. Being there, being on camera, or on stage, with everybody listening to you it's so cool when people look up to you. I've already been asked for my autograph and it's just a really good feeling to have. — Ali Lohan

Steve is troubled by a lot of things. He is twenty-three, was raised in Virginia, and has the idea that California is the beginning of the end. "I feel it's insane," he says, and his voice drops. "This chick tells me there's no meaning to life but it doesn't matter, we'll just flow right out. There've been times I felt like packing up and taking off for the East Coast again, at least there I had a target. At least there you expect that it's going to happen." He lights a cigarette for me and his hands shake. "Here you know it's not going to."
I ask what it is that is supposed to happen.
"I don't know," he says. "Something. Anything. — Joan Didion

I live completely without regret. Sure there are plenty of things that someone could second guess, but I see the path of life like driving down the road without a map. The thing is, some dark alleys open up in majestic places, and some bright and shiny highways to the top end in cliffs to the bottom. You never know until you get there. What I know for sure is that if many years ago I actually had a map to the path of life, the destination that I would have chosen is right here, with this family, in this place, and with these smiles. That makes anything that could have been regretful, the best decision in the world. — Michael A. Wood Jr.