For Shell Quotes & Sayings

The drum-fire of propaganda that the Fed is manning the ramparts against the menace of inflation brought about by others is nothing less than a deceptive shell game. The culprit solely responsible for inflation, the Federal Reserve, is continually engaged in raising a hue-and-cry about 'inflation,' for which virtually everyone else in society seems to be responsible. What we are seeing is the old ploy by the robber who starts shouting 'Stop, thief!' and runs down the street pointing ahead at others. — Murray Rothbard

Wealth for its own sake is an empty shell. Wealth that includes making other people's lives better will reward you even more than the beautiful mansion you live in. — Gene Simmons

True beauty is what lies inside of us, not what the world sees. A beautiful shell that houses a vile soul becomes sullied over time. But an outer shell, imperfect as it may be, that houses a beautiful, shines with that beauty, radiating it for all who have eyes to see. — Sara B. Larson

Brunetti asked, surprised how painful he still found the thought of his mother. He had tried for the last year, with singular lack of success, to tell himself that his mother, that bright-spirited woman who had raised them and loved them with unqualified devotion, had moved off to some other place, where she waited, still quickwitted and eager to smile, for that befuddled shell that was her body to come and join her so that they could drift off together to a final peace. 'I — Donna Leon

When I noticed other people, I wondered what it was like to be alive. They did not know, could not know, how I felt inside. My shell still passed for normal. I felt like I should scream for help, someone should help, but I knew that the time for screaming had passed. Best to just keep on walking, walking dead, one of the few things I could still do. So I kept walking. — Jonathan Rottenberg

I like the way the morning can be stormy and the afternoon clear and sparkly as a jewel in the water. Put your hand in the water to reach for a sea urchin or a sea shell, and the thing desired never quite lies where you had lined it up to be. The same is true of love. In prospect or contemplation, love is where it seems to be. Reach in to lift it out and your hand misses — Jeanette Winterson

Listen! Clam up your mouth and be silent like an oyster shell, for that tongue of yours is the enemy of the soul, my friend. When the lips are silent, the heart has a hundred tongues. — Rumi

After scientists broke open the coat of a lotus seed (Nelumbo nucifera) and coddled the embryo into growth, they kept the empty husk. When they radiocarbon-dated this discarded outer shell, they discovered that their seedling had been waiting for them within a peat bog in China for no less than two thousand years. This tiny seed had stubbornly kept up the hope of its own future while entire human civilizations rose and fell. And then one day this little plant's yearning finally burst forth within a laboratory. I wonder where it is right now. — Hope Jahren

If you're an introvert, you also know that the bias against quiet can cause deep psychic pain. As a child you might have overheard your parents apologize for your shyness. Or at school you might have been prodded to come "out of your shell" -that noxious expression which fails to appreciate that some animals naturally carry shelter everywhere they go, and some humans are just the same. — Susan Cain

But I go back down near the water with Steppa to look for treasure. We find a white shell like a snail, but when I curl my finger inside, he's gone out. "Keep it," say Steppa. "But what about when he comes home? — Emma Donoghue

The grain had entered the shell (Sylvie's own metaphoric stance) and the pearl that would be Edward Beresford Todd began to grow until he was revealed into the sunshine that came before the Great War and lay happily for hours on end in his pram with nothing but a silver hare dangling from the pram hood for company. His — Kate Atkinson

You are like a shell," he said. "A seashell. Hollow but beautiful."
"Hollow." She nodded.
For the rest of the day, they sat not far from each other, gazing out the window at the light shifting almost imperceptibly. They sat about and let themselves be objects on which dust might settle, air might past, light could play.
"I am just an emptiness," she said.
"No," he told her. "You are a resting place. — Ramona Ausubel

I've always found that the most beautiful people, truly beautiful inside and out, are the ones who are quietly unaware of their effect." His eyes searched mine intently, and for a moment we stood there toe to toe. "The ones who throw their beauty around, waste what they have? Their beauty is only passing. It's just a shell hiding nothing but shadows and emptiness. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

The Armadillo A big fiesta was announced on Lake Titicaca, and the armadillo, who was a very superior creature, wanted to dazzle everybody. Long beforehand, he set to weaving a cloak of such elegance that it would knock all eyes out. The fox noticed him at work. "Are you in a bad mood?" "Don't distract me. I'm busy." "What's that for?" The armadillo explained. "Ah," said the fox, savoring the words, "for the fiesta tonight?" "What do you mean, tonight?" The armadillo's heart sank. He had never been more sure of his time calculations. "And me with my cloak only half finished!" While the fox took off with a smothered laugh, the armadillo finished the cloak in a hurry. As time was flying, he had to use coarser threads, and the weave ended up too big. For this reason the armadillo's shell is tight-warped around the neck and very open at the back. (174) — Eduardo Galeano

Pain is a spiritual wake-up call showing you that there are oceans you have not yet explored. Step beyond the world you know. Reach for heights that you never thought possible. Go to places you have deemed off limits. This is the time to take off the shell of your past and step into the rich possibilities of your future. God does not give us dreams that we cannot fulfill. If you want to do something great with your life-whether it's to fall madly in love, become a teacher, be a great parent-if you aspire to do something beyond what you are doing now, this is the time to begin. Trust yourself. — Debbie Ford

Somewhere among them - those green and untested boys - lay much of the stock from which he would have to select a crew capable of going all the way. The trick would be to find which few of them had the potential for raw power, the nearly superhuman stamina, the indomitable willpower, and the intellectual capacity necessary to master the details of technique. And which of them, coupled improbably with all those other qualities, had the most important one: the ability to disregard his own ambitions, to throw his ego over the gunwales, to leave it swirling in the wake of his shell, and to pull, not just for himself, not just for glory, but for the other boys in the boat. — Daniel James Brown

Hear this now. Nothing, not even death, will keep me from loving you. Though this body may wither and become a dry shell, my spirit will pursue you until the end of time. We will never be apart." He covered her mouth with his and tasted her blood. Trailing tender kisses across her cheek and jawline, he nestled against her neck. "Eternally yours," he whispered. She clutched his head and offered her throat. "Together forever," she responded. Broderick hesitated, her erratic pulse beating against his tongue. "Give me peace," she whispered in a tortured breath. "Do this for me." "I will love you forever, Davina." His fangs pierced her cool skin and Broderick drank the life from his wife, granting her wish ... and tormenting his already damned soul. — Arial Burnz

And what you thought you came for
is only a shell, a husk of meaning
from which the purpose breaks only when it is fulfilled
if at all. Either you had no purpose
or the purpose is beyond the end you figured
And is altered in fulfillment. — T. S. Eliot

unusual in comparison with other tree nuts since the nut is outside the fruit. The cashew apple is an edible false fruit, attached to the externally born nut by a stem. In its raw state, the shell of the nut is leathery, not brittle. It contains the thick vesicant oil, CNSL, within a sponge-like interior. A thin testa skin surrounds the kernel and keeps it separated from the inside of the shell. The primary products of cashew nuts are the kernels which have value as confectionery nuts. Cashew nut shell liquid (CNSL) is an important industrial raw material for resin manufacture and the shells can be burned to provide heat for the decorticating operation. Cashew Apple Nut ShellFigure 2: Cross-section of a Cashew Fruit Tasta Skin Kernal — Anonymous

I adore summer entertaining. For a dinner party at the farm, I might prepare homemade fettuccine with porcini mushrooms, soft-shell crabs, spinach from the garden, and lemon tarts with fraises des bois for dessert. — Martha Stewart

Shy South comes home to her farm to find a blackened shell, her brother and sister stolen, and knows she'll have to go back to bad old ways if she's ever to see them again. She sets off in pursuit with only her cowardly old step-father Lamb for company. But it turns out he's hiding a bloody past of his own. None bloodier. Their journey will take them across the lawless plains, to a frontier town gripped by gold fever, through feuds, duels, and massacres, high into unmapped mountains to a reckoning with ancient enemies, and force them into alliance with Nicomo Cosca, infamous soldier of fortune, a man no one should ever have to trust ... — Joe Abercrombie

Problems are an important part of maturing
meet them straight on. Work them out. It's like the chick in the egg. It has to break through the eggshell on its own. That's how it gains its first strength. If you break the shell for the chick, you end up with a puny little runt. — Mark Tobey

It is only through letting our heart break that we discover something unexpected: the heart cannot actually break, it can only break open. When we feel both our love for this world and the pain of this world-together, at the same time-the heart breaks out of its shell. To live with an open heart is to experience life full-strength. — John Welwood

Venus Transiens

Tell me,
Was Venus more beautiful
Than you are,
When she topped
The crinkled waves,
Drifting shoreward
On her plaited shell?
Was Botticelli's vision
Fairer than mine;
And were the painted rosebuds
He tossed his lady
Of better worth
Than the words I blow about you
To cover your too great loveliness
As with a gauze
Of misted silver?

For me,
You stand poised
In the blue and buoyant air,
Cinctured by bright winds,
Treading the sunlight.
And the waves which precede you
Ripple and stir
The sands at my feet. — Amy Lowell

If you should take the human heart and listen to it, it would be like listening to a sea-shell; you would hear in it the hollow murmur of the infinite ocean to which it belongs, from which it draws its profoundest inspiration, and for which it yearns. — Edwin Hubbel Chapin

He asked if she sold luminous flowers that he had heard about, flowers which shone in the dark. He wanted them, he said, for a woman who shone in the dark. He could swear that when he took her to the theater and she sat back in the dark in her evening dress, her skin was as luminous as the finest sea shell, with a pale pink glow to it. And he wanted these flowers for her to wear in her hair. Mathilde did not have them. But as soon as the man left she went to look at herself in the mirror. This was the kind of feeling she wanted to inspire. Could she? — Anais Nin

It's a funny thing about Americans, we love to bitch about paying too much for the things we really need and are really a bargain, like gas and postage stamps, but we willingly shell out outrageous amounts for unnecessary crap like gourmet coffee and soap to make your crotch smell good. Two dollars a gallon to go ten miles is too much, but five to the parking valet to go ten feet is okay. — Bill Maher

Maybe, generations ago, young people rebelled out of some clear motive, but now, we know we're rebelling. Between teen movies and sex-ed textbooks we're so ready for our rebellious phase we can't help but feel it's safe, contained. It will turn out all right, despite the risk, snug in the shell of rebellion narrative. Rebellion narrative, does that make sense? It was appropriate to do, so we did it. — Daniel Handler

I was always really shy. That's why being in front of cameras like this is uncomfortable. I found that when I was a kid, I would hide behind playing pretend. That's when I would come out of my shell. I would dress up as an old man or something and go out onto the street with my mom. I would come out of my shell that way. So I ended up stumbling into acting. It was the one thing that I found a passion for. — Austin Butler

I must be the only player in the world who ever injured himself for a tournament by stepping on a shell on the beach. I don't know what I'm going to do. — Goran Ivanisevic

All those words of praise they use for novels - spare, economical. Why should I shell out £17 for economical? — Howard Jacobson

You know where the word shrapnel comes from?" "Where?" "An eighteenth-century British guy named Henry Shrapnel." "Really?" "He was a captain in their artillery for eight years. Then he invented an exploding shell, and they promoted him to major. The Duke of Wellington used the shell in the Peninsular Wars, and at the Battle of Waterloo. — Lee Child

There is a curious thing that happens with the passage of time: a calcification of character ... Change isn't always for the worst; the shell that forms around a piece of sand looks to some people like an irritation, and to others, like a pearl. — Jodi Picoult

Obedience is not truly performed by the body of him whose heart is dissatisfied. The shell without a kernel is not fit for store. — Saadi

For money you can have everything it is said. No, that is not true. You can buy food, but not appetite; medicine, but not health; soft beds, but not sleep; knowledge but not intelligence; glitter, but not comfort; fun, but not pleasure; acquaintances, but not friendship; servants, but not faithfulness; grey hair, but not honor; quiet days, but not peace. The shell of all things you can get for money. But not the kernel. That cannot be had for money. — Arne Garborg

We're [as parents] striving for an unattainable, inauthentic shell, and ignoring the real nut, the gooey inside: love, laughter, and fulfillment from simple things. — Julie Lythcott-Haims

The harried Lincoln made clear to Sumner that he believed compromise would simply open the door for further demands and more concessions: "Give them personal liberty bills, and they will pull in the slack, hold on, and insist on the border-state compromises. Give them that, they'll again pull in the slack and demand Crittenden's compromise. That pulled in, they will want all that South Carolina asks." He "would sooner go out into his backyard and hang himself." Then Lincoln punctuated his resolve with a down-home pledge: "By no act or complicity of mine shall the Republican party become a mere sucked egg, all shell and no principle in it. — Harold Holzer

The serious people who took him seriously never felt quite sure of his deportment; they were somehow aware that trusting their reputations for judgment with him was like furnishing a nursery with egg-shell china. — H.G.Wells

Phyllida's hair was where her power resided. It was expensively set into a smooth dome, like a band shell for the presentation of that long-running act, her face. — Jeffrey Eugenides

Gratitude makes the world a softer, kinder place. It softens that brittle shell of defence. There is always something to be grateful for, no matter how small or simple. — Janey Colbourne

My time at Shell was a most valuable experience because it taught me to look at the world in a long-term way. Shell takes a 20-year view on events and plans for different scenarios. It makes you see the world as a kind of large matrix. — Vince Cable

As he rested in the great hollow shell of tranquility and light, listening to its silence, it dawned upon him that 'empty' was the wrong word for this place. It was as full as could be: full of silence, full of light, full of peace. There — Penelope Wilcock

As nature has uncovered from under this hard shell the seed for which she most tenderly cares - the propensity and vocation to free thinking - this gradually works back upon the character of the people, who thereby gradually become capable of managing freedom; finally, it affects the principles of government, which finds it to its advantage to treat men, who are now more than machines, in accordance with their dignity. — Immanuel Kant

Often, your lessons will not come easily. Suffering has always been a vehicle for deep spiritual growth. Those who have endured great suffering are generally the ones who evolve into great beings. Those who have been deeply hurt by life are generally the ones who can feel the pain of others in a heartbeat. Those who have endured adversity become humbled by life, and as a result, are more open, compassionate and real. We may not like suffering when it visits us, but it serves us so very well: it cracks the shell that covers our hearts and empties us of the lies we have clung to about who we are, why we are here and how this remarkable world of ours really functions. Once emptied, we can be refilled with all that is good, noble and true. Troubles can transform, if we choose to allow them to do so. As Joseph Campbell — Robin S. Sharma

Pocock paused and stepped back from the frame of the shell and put his hands on his hips, carefully studying the work he had so far done. He said for him the craft of building a boat was like religion. It wasn't enough to master the technical details of it. You had to give yourself up to it spiritually; you had to surrender yourself absolutely to it. When you were done and walked away from the boat, you had to feel that you had left a piece of yourself behind in it forever, a bit of your heart. He turned to Joe. "Rowing," he said, "is like that. And a lot of life is like that too, the parts that really matter anyway. Do you know what I mean, Joe? — Daniel James Brown

Is it not rather ugly, one may ask? One collects material possessions not only for security, comfort or vanity, but for beauty as well. Is your sea-shell house not ugly and bare? No, it is beautiful, my house. It is bare, of course, but the wind, the sun, the smell of the pines blow through its bareness. The unfinished beams in the roof are veiled by cobwebs. They are lovely, I think, gazing up at them with new eyes; — Anne Morrow Lindbergh

The place where the story happened was a world on the back of four elephants perched on the shell of a giant turtle. That's the advantage of space. It's big enough to hold practically anything, and so, eventually, it does.
People think that it is strange to have a turtle ten thousand miles long and an elephant more than two thousand miles tall, which just shows that the human brain is ill-adapted for thinking and was probably originally designed for cooling the blood. It believes mere size is amazing.
There's nothing amazing about size. Turtles are amazing, and elephants are quite astonishing. But the fact that there's a big turtle is far less amazing than the fact that there is a turtle anywhere. — Terry Pratchett

When you love someone you tend to tell them so much about your past because you're trying to catch up to the present moment. You're trying to say, my past has been bloody. My past has been as painful and pounding as an ear ache, but I am still here. I survived it. You're trying to say, here I am before you. I can be brutal. I can be as harsh and unforgiving as sun burn, but this is how I got to this moment. This is who I am. I am not always kind and lovely, I am so often fierce and cutting and unforgiving. I have made some mistakes I'm still trying to forgive myself for. Please accept it. Please try to love me for it. Here is the muscle and bone of me. It's frightening. It's a roller coaster. Here is the meat of me, after I've shed my skin, after I've left the cicada shell behind. It's manic. It's a monster, but it will try to love you well. It will try to leave fingerprints all over you. — Jessica Therese

By simply going outside of your shell and trying to help others, it would be easy for you to experience utmost joy. — Erick Bulatowicz

The emotion I'd held back for years assaulted me with staggering intensity. Everything. All of it. I cried for Clay, for the lost years with Courtney, but most of all for myself and the cowardly person I'd become. They were right. I was a shell of who I used to be and lived a lonely little life. I'd been certain that protecting my heart had been the right way to go. That Courtney and I didn't mix in the long term. That love was not for me. I'd been wrong on all counts. — Melissa Brayden

When my job was attempting to predict future economic developments for the Shell oil company, I was frequently reminded of an Arabic saying: 'Those who claim to foresee the future are lying, even if by chance they are later proved right.' — Vince Cable

A real man, the kind of man a woman wants to give her life to, is one who will respect her dignity, who will honor her like the valuable treasures she is. A real man will not attempt to rip her precious pearl from its protective shell, or persuade her with charm to give away her treasure prematurely, but he will wait patiently until she willingly gives him the prize of her heart. A real man will cherish and care for that precious prize forever. — Leslie Ludy

Shell Oil's decision to pull the plug on drilling for oil in the Chukchi Sea is a major victory for the Arctic. — Frances Beinecke

Considering Lymond, flat now on the bed in wordless communion with the ceiling, Richard spoke. "My dear, you are only a boy. You have all your life still before you."

On the tortoise-shell bed, his brother did not move. But there was no irony for once in his voice when he answered. "Oh, yes, I know. The popular question is, For what? — Dorothy Dunnett

We sat grown quiet at the name of love;
We saw the last embers of daylight die,
And in the trembling blue-green of the sky
A moon, worn as if it had been a shell
Washed by time's waters as they rose and fell
About the stars and broke in days and years.
I had a thought for no one's but your ears:
That you were beautiful, and that I strove
To love you in the old high way of love;
That it had all seemed happy, and yet we'd grown
As weary-hearted as that hollow moon — W.B.Yeats

One day, while he was idly reciting his verses to a captive audience, a scrap of paper, borne by the wind, landed on his lap. On it were written two words: "Layla" and "Majnun." As the crowd watched, Majnun tore the paper in half. The half on which was written "Layla" he crumpled into a ball and threw over his shoulder; the half with his own name he kept for himself.
"What does this mean?" someone asked.
"Do you not realize that one name is better than two?" Majnun replied. "If only you knew the reality of love, you would see that when you scratch a lover, you find his beloved."
"But why throw away Layla's name and not your own?" asked another.
Majnun glowered at the man. "The name is a shell and nothing more. It is what the shell hides that counts. I am the shell and Layla is the pearl; I am the veil and she is the face beneath it."
The crowd, though they knew not the meaning of his words, were amazed by the sweetness of his tongue. — Reza Aslan

Big G.B. said, "Your Daddy ain't magic."
I said, "He ain't?"
He said, "Naw, there ain't any magic."
I said, "What about the blind man's dummy? Is Joesph of Arimathea magic?"
He said, "Get your shotgun, Sugar."
I went to the corner near the stove and took my shotgun by the barrel. I got my shell bag and looked at Big G.B.to see what he was thinking. His face didn't tell me. I stood by the kitchen door holding the shotgun and shells. I said, "Is Joseph of Arimathea magic, Big G.B.?"
He said, "There ain't no magic. Magic is the same as sentimental. Scratch the surface of sentimental and you know what you find?
Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan. Magic is German in nature and evil and not real. Scratch magic, Sugar, and you're looking for death. — Lewis Nordan

God is not needed to create guilt or to punish. Our fellow men suffice, aided by ourselves. You were speaking of the Last Judgement. Allow me to laugh respectfully. I shall wait for it resolutely, for I have known what is worse, the judgement of men. For them, no extenuating circumstances; even the good intention is ascribed to crime. Have you at least heard of the spitting cell, which a nation recently thought up to prove itself the greatest on earth? A walled-up box in which the prisoner can stand without moving. The solid door that locks him in the cement shell stops at chin level. Hence only his face is visible, and every passing jailer spits copiously on it. The prisoner, wedged into his cell, cannot wipe his face, though he is allowed, it is true. to close his eyes. Well, that, mon cher, is a human invention. They didn't need God for that little masterpiece. — Albert Camus

It is more magnificent than what I thought heaven might be, and yet it is all of its wonder, as well."
...
"Iris, we are shut off from it in this life because if any knew its magnificence, life itself would end, for all who are living would seek death. But as the egg must be in the nest for the bird to fly from it, so the living must live and die when nature intends so that the shell may be broken at the point when the living have wings to fly. It is as if in life we are blind, and in death we see. In life we think in error, but in death we know and love and understand. — Douglas Clegg

The true poem is the poet's mind; the true ship is the ship-builder. In the man, could we lay him open, we should see the reason for the last flourish and tendril of his work; as every spine and tint in the sea-shell preexist in the secreting organs of the fish. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Maybe we can hold the windows and doors," Mars said doubtfully. The ruined building was little more than a shell, with no roof and gaping empty rectangles for windows. "But if they charge us ... " "They're charging!" Hel shouted. — Michael Scott

I think it's good that [my granddaughter] here because I lost my parents and now it's great that there's a new generation. And she's taught me new things that I've forgotten. Like, when you're on holiday and see what it's like to see a shell or go into the water for the first time. — Carine Roitfeld

A single decision by the chairman of Royal Dutch/Shell has a greater impact on the health of the planet than all the coffee-ground-composting, organic-cotton-wearing ecofreaks gathering in Washington D.C., for Earth Day festivities this weekend. — Sharon Begley

I once thought that grief was chronic, that all you could do was appreciate the good days and take them along with the bad. And then I started to think that maybe the good days aren't just days; maybe the good days can be good weeks, good months, good years. Now I wonder if grief isn't something like a shell. You wear it for a long time and then one day you realize you've outgrown it. So you put it down. — Taylor Jenkins Reid

It was simple. His world was Kate. If he denied that, he might as well stop breathing right now.
"I have to go," he blurted out, standing up so suddenly that his thighs hit the edge of the table, sending walnut shell shards skittering across the tabletop.
"I thought you might," Colin murmured.
Benedict just smiled and said, "Go."
His brothers, Anthony realized, were a bit smarter than they let on.
"We'll speak to you in a week or so?" Colin asked.
Anthony had to grin. He and his brothers had met at their club every day for the past fortnight. Colin's oh-so-innocent query could only imply one thing - that it was obvious that Anthony had completely lost his heart to his wife and planned to spend at least the next seven days proving it to her. And that the family he was creating had grown as important as the one he'd been born into.
"Two weeks," Anthony replied, yanking on his coat. "Maybe three."
His brothers just grinned. — Julia Quinn

For all my rational Western intellect and education, I was for the moment overwhelmed by a primitive sense of living in a world ordered by a malign and perverted god, and it coloured my view of everything that afternoon - even the coconuts. The villagers sold us some and split them open for us. They are almost perfectly designed. You first make a hole and drink the milk, and then you split open the nut with a machete and slice off a segment of the shell, which forms a perfect implement for scooping out the coconut flesh inside. What makes you wonder about the nature of this god character is that he creates something that is so perfectly designed to be of benefit to human beings and then hangs it twenty feet above their heads on a tree with no branches. — Douglas Adams

Outside Styx's apartment was not the first time Rochester and I had met, or would it be the last. We first encountered each other at Haworth House in Yorkshire when my mind was young and the barrier between reality and make-believe had not yet hardened into the shell that cocoons us in adult life. The barrier was soft, pliable and, for a moment, thanks to the kindness of a stranger and the power of a good storytelling voice, I made the short journey
and returned. — Jasper Fforde

People say Jesus Christ is a god, and they pray to him. Likewise, the Navajos have a god. He is an everlasting god who never dies, and we pray to him for everything. We were created from white shell in a sacred, holy way. Part of the white shell was taken and put in our bodies, but no one can see it. White Shell is a god. We pray to her "to give us the invisible white shell shoes, white shell socks, clothing, feathers," and so on. This god is female and is out there, but we cannot see her. — John Holiday

If you want to write for T.V. and movies, you will be subjected to kind and unkind criticism. You had better get used to it and develop a shell. — Anne Beatts

In the end, they pardoned me and packed me off to a home for the shell-shocked. Shortly before the end of the war, I was discharged a second time, once again with the observation that I was subject to recall at any time. — George Grosz

We even save a few lives, but only a fraction of the lives that need to be saved. Soon, we will leave and when we leave there will be nothing to take our place. The meningitis epidemic, cholera, measles, typhoid fever, all preventable diseases, will return and continue as before. The only solution is a political solution, national public health programs, responsible corporations who reap only as much as they sow. Shell Oil with a conscience. Nigeria doesn't need us. What we do here is less than nothing. We take the pressure off the powers that be, making it easier for those who plunder to keep on plundering. This is the humanitarian aid paradox. — Pamela Grim

service to Gott. And while Samuel's feelings about himself were humble in nature, his feelings for Ruth were anything but. Ruth meanwhile was no fan of attention. She was naturally shy. Samuel had managed to coax her out of her shell though. Still, Ruth was hardly comfortable in the spotlight. It was a mystery to everyone else why Ruth was such a wallflower. She had so much going for her, she just didn't seem to realize it. "Now Samuel, — Becca Fisher

ANTHONY DOERR is the author of the story collections Memory Wall and The Shell Collector, the novel About Grace, and the memoir Four Seasons in Rome. He has won numerous prizes both in the United States and overseas, including four O. Henry Prizes, three Pushcart Prizes, the Rome Prize, the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award, the National Magazine Award for fiction, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the Story Prize. Raised in Cleveland, Doerr lives in Boise, Idaho, with his wife and two sons. — Anthony Doerr

I have seen A curious child, who dwelt upon a tract Of inland ground, applying to his ear The convolutions of a smooth-lipped shell; To which, in silence hushed, his very soul listened intensely; for from within were heard Murmurings whereby the monitor expressed Mysterious union with its native sea. Even such a shell the universe itself Is to the ear of faith; and there are times, I doubt not, when to you it doth impart Authentic tidings of invisible things, Of ebb and flow, and ever enduring power, And central peace, subsisting at the heart Of endless Agitation. — William Wordsworth

HANNAH'S KENTUCKY CHOCOLATE CHIP PIE Ingredients: 1 stick butter or margarine, melted 2 eggs, beaten 1 cup sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla 1 cup chocolate chips 1 cup nuts, chopped 1 (9 inch) unbaked pie shell Preheat oven to 325 degrees. In small kettle, melt the margarine and set aside. In bowl, beat eggs, sugar, and vanilla. Add chocolate chips and nuts and stir. Add margarine and beat well. Put in unbaked pie shell. Bake for 50 minutes or until done. — Wanda E. Brunstetter

In school, they would tell you that life wouldn't come to you; you had to go out and make it your own. But when it came to love, the message for girls seemed to be this: Don't. Don't go after what you want. Wait. Wait to be chosen, as if only in the eye of another could one truly find value. The message was confusing and infuriating. It was a shell game with no actual pea under the rapidly moving cups. — Libba Bray

What did that feel like, to be a girl like Helen, unguarded, straightforward, who had allowed me to unpeel her like a mollusc from its shell, only to find that the exposure was devastating? That entrusting yourself entirely to someone can make you want to die? Helen, does it mean anything at all that I'm thinking these thoughts? That I'm able to remember and construct things differently? That for the first time I glimpsed it there from your point of view? Does it mean it's all over for me, for the old me? — Jill Dawson

Nothing prepared me for the loss of my mother. Even knowing that she would die did not prepare me. A mother, after all, is your entry into the world. She is the shell in which you divide and become a life. Waking up in a world without her is like waking up in a world without sky: unimaginable. — Meghan O'Rourke

Artemis grabbed her shoulders, for once abandoning his shell of icy composure. "Holly, Holly, speak to me. Your finger is it okay?"
Holly wiggled her fingers, then curled them into a fist.
"I think so," she said, and whacked Artemis right between the eyes. The surprised boy landed in a snowdrift for the third time that day.
Holly winked at an amazed butler.
"Now we're even," she said.
Commander Root didn't have many treasured memories. But in future days, when things were at their grimmest, he would conjure up this moment and have a quiet chuckle. — Eoin Colfer

It's been nice knowing you, Clara,
Huh? My brain still a bit shell-shocked.
Say a prayer for me, will you? He gives me a shaky grin.
Because I'm pretty sure my parents are going to kill me — Cynthia Hand

from The Prep Pantheon: An All-Time Great Alumni Association

Caroline Kennedy. Concord Academy '75. Harvard '80. On technical points Preppier than Mummy. During four years at Harvard Square, an unnatural fiber never went near her body (except for the shell of her L. L. Bean down vest). Her lacrosse game was ruthless, her brunch technique dazzling (smoked heavily, sat with the descendents of three other presidents). — Lisa Birnbach

Secrets and lies, they eat your insides until all you have left is a hard thin skin that covers you like the shell of one of those eggs you poke a little hole in and draw out its eggy contents before you dye it for Easter. — Russell Banks

I like to go into a little shell and be a hermit and make music for a while. — Delta Goodrem

I will gladly shell out $24.95 or $9.99 or 99 cents on iTunes to read or see or listen to the 24-karat treasure that you have refined from your pain and your vision and your imagination. I need it. We all do. We're struggling here in the trenches. That beauty, that wisdom, those thrills and chills, even that mindless escape on a rainy October afternoon - I want it. Put me down for it. — Steven Pressfield

Break out to go out:

The birds dare to break the egg shell
It does so in order to get out of that Hell
When it finally succeeds, it'll then fly
To its comfort zone it'll say bye
Are you being confined in a small space
How long will you remain at that place?
Before you can explore more territories,
Break away from the former glories.
Yesterday's excellence is today's average
You must strive to be better age after age
Never accept the available mediocrity
As the only preferable opportunity
Decide to grow from below to hero
And make it a point to vacate level zero
Reach out and arise with power
God's blessings on you, will shower
Agree to grow, never attempt to be slow
Be not afraid. Never doubt. You'll flow
The grace of God will be your guide
Taking you along, side by side. — Israelmore Ayivor

We shell out hundreds of dollars for tracking bands, something convicts are forced to wear. — Anonymous

deep-seated hatred between the cattlemen and the settler."40 This should come as no shock; the only surprise is that the big cattlemen would sometimes deny their attitude toward settlers. A settler who exercised his perfect right to 160 acres along a stream could significantly impair a big cowman's range; if several did so, the range would be lost altogether, as happened, for example, along Shell Creek in the Big Horn Basin. — John W. Davis

If he'd been making shell-cases during the war it might have been better for music. — Maurice Ravel

{Y}ou make do with what you're given, and I've spent a good many years learning to write fine-sounding sentences so that I can hide behind them. It's the way of the hermit crab, with nothing to recommend it but the pretty shell it annexes for its own. — Norman Lock

It was during this [as a kid] time that I came out of my shell vocally and performance wise, I learned how to really and truly sing in a different way ... my way. It was an amazing experience because I also realized my lifelong dream - to sing my own songs ... I have something to say and it was a great release for me to share that part of myself with others. — Tessanne Chin

Bees buzzed in the bean blossoms. And the sun beat down on the upturned shell of Om.
There is also a hell for tortoises.
He was too tired to waggle his That was all you could do, waggle your legs. And stick your head out as far as it would go and wave it about in the hope that you could lever yourself over. — Terry Pratchett

And in this self-expression I put all the thoughts I had about her, I released the anger she made me feel, my amorous way of thinking about her, my determination to exist for her, the desire for me to be me, and for her to be her, and the love for myself that I put in my love for her
all the things that could be said only in that conch shell wound into a spiral. — Italo Calvino

First, I have culled evidence that physical death is not the end of the road for any of us. I know this message is critical because I've seen people consumed by fear of death or suffering unbearable grief after losing a loved one. Some can draw into a shell, ceasing all efforts to reach their potential, or even give up on life. — Mark Ireland

Contact with the world, with which I have been steadily rubbing shoulders now for fourteen months, makes me feel more and more like returning to my shell. I hate the crowd, the herd. It seems to me always atrociously stupid or vile. — Gustave Flaubert

You cannot reason with a rifle bullet fired from across the battlefield. You cannot negotiate with an artillery shell lobbed from over the horizon. You cannot compromise with a nuclear warhead screaming in from half a world away. The only answer to the gun, the only defense for the gun, has been more guns. — Arthur C. Clarke

There was the same dazzling red glare. The sea gasped for air with each shallow, stifled wave that broke on the sand ... with every blade of light that flashed off the sand, from a bleached shell or a peice of broken glass, my jaws tightened. I walked for a long time. — Albert Camus

I want to be alone. Sympathies wasted on my hollow shell. I feel there's nothing left to fight for. No reason for a cause. — Sarah McLachlan

As long as it's a regular day, not too rough to begin with, the ocean is pretty smooth once you make it out past the first set of waves. That's why people are afriad to swim in the ocean. They try to jump over those waves and get slammed down to the bottom and pulled across the sand like a piece of shell. You've got to go throught them, dive under just when they're rising up for you, set your direction, close your eyes, and just swim like hell. Once you get throught that, you'll find there isn't a better place for swimming because it's the ocean and it goes on forever. You don't have to see anyone if you don't want to. If you look out, away from the beach, it's easy to imagine that there's no one else but you in the whole world, you and maybe a couple of sea gulls. — Ann Patchett

Our bodies are simply our shells, the package for the spirit and the soul. — Eric Samuel Timm

We humans think we are smart, but an orchid, for example,
knows how to produce noble, symmetrical flowers,
and a snail knows how to make a beautiful, well-proportioned shell.
Compared with their knowledge, ours is not worth much at all.
We should bow deeply before the orchid and the snail
and join our palms reverently before the monarch butterfly and the magnolia tree.
The feeling of respect for all species will help us recognize the noblest nature in ourselves.
Thich Nhat Hanh — Thich Nhat Hanh