Halfway Point Quotes & Sayings

There were a lot of botched kills throughout the eastern part of Kentucky when the work fell outside his control. Six or seven years ago, a man from Perry County was shot point blank in the head and left for dead in the middle of downtown. Problem was, the bullet had traveled between the man's scalp and his skull halfway across his head and exited the same way it had entered on the other side. The whole thing had left him with only fingernail-sized contusions on both sides of his head. He identified the guy who shot him and saw him arrested and convicted of attempted murder.
Now, it's true that a situation like that was a rare one, but part of doing a job right was minimizing the chance for something to go wrong. — Sheldon Lee Compton

I'm getting my stuff," he said, and bolted for the steps.
"You don't have to move out," Astrid called after him.
Sam stopped halfway up the steps. "Oh, I'm sorry. Is that the voice of the council telling me where I can go?"
"There's no point having a town council if you think you don't have to listen to it," Astrid said. She was using her patient voice, trying to calm the situation. "Sam, if you ignore us, no one will pay attention."
"Guess what, Astrid, they're already ignoring you. The only reason anyone pays any attention to you and the others is because they're scared of Edilio's soldiers." He thumped his chest. "And even more scared of me. — Michael Grant

Our religious police has the most dangerous effect on society - the segregation of genders, putting the wrong ideas in the heads of men and women, producing psychological diseases that never existed in our country before, like fanatacism. — Basmah Bint Saud

Aidan gasped. "How did you get into my email?" "Not the point right now." Jamie waved him off as his eyes tracked down the list, freezing halfway. — Layla Reyne

And while you were paying attention to these things, you were momentarily delivered from daydreams, from memories, from anticiaptions, from silly notions - from all the symptoms of you."
"Isn't tasting me?"
...
"I'd say it was halfway between me and not-me. Tasting is not-me doing something for the whole organism. And at the same time tasting is me being conscious of what's happening. And that's the point of our chewing-grace - to make the me more conscious of what the not-me is up to. — Aldous Huxley

As we reached the turning of the hall, Randall spoke behind us. "Jamie," he said. The voice was hoarse with shock, and held a note halfway between disbelief and pleading. Jamie stopped then, and turned to look at him. Randall's face was a ghastly white, with a small red patch livid on each cheekbone. He had taken off his wig, clenched in his hands, and sweat pasted the fine dark hair to his temples. "No." The voice that spoke above me was soft, almost expressionless. Looking up, I could see that the face still matched it, but a quick, hot pulse beat in his neck, and the small, triangular scar above his collar flushed red with heat. "I am called Lord Broch Tuarach for formality's sake," the soft Scottish voice above me said. "And beyond the requirements of formality, you will never speak to me again - until you beg for your life at the point of my sword. Then, you may use my name, for it will be the last word you ever speak. — Diana Gabaldon

The stupid line was so long that aluminum could have rusted in the time it took them to reach the halfway point. — Brandon Sanderson

I missed her so much I wanted to die: a hard, physical longing, like a craving for air underwater. Lying awake, I tried to recall all my best memories of her - to freeze her in my mind so I wouldn't forget her - but instead of birthdays and happy times I kept remembering things like how a few days before she was killed she'd stopped me halfway out the door to pick a thread off my school jacket. For some reason, it was one of the clearest memories I had of her: her knitted eyebrows, the precise gesture of her reaching out to me, everything. Several times too - drifting uneasily between dreaming and sleep - I sat up suddenly in bed at the sound of her voice speaking clearly in my head, remarks she might conceivably have made at some point but that I didn't actually remember, things like Throw me an apple, would you? and I wonder if this buttons up the front or the back? and This sofa is in a terrible state of disreputableness. — Donna Tartt

A Book I Can Put Down

I'm halfway through
and I've gotten used
to the way it wants
to be read. This writer
wants to spoon it up,
wants to watch me
swallow it. This writer
makes a point of good
deeds, clean living,
god and country,
when what I want
is sin and shame,
the rusty metal edge
of cruelty, varieties
of pain, his mother
still crying years later,
just like mine. I want
a writer who's given up
on the moral of the story,
one who'll hand me
a knife and sit back
to see what I do with it.

(Published in Anderbo) — Antonia Clark

As an architect you are a builder. You are of course more than a builder. You need to be a militant, you have to be a poet, you have to be a visionary, you have to be an artist. But certainly you have to be a builder. Everything starts from there. — Renzo Piano

At the halfway point of any drunken night, there is a moment when an Indian realizes he cannot turn back toward tradition and that he has no map to guide him toward the future. — Sherman Alexie

The summit is just a halfway point. — Ed Viesturs

[Optimism] is not about providing a recipe for self-deception. The world can be a horrible, cruel place, and at the same time it can be wonderful and abundant. These are both truths. There is not a halfway point; there is only choosing which truth to put in your personal foreground. — Sonja Lyubomirsky

The great festival of Lughnasa was held at Carmun once every three years. The site of Carmun was eerie. In a land of wild forest and bog, it was an open grassy space that stretched, green and empty, halfway to the horizon. Lying some distance west of the point where, if you were following it upstream, the Liffey's course began to retreat eastwards on the way to its source in the Wicklow Mountains, the place was absolutely flat, except for some mounds in which ancestral chiefs were buried. The festival lasted a week. There were areas reserved for food and livestock markets, and another where fine clothes were sold; but the most important quarter was where a large racetrack was laid out on the bare turf. — Edward Rutherfurd

What happens if you lose?" Jeremy pressed.
"I don't see it as winning or losing. I'm just looking for a middle ground," he [Justin] said. "I get that technology is convenient and has its benefits. We definitely can't live without it. We can't go back to living in caves. But most people are so plugged in, they're not even living in the real world. Our lives aren't grounded by anything. Being too dependent on something makes you a slave to it. And I sure as hell won't worship a digital screen. So I'm looking for a halfway point. A balance. It's not just about ending digital school. It's about having a choice. — Katie Kacvinsky

I was learning the nature of magic; it seemed to work according to a strict set of rules. And yet, somehow, it never worked in quite the way you expected. — Juliet Marillier

My grandmother caught me climbing the highest tree in her yard, the one we were all forbidden to attempt. All five feet of her stood tall as she tilted her head back and squinted up at me. "Well, don't stop now," she said. "If you're going to fall no use doing it from the halfway point. Keep climbing and let's see just how high you can go. — Toni Sorenson

Short boots are cool, in my humble opinion. They say, 'Hey! Winter is over, but summer hasn't yet arrived - so enjoy this halfway point!' — Rachel Nichols

Mean, if you start a book and a couple of chapters in you decide you just aren't into it that's one thing, but once you reach the halfway point, there's no turning back. You're obligated. — Kim Holden

The only thing that could possibly seperate me from him right now would be a bolt of lightening. Or the fact that it's raining so hard I can't breathe. — Colleen Hoover

Gentleness! more powerful than Hercules. — Ninon De L'Enclos

No word makes me happier than the word "daddy" when it's directed to me. — Michael Josephson

Every patient tends to bury the most important story inside some other story, just the way new writers often 'bury the lede.' 'Burying the lede' is an old journalism term for when you only find out the real point about halfway into the article, but it also applies to therapy. — Gina Barreca

Steve Jobs in a new analog way: by sending snail mail. The U.S. Postal Service has approved a commemorative stamp honoring the Apple co-founder to be printed as part of a collectible series next year. Stamp subjects are traditionally kept a secret until just before printing to raise public demand, however, — Anonymous

It's funny, because when you're younger you're in a rush to be 18 or 21 or whatever. But then you hit 30. And now, the days go by like hours. You think, 40, man, this could be the halfway point. It could be the three-quarters point, you know? Who knows? — Mark Wahlberg

I spent four minutes yesterday looking for the halfway point between where I am & where I want to be. I found the city - you just have to tell me if you want pizza, coffee or strange street meat. Just four minutes searching, but all day (really all week), I've been thinking of this letter & you. — Darnell Lamont Walker

Loving someone is easy. It's your car and all you have to do is start the engine, give her a little gas and point the thing wherever you want to go. But being loved is like being taken for a ride in someone else's car. Even if you think they'll be a good driver, you always have the innate fear they might do something wrong: in an instant you'll both be flying through the windshield toward imminent disaster. Being loved can be the most frightening thing of all. Because love means good-bye to control; and what happens if halfway or three-quarters of the way through the trip you decide you want to go back, or in a different direction, and you're only the codriver? — Jonathan Carroll

I'm going to fuck you, hard. I'm going to use your body until I come inside you. And then we're going to play. All night long — Jaci Burton

If you are willing to take the punishment, you're halfway through the battle. That the issues may be trivial, the battle ugly, is another point. — Lillian Hellman

In my career as a director, there's always been some point where you get halfway through it, or three-quarters, and you go: 'What is this thing all about, and why am I telling the story? Does anybody really care about seeing this?' At that time you have to say: 'OK, forget that and just go ahead.' — Clint Eastwood

Yes, as a people we are spoiled. We look for dinners that take two minutes to cook in our microwave instead of five, and we audibly sigh if the directions on the box require us to stir at the halfway point. Aw, I gotta stir? See what else is in the freezer. — Martha Bolton

He could see himself selling himself as a compelling mutation, a young god, proud to the point of sexy arrogance of his anatomical deviation: ninety percent thriving muscled man-flesh and ten percent glorious blindingly white angel wing.
Baby, these feathers are going to tickle you halfway to heaven, and this man-part is going to take you the rest of the way. — Michael Cunningham

He proposed an imitation game. There would be a man (A), a woman (B) and an interrogator (C) in a separate room, reading the written answers from the others, trying to work out which was the woman. B would be trying to hinder the process. Now, said Turing, imagine that A was replaced by a computer. Could the interrogator tell whether they were talking to a machine or not after five minutes of questioning? He gave snatches of written conversation to show how difficult the Turing Test would be: Q: Please write me a sonnet on the subject of the Forth Bridge. A: Count me out on this one. I never could write poetry. To imitate that a computer would need deep knowledge of social mores and the use of language. To pass the Turing Test the computer would have to do more than imitate. It would have to be a learning entity. — David Boyle

The person who is not strong enough gives up at the halfway point - but you are limiting yourself before even starting. — Confucius

I am, I must confess, suspicious of those who denounce others for having too much sex. At what point does a healthy amount become too much? There are, of course, those who suffer because their desire for sex has become compulsive; in their case the drive (loneliness, guilt) is at fault, not the activity as such. When morality is discussed I invariably discover, halfway into the conversation, that what is meant are not the great ethical questions but the rather dreary business of sexual habit, which to my mind is an aesthetic rather than an ethical issue. — Edmund White

The pictures I contemplate painting would constitute a halfway state and attempt to point out the direction of the future - without arriving there completely — Jackson Pollock

Dear me! how long is art!
And short is our life!
I often know amid the scholar's strife
A sinking feeling in my mind and heart.
How difficult the means are to be found
By which the primal sources may be breached;
And long before the halfway point is reached,
They bury a poor devil in the ground. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

That's the point of Zeno's Paradox, isn't it? Whatever your goal, you're never more than halfway there. — Sam A. Patel