I'm On The Verge Quotes & Sayings

I had nightmares about what Poseidon might turn me into if I were on the verge of death-plankton maybe.
-Percy Jackson — Rick Riordan

Happily, at forty-six I still feel as experimental and on the verge of getting at the truth as ever. — Virginia Woolf

What I really wanted was to travel and see all the different animals that were on the verge of extinction. — Leonardo DiCaprio

The greatest religion gives suffering to nobody," reads a weather-beaten sign, quoting the Buddha, at Chele La pass, the highest motorable point in the country, near Paro. This maxim is everywhere evident. As a Bhutanese friend and I walked in the mountains one afternoon, he reflexively removed insects from the path and gently placed them in the verge, out of harm's way. Early one morning in Thimphu, I saw a group of young schoolboys, in their spotless white-sleeved ghos, crouching over a mouse on the street, gently offering it food. In Bhutan, the horses that trudge up the steep trail to the Tiger's Nest monastery are reserved for out-of-shape tourists; Bhutanese don't consider horses beasts of burden and prefer not to make them suffer under heavy loads. Even harvesting honey is considered a sign of disrespect for the industrious bees; my young guide, Kezang, admonished me for buying a bottle of Bhutanese honey to take home. (Chastened, I left it there.) In — Madeline Drexler

It never was anything very splendid at the best," said he. He lifted the lamp from the table with a sort of abstraction, not remarking even my offer to take it from him, and led the way. He was on the verge of seventy, and looked his age; but it was a vigorous age, with no symptom of giving way. The circle of light from the lamp lit up his white hair and keen blue eyes and clear complexion; his forehead was like old ivory, his cheek warmly colored; an old man, yet a man in full strength. He was taller than I was, and still almost as strong. As he stood for a moment with the lamp in his hand, he looked like a tower in his great height and bulk. I reflected as I looked at him that I knew him intimately, more intimately than any other creature in the world, - I was familiar with every detail of his outward life; could it be that in reality I did not know him at all? * — Mrs. Oliphant

There's no district 12 to escape from now, no Peacekeepers to trick, no hungry mouths to feed. The Capitol took away all of that, and I'm on the verge of losing Gale as well. The glue of mutual needs that bonded us so tightly together for all those years is melting away. — Suzanne Collins

In adolescence, I hated life and was continually on the verge of suicide, from which, however, I was restrained by the desire to know more mathematics. — Bertrand Russell

been through enough. Don't do this to her." "I've done nothing to her," Naz says, his hand shifting higher, tightening around my throat. I gasp as he leans down, kissing my temple. "Nothing she hasn't wanted me to do." My mother's on the verge of hyperventilating. "Just let her go and let's talk about this. I'll give you whatever you want, whatever it is. Take me, but leave her alone. Please, I'm begging you. I'll do anything." Naz loosens his hold, and I breathe deeply, disoriented. "Johnny here?" "No." "Bet he went out the back door when he saw me, didn't he? — J.M. Darhower

She didn't look like any motel manager I had ever seen. More likely an actress who hadn't quite made the grade down south, or a very successful amateur tart on the verge of turning pro. Whatever her business was, there had to be sex in it. She was as full of sex as a grape is full of juice, and so young that it hadn't begun to sour. — Ross Macdonald

When you play in a band, you're in phase with people. When you're a DJ, you're totally off-phase. Your work time is 3 A.M. - 5 A.M. and I don't think you can connect. You're miserable the whole time. Whenever I see a DJ in the airport, they are always on the verge of crying. — Thomas Mars

You're annoying. You always act as if everything is so easy. 'Well, Oliver, it seems to me that your choice is either to quit or continue,'" he mimicked, remembering his father's advice when he'd been on the verge of leaving school. The other man only smiled. "I'm your father. It's my job to annoy you. — Courtney Milan

Really love him, I mean," Geilie persisted. "Not just to bed him; I know you want that, and he does too. They all do. But do you love him?"
Did I love him? Beyond the urges of the flesh? The hole had the dark anonymity of the confessional, and a soul on the verge of death had no time for lies.
"Yes," I said, and laid my head back on my knees.
It was silent in the hole for some time, and I hovered once more on the verge of sleep, when I heard her speak once more, as though to herself.
"So it's possible," she said thoughtfully. — Diana Gabaldon

Let's clear the air here,Joshua." She leaned forward,the confidence in her eyes sultry. "I like sex.i think it's an excellent form of entertainment. But I don't have to be entertained every time someone suggests a party.I select the time,the place, and my playmates."
Satisfied,she sat back and lazily chose a tiny cake from the basket. That, she was sure,should settle that.
"You might be able to get away with that.If you hadn't been trembling and moaning under me half an hour ago."
"I was not moaning."
He smiled. "Oh,yes.You were." Yes,indeed,he was feeling much,much better. "And on the verge of writhing."
"I never writhe."
"You will. — Nora Roberts

Do you know what the worst thing about literature is? . What? I said. That you end up being friends with writers. And friendship, treasure though it may be, destroys your critical sense. Once, said Don Pancracio, Monteforte Toledo dropped this riddle in my lap: a poet is lost in a city on the verge of collapse, with no money, or friends, or anyone to turn to. And of course, he neither wants nor plans to turn to anyone. For several days he roams the city and the country, eating nothing, or eating scraps. He's even stopped writing. Or he writes in his head: in other words, he hallucinates. All signs point to an imminent death. His drastic disappearance foreshadows it. And yet the poet doesn't die. — Roberto Bolano

I'd ask you to be careful tomorrow, if I thought you'd listen to me,' I said to him.
He looked sympathetic but annoyed. 'Mum, I'm not a baby anymore.' Then sensing that I was on the verge of crying, he hugged me gently to his chest.
I couldn't remember the last time he'd hugged me this way. With my face pressed next to his heart I whispered softly, 'You'll always be my baby.' The hug grew firmer and the teardrops began to fall freely. — Teresa Schulz

No one in my family or my circle of friends had ever had to confront something like this. Jamie was seventeen, a child on the verge of womanhood, dying and still very much alive at the same time. I was afraid, more afraid than I'd ever been, not only for her, but for me as well. I lived in fear of doing something wrong, of doing something that would offend her. Was it okay to ever get angry in her presence? Was it okay to talk about the future anymore? — Nicholas Sparks

Benjamin felt himself on the verge of a proposal--with an effort he choked back the impulse. "You're just the
romantic age," she continued--"fifty. Twenty-five is too wordly-wise; thirty is apt to be pale from overwork;
forty is the age of long stories that take a whole cigar to tell; sixty is--oh, sixty is too near seventy; but fifty is
the mellow age. I love fifty. — F Scott Fitzgerald

They're making me so weak that I'm on the verge of collapsing to the floor. I've kissed a few boys in the past . . . but Day makes me feel like I've never been kissed before. Like the world has melted away into something unimportant. — Marie Lu

-just on the verge of
becoming a woman, and in these three years and almost five months, I'd
reached maturity. I was older than the mountains outside. The wisdom
of the attic was in my bones, etched on my brain, part of my flesh. — V.C. Andrews

A beautiful word in the middle of a sentence can sometimes reduce me to tears in an interview, and when I'm reading, too. I've sometimes wondered whether I'm at the point of tears all the time because I use my eyes so much that they're strained and on the verge of tears anyway. — Michael Silverblatt

Poor Scott. Briefly, briefly, as a boy on the verge of manhood, he'd been so handsome and promising that the sequel must have seemed a dream; behind the acne and brain damage and bewildering alienation, he was a golden boy still. Probably he thought he'd given his poor old stepmom the thrill of her life. One thing was certain: at that moment he'd loved her and was sorry for ever thinking ill of her - she'd packed his lunch! - and wanted to convey this in some meaningful way. Probably, too, he was drunk and/or high. As Scott's only brother - a person who shared his sense of humor and some of his darker tendencies too - I considered explaining as much to Sandra, for what it was worth. Instead I said, "Welcome to the club." ". . . No!" I nodded. "Tongue and all." Sandra — Blake Bailey

We are on the verge of losing the traditional idea of the family, especially in Japan, where the declining birth rate shows no signs of stopping. This is precisely why I think we should consider with a sense of urgency what the new image of "family" should be like, and not fall into the nostalgism that days gone by were just better. — Mamoru Hosoda

You hunt and catch your own food. Am I correct?"
"We are fierce predators of the night," DeChevue said proudly.
Edwin tried again, "You hunt and gather your own food?"
DeChevue still didn't get it. "Yes, M'sieur. We hunt, proudly."
"You know, there is a special name for people who have to catch and kill everything they eat."
"And that name has been the terror of the night from the dawn of man. Which name would you like? I can supply many. Nosferatu? Das Vampire?"
"Peasant," Edwin said. "A person who has to provide all his own food is a peasant. How is it that you have lived all this time and are still ignorant of the division of labor?"
DeChevue's mouth opened and closed several times. Each time he seemed on the verge of saying something, yet each time words failed him. — Patrick E. McLean

It's not that I don't appreciate my life sober, but it's like there are two different people battling inside of me. I want to be good, do good, be a worker among workers, a friend among friends. But there's also this part of me that is so dissatisfied with everything, If I'm not living on the verge of death, I feel like I'm not really living. — Nic Sheff

I love heights. I love speed. I'm on the verge of being a pyromaniac. Maybe my phobia is boredom. — Erin Wasson

How lovely she was in her raiments of silk and levantine purple; the fabric provocatively set off the sheen of her white shoulders, which glistened with the sweat of the world. I was on the verge of giving in to the dangerous enticements of her caresses when I realized that I recognized her from an earlier encounter, back at the dawn of time. — Gerard De Nerval

Anyone who knows the history of the Pete Best Band or the Combo, we were on the verge of breaking in in America. In the mid-'60s, I had great songwriters; we wrote some great stuff. — Pete Best

I don't know who those other people are and what they did to you, but I'm not one of them," I whispered, on the verge of tears. (Molly)
"You are. You just don't know yet." (Victor) — A.B. Whelan

I'm on the verge of a total breakdown. Sciatica. Taxes. Cars. Fleas, possibly. It's an absurd existence. — Jonathan Ames

Ivy linked her arm through mine again and I led her toward where I left the car. As we walked, some shrieking, and yelling broke over the sounds of the party, and I glanced around for what was going on. Over on the other side of the fire, two girls were on the verge of what looked like a fight. I couldn't help but stare because I was so surprised. One of the girls reached out and yanked a handful of the other's hair. It was all downhill from there.
Beside me, Ivy laughed. "That's what she gets for trying to steal someone's man."
I tore my eyes off the fight and glanced at Ivy. "Seriously?"
"Them bitches be cray-cray," she slurred.
I didn't understand what that meant, but I laughed because it sounded ridiculous.
- Ivy & Rimmel — Cambria Hebert

Maybe you feel so consumed with the pull of your desire that you wonder if there is still hope for you. Perhaps you feel so beaten down by a certain trial in your life that you don't know if you will ever have the strength to get up again. Maybe you are so exhausted from your attempt to juggle all the different idols begging for your attention that you're on the verge of collapse. If you want to have genuine faith in a God who has the power to stand with you in the fire and bring you out unharmed, then I beg you to examine your faith, as Scripture tells us to do: Examine yourselves to see if your faith is genuine. — Kasey Van Norman

We're at war.
On the verge of an apocalypse filled with monsters and torture in a nightmare world.
And I'm standing here, a moonstruck teenager pining for an enemy soldier. What am I, crazy?
This time, I'm the first to turn away. — Susan Ee

After a short period spent in Brussels as a guest of a neurological institute, I returned to Turin on the verge of the invasion of Belgium by the German army, Spring 1940, to join my family. The two alternatives left then to us were either to emigrate to the United States, or to pursue some activity that needed neither support nor connection with the outside Aryan world where we lived. My family chose this second alternative. I then decided to build a small research unit at home and installed it in my bedroom. — Rita Levi-Montalcini

It little mattered whether my curiosity irritated him: I knew the pleasure of vexing and soothing him by turns; it was one I chiefly delighted in, and a sure instinct always prevented me from going too far: beyond the verge or provocation I never ventured; on the extreme brink I liked well to try my skill. Retaining every minute form of respect, every propriety of my station, I could still meet him in argument without fear of uneasy restraint: this suited both him and me. — Charlotte Bronte

Yet there are those who wonder. There are those who have gentle stirrings. And there are those who have stepped upon the beautiful threshold of awareness - all on the verge of perceiving that which there is to see. To these ones, I say, open your exquisite senses. Look with fine clarity into that which is beyond and beneath, within and without. In these coming critical times, listen to and heed the directives of your spirits that retain the high wisdom you are just now perceiving. — Mary Summer Rain

For a long time, I would go out of my way to have a personal appearance on the verge of an insane person, because it was closer to how I felt, but I looked so dumb. So, I just stopped. It was like, 'I'm just going to look like a banker.' — Kurt Braunohler

I catch your eye. I, who had been thinking myself so vast, a temple, a church, a whole universe, confined and capable of being everywhere on the verge of things and here too, am now nothing but what you see. — Virginia Woolf

Oh, I don't mind his being wicked: he's all the better for that; and as for disliking him - I shouldn't greatly object to being Lady Ashby of Ashby Park, if I must marry. But if I could be always young, I would be always single. I should like to enjoy myself thoroughly, and coquet with all the world, till I am on the verge of being called an old maid; and then, to escape the infamy of that, after having made ten thousand conquests, to break all their hearts save one, by marrying some high-born, rich, indulgent husband, whom, on the other hand, fifty ladies were dying to have.'

'Well, as long as you entertain these views, keep single by all means, and never marry at all: not even to escape the infamy of old-maidenhood. — Anne Bronte

No one knows what the Net will be like with emotion -'
'We know,' the Ghost said. 'Before Silence, our race was on the verge of extinction.' Violence and insanity had run rampant, savaging the PsyNet from within.
'Yes, exactly - *before* Silence. The Protocol's changed us, changed the Net. I'm alive today because of what I learned from the conditioning process. We won't go back to what we were. — Nalini Singh

I had already imagined how it would be next year.
I'd be at Columbia, and Marcus would move to Manhattan, or maybe one of the outer boroughs. I would study hard, and he would make money playing gigs at dingy bars. We'd spend countless hours going to clubs to see bands on the verge, touring obscure art exhibits, and sipping pot after pot of black coffee at hole-in-the-wall cafes. Many more hours would be spent lounging under the covers. We would never run out of witty and fascinating things to say to each other. Eventually, he'd apply to Columbia, and we'd be the sort of well-educated, cosmopolitan couple that confuse the suburbumpkins who never leave Pineville. — Megan McCafferty

We live so many lifetimes in one lifetime.

The most precious form of life is the child. Second is the cacao plant.

All I can do is do all I can. — Robyn Engel

I suppose you mean to scandalize society by announcing your betrothal to Miss Butterfield tonight."
"Of course," Oliver said, without a trace of irritation. "Unless you'd rather do it yourself. I'm more than happy to hand the office over to you, Gran. Maria and I will just nod and smile while you get all the glory for making the match."
Mercy. Talk about throwing down the gauntlet.
Mrs. Plumtree's mouth fell open. Then snapped shut. When she spoke again, her voice sounded strained, though Maria could have sworn she caught a gleam in the elderly lady's eye. "Perhaps I will. God knows you won't do it properly."
"Go ahead." His eyes said, I dare you.
There was a trace of smugness on his face now, as if he knew he was on the verge of winning.
A tense quiet fell over the carriage. Clearly Mrs. Plumtree and Oliver were each waiting for the other to back down. — Sabrina Jeffries

The year the bus drivers went on strike in Pittsburgh, I was twenty-three and living on the edge of the city in a neighborhood that was on the verge of becoming a ghetto. I had just been fired from a good job as a cartographer in a design studio where I had worked for about four months. — Said Sayrafiezadeh

A real litmus test for me is how people treat someone who is waiting on them. That's a dealbreaker for me.If I were on the verge of getting into a serious relationship and I saw that person be mean to a waiter ... I'm out. — Steven Soderbergh

After a few moments and a series of clicks, I heard, "Jayne here. How can I help you?"
"Actually, I'm the one that can help you."
"Ms. Lane," he said flatly.
"The one and only. You want to know what's going on in this city, Inspector? Join me for tea this afternoon. Four o'clock. At the bookstore." I caught myself on the verge of adding, in a deep announcer's voice, and come alone. I'm the product of a generation that watches too much TV. — Karen Marie Moning

You know, we all have our inner demons. I, for one - I can't speak for you, but I'm on the verge of moral collapse at any time. It can happen by the end of the show. — Glenn Beck

Irwin Silber, the editor of the folk magazine Sing Out! was there, too. In a few years' time he would castigate me publicly in his magazine for turning my back on the folk community. It was an angry letter. I liked Irwin, but I couldn't relate to it. Miles Davis would be accused of something similar when he made the album Bitches Brew, a piece of music that didn't follow the rules of modern jazz, which had been on the verge of breaking into the popular marketplace, until Miles's record came along and killed its chances. Miles was put down by the jazz community. I couldn't imagine Miles being too upset. — Bob Dylan

I'm on the verge of tears by the time we arrive at Pastels since I'm positive we won't get seated but the table is good, and relief that is almost tidal in scope washes over me in an awesome wave. — Bret Easton Ellis

I'm on the verge of suicide, so what's murder? — Bushwick Bill

I'm not used to girls, or familiar with their customs. I feel awkward around them, I don't know what to say. I know the unspoken rules of boys, but with girls I sense that I am always on the verge of some unforeseen, calamitous blunder. — Margaret Atwood

With you, I'm always on the verge - feeling dizzy like looking at waves - and you, my Love, make me tipsy ... — John Geddes

I think I would rather live on the verge of falling and let my security be in the all-sufficiency of the grace of God than to live in some pietistic illusion of moral excellence. Not that I don't want to be morally excellent but my faith isn't in the idea that I'm more moral than anybody else. My faith is in the idea that God and His love are greater than whatever sins any of us commit. — Rich Mullins

We are a people that have always celebrated other people's success so long as we always had the opportunity to meet that success ourselves. That is the American nature. That is the American character. That is one of the things that makes us different from the rest of the world. And I'm afraid we could lose that or are on the verge of losing that. — Marco Rubio

Like I'm on the verge of just blowing up. All the stress and pressure and anxiety just bubbling up. — Ned Vizzini

I'm teetering on the verge of tears and I feel like such a wuss. Who am I to be crying when all these people just got displaced from their homes? No one. That's who. — Anna Banks

I feel as if I'm always on the verge of waking up. — Fernando Pessoa

He raked his hand through his hair. 'This is more difficult than I'd anticipated.'
Good, she thought. If he was going to break her heart, she didn't want it to be easy for him.
'What I'm trying to say is that I had it all wrong. I don't want a wife who...'
'You don't want a wife?' she choked.
'No!' he practically yelled. Then he continued in a more normal tone, 'I don't want a wife who will look the other way if I stray.'
'You want me to /watch?/
'No, I want you to be furious.'
Ellie was by now on the verge of tears. 'You deliberately want to make me angry? To hurt me?'
'No. Oh, God, you've got it all wrong...I just want you to love me so much that if I did [be unfaithful] - which I'm not going to - you would want to have me drawn and quartered. — Julia Quinn

A customs man at JFK had asked them to open the suitcases (in case they were smuggling in Indian fruits or sweets, perhaps). 'Ulysses!' the large bespectacled disbelieving customs man had said. 'Are you a student?' Ananda had nodded, though he was in the equivalent of high school. 'I wouldn't read Ulysses unless I was a student!' said the customs man, shutting the suitcase after his glimpse into the tantalising freemasonry of studenthood. A potentially incendiary book then - on the verge of being, but not quite, contraband. And near-unreadable. Ananda — Amit Chaudhuri

I believe we have made a decision now that will permit us to create an economic order in the world that will promote more growth, more equality, better preservation of the environment, and a greater possibility of world peace, we are on the verge of a global economic expansion that is sparked by the fact that the United States at this critical moment decided that we would compete, not retreat. — William J. Clinton

This ghost angel told me that you were inside that demon over there." She points to Beliel who seems on the verge of losing consciousness in the passenger seat. "He said that you might come out any minute. I didn't believe him of course. That's crazy talk. But still, you never know." She shrugs. "And look what happened." She squints at me suspiciously. "It is you, isn't it? — Susan Ee

Sure, I've gotten some disbelieving stares when I've tried to explain this little habit of mine to, say, a bus seatmate. I've watched a guy adjust his posture, or get up and move back several rows, even if it meant he now sat next to someone else who was clearly on the verge of some other kind of insanity. — Steve Martin

My fingers draw up her back and tangle into her hair. "They'll never separate us."
"Never," she repeats.
Our lips crush together, our bodies pressed tight. An inferno of lips and hands and movements that continues to grow in heat. The blanket falls away as Rachel slides her legs so that she straddles me. On the verge of burning up completely, I groan and cling to her small frame. Her hands drift under my shirt, leaving a singeing trail.
We've become a wildfire. Almost unstoppable. I kiss her neck and the beautiful sounds escaping her mouth encourage me further. My hands skim under her shirt, up her back, linger for seconds near her bra, and I gently nip her ear when I feel lace.
Images pour into my mind of what she'd look like with her shirt off, then her jeans. My fist traps strands of her hair. "I want you, Rachel."
And because I do, I kiss her fully on the mouth - nothing left to the imagination. Every fantasy becomes a reality with that one embrace. — Katie McGarry

I'm on the verge of taking a stand. — Tom Hollander

I knew what she meant, and in that moment felt as though I had shaken off some of the dust and grit of ten dry years; then and always, however she spoke to me, in half sentences, single words, stock phrases of contemporary jargon, in scarcely perceptible movements of eyes or lips or hands, however inexpressible her thought, however quick and far it had glanced from the matter in hand, however deep it had plunged, as it often did, straight from the surface to the depths, I knew; even that day when I still stood on the extreme verge of love, I knew what she meant. — Evelyn Waugh

If I die tonight it will be with every single thing unfinished (like, I suppose, any other night), and yet, what a gift to die on the verge of tears. I have spent my life trying to understand the way this rock and this ache go together, why a granite peak is more dramatic half dressed in clouds ... ,why sunlight under fog is better than the sum of its parts, why my best days and my worst days are always the same days, why (often) leaving seems like the only solution to the predicament of loving (each other) the world. — Pam Houston

The feeling of the supremacy of general over particular, of law over fact, of theory over personal experience, took root in my mind at an early age and gained increasing strength as the years advanced. It was the town that played the major role in shaping this feeling, a feeling which later became the basis for a philosophic outlook on life. When I heard boys who were studying physics and natural history repeat the superstitious notions about "unlucky" Monday, or about meeting a priest crossing the road, I was utterly indignant. I felt that my intelligence had been insulted, and I was on the verge of doing any mad thing to make them abandon their shameless superstitions. — Leon Trotsky

You did not just say that. I have a feeling we're on the verge of hugging and coming up with cute nicknames for each other. — Richelle Mead

I like myself.

Not once did I ever hate myself.

My basic, but high specs; my decent face; and my pessimistic, but realistic thinking; I didn't hate any single one of them.

But now, for the first time, I was on the verge of hating myself.

I arbitrarily placed my expectations on her, I arbitrarily forced my ideals on her, I arbitrarily acted as if I understood her, and I arbitrarily disappointed myself. Over and over again, I'd warn myself, yet I just wouldn't learn.

- - Even Yukinoshita Yukino tells lies.

For not being able to acknowledge something so obvious, I hate myself. — Wataru Watari

What I have always found most comforting about these forms is the trace of hope I get as I'm filling them out. How they break your life down into such tidy realms, making each seem tractable, because discrete, in a way they never are beyond the white noise of the waiting room. You get that fleeting sense that you're on the verge of being understood, truly and fully, and for the first time, if you could just get it all down in black and white before the receptionist calls your name. — Adam Haslett

It is the reign of Autumn, the height of the Carnival of Decay, the roses have got inflammation in their blushes, an uncanny hectic tinge, through their soft damask. I felt myself like a creeping thing on the verge of destruction, gripped by ruin in the midst of a whole world ready for lethargic sleep. — Knut Hamsun

I remember in 2000, when President Clinton came to Cartagena just before Plan Colombia started, the country was on the verge of becoming a failed state. Today, we are one of the most solid democracies, where institutions are working, where the scandals such as false positives have come to light because of those functioning institutions. — Juan Manuel Santos

There were three classes of inhabitants who either frequent or inhabit the country which we had now entered: first, the loggers, who, for a part of the year, the winter and spring, are far the most numerous, but in the summer, except for a few explorers for timber, completely desert it; second, the few settlers I have named, the only permanent inhabitants, who live on the verge of it, and help raise supplies for the former; third, the hunters, mostly Indians, who range over it in their season. — Henry David Thoreau

I put my hand in my pocket and squeeze my rocks and wonder if there is a word for the marks you get on your palm when you squeeze something so hard that the skin is on the verge of ripping. — Amy Zhang

So many times I've wanted to crack up, standing there stiff while seven women are crawling round my toes fixing hems and the designer's having a freak-out because the denim cuffs are crooked. I'm on the verge of hysteria. — Helena Christensen

I was on the verge of ruin but well-compensated by the miracle of still being alive at my age. — Gabriel Garcia Marquez

I was on the verge of crying with grief at still being alive. — Knut Hamsun

Leave already, because I'm on the verge of hypothetically kicking my foot up your ass, and I doubt the pain of it will be pretend. — Devon Ashley

With a click, my novel would be born; it would come out into the light suddenly transformed from the hypothetical text composed in my imagination into finished, tangible thing with a real and independent existence. The moment of clicking on the print button always gave rise to strange and powerful ambivalence
a combination of self-satisfaction, gloom and anxiety. Self-satisfaction for having finished writing the book. Gloom because taking my leave of the characters has the same effect on me as when a group of friends have to depart. And anxiety, perhaps because I am on the verge of delivering up into other people's hands something that I treasure. — Alaa Al Aswany

Thalia had gotten herself turned into a pine tree when she was twelve. Me ... Well, I was doing
my best not to follow her example. I had nightmares about what Poseidon might turn me into
if I were ever on the verge of death
plankton, maybe. Or a floating patch of kelp. — Rick Riordan

A few months ago, I was sitting morosely at my desk, wondering why I had ever agreed to review Barbara Bush: A Memoir for an English newspaper. The experience was proving to be a degradation of the act of reading. Imagine, if you will, being strapped into a chair and made to listen to Liberace playing the piano for hour upon hour. Or imagine being fed chocolate dinner mints, like a hapless goose, until you are on the verge of explosion. Such was my lot. — Christopher Hitchens

When Beth struggles for words it means she's on the verge of saying something worth hearing. Her emotions confuse her. Maybe tonight, she'll finally find the courage to say the words I'm longing to hear. — Katie McGarry

Patrick shakes his head and we're both on the verge of tears then, like we've finally destroyed each other, finally eaten each other alive. We're never coming back from this; I know it. Both of us have finally gone too far. — Katie Cotugno

I have lost years that I will never get back. Only now am I just beginning to live, on the verge of old age. It is painful and unfair. But today I have a different attitude to life: it can't be constructed from superficial things, no matter how attractive they may appear. Neither wealth not appearances have any importance now.
Pain gave me new life. It took a long time for me to die as Malika, General Oufkir's eldest daughter, the child of a powerful figure, of a past. I've gained an identity. My own identity. And that is priceless.
If there had not been all that waste, all that horror ... I'd almost venture to say that my suffering made me grow. In any case, it changed me. for the better. It's as well to make the best of things. — Malika Oufkir

I tried the paleo diet, which is the caveman diet - lots of meat. And I tried the calorie restriction diet: The idea is that if you eat very, very little - if you're on the verge of starvation, you will live a very long time, whether or not you want to, of course. — A. J. Jacobs

I eat out of stress, she told Robbie, and now, between work and her nephews driving her crazy, she was just on the verge of having to switch from her MEDIUM to her FAT AS A HOG wardrobe again, which meant she was going to have to switch shoe sizes as well. Robbie said she was the only perwon in America who gained weight in her feet. — Fannie Flagg

Somehow I have been stunned. Stand back!
Give me a little time beyond my cuffed head and slumbers
and dreams and gaping,
I discover myself on the verge of the usual mistake. — Walt Whitman

Sure there are times when one cries with acidity,
'Where are the limits of human stupidity?'
Here is a critic who says as a platitude
That I am guilty because 'in gratitude
Sherlock, the sleuth-hound, with motives ulterior,
Sneers at Poe's Dupin as "very inferior".'
Have you not learned, my esteemed communicator,
That the created is not the creator?
As the creator I've praised to satiety
Poe's Monsieur Dupin, his skill and variety,
And have admitted that in my detective work
I owe to my model a deal of selective work.
But is it not on the verge of inanity
To put down to me my creation's crude vanity?
He, the created, would scoff and would sneer,
Where I, the creator, would bow and revere.
So please grip this fact with your cerebral tentacle:
The doll and its maker are never identical. — Arthur Conan Doyle

You aren't enjoying my misery, are you?" I admitted with a little sigh of defeat. "No, of course not," Armand said, "only, as usual, you don't really seem miserable. You're on the verge of an adventure, and just a little more cautious this time than when you let that mortal run off with your body and you took his." "No, not more cautious. Terrified. I think this creature, Memnoch, is the Devil. — Anne Rice

I'm always on the verge of death in my head. — Howie Mandel

I should run, but I'm paralyzed by the sight of him. Even moving slowly, Isaiah possesses the prowess of a panther. His muscles pronounced in the easy way he strides. The set, determined gaze on me as his prey. This only proves how weak I am. Like the animal on the verge of being devoured in the wild, I stand here stunned by his dangerous beauty. — Katie McGarry

You know what would help?" I asked, not meeting his eyes.
"Hmm?"
"If you turned off this crap music and put on something that came out after the Berlin Wall went down."
Dimitri laughted. "Your worst class is history, yet somehow, you know everything about Eastern Europe."
"Hey, gotta have material for my jokes, Comrade." Still smiling, he turned the radio dail. To a country station.
"Hey! This isn't what I had in mind," I exclaimed. I could tell he was on the verge of laughing again.
"Pick. It's one or the other."
I sighed. "Go back to the 1980s stuff."
He flipped the dail, and I crossed my arms over my chest as some vaguely European-sounding band sang about how video had killed the radio star. I wished someone would kill this radio. — Richelle Mead

Hesitantly, I touched the stump where my finger used to be. In my mind, something almost remembered itself, but the fumes of turpentine were making me a little lightheaded; whatever memory was on the verge of coughing itself up was gone even before it materialized. Out the window, I could see a squirrel was stumbling erratically around in circles underneath the old basketball net. Then I realized that it wasn't a squirrel; it was a brown paper bag. — Dan Chaon

I shall be as willing as the next man to fall down in worship before the System, if only I can manage to set eyes on it. Hitherto I have had no success; and though I have young legs, I am almost weary from running back and forth ...
Once or twice I have been on the verge of bending the knee. But at the last moment, when I already had my handkerchief spread on the ground, to avoid soiling my trousers, and I made a trusting appeal to one of the initiated who stood by: "Tell me now sincerely, is it entirely finished; for if so I will kneel down before it, even at the risk of ruining a pair of trousers (for on account of the heavy traffic to and from the system, the road has become quite muddy)," - I always receive the same answer: "No, it is not yet quite finished." And so there was another postponement - of the system, and of my homage.
System and finality are pretty much one and the same, so much so that if the system is not finished, there is no system. — Soren Kierkegaard

Just as I watch him sit on a beach, on the trembling verge of walking out of his prison, so I watch all of us with the same hopes and dreams. I am always here. I am love.

And I cannot be contained. — Geoff Visgilio

There's a mix of longing and sadness in his eyes, but he's not letting me get any closer. Seeing that brings me back to myself. Back to the here and now. The invasion. My mom. My sister. The massacres. They all come rushing back. He's right. We're at war. On the verge of an apocalypse filled with monsters and torture in a nightmare world. And I'm standing here, a moonstruck teenager pining for an enemy soldier. What am I, crazy? — Susan Ee

Wherever there is one job on the verge of being lost, I will fight to save it. Wherever there is one company looking to grow in West Virginia, I will fight to make that growth a reality. — Joe Manchin

I was already dozing off in the shade, dreaming that the rustling trees were my many selves explaining themselves all at the same time so that I could not make out a single word. My life was a beautiful mystery on the verge of understanding, always on the verge! Think of it! — Charles Simic

At this moment, as I stood on the verge of tears, the words "realism" and "romanticism" welled up within me. I have no sense of realism. And that this very fact might be what permits me to go on living sends cold chills through my whole body. — Osamu Dazai

When I was little I always thought I was marked out, special, on the verge of something momentous. I used to tingle with anticipation. — Felicity Kendal

I'm one of those people who when I go over a bridge, I want to jump. It's just this intense tickle in the back of my throat. It's like I'm on the verge the whole time I'm walking over that bridge, and I'm not going to get a release until I jump. — Willem Dafoe