Just Tried Quotes & Sayings

I grew up believing in God without having a clue what He is like. I called myself a Christian, was pretty involved in church, and tried to stay away from all of the things that 'good Christians' avoid- drinking, drugs, sex, swearing. Christianity was simple: fight your desires in order to please God. Whenever I failed (which was often), I'd walk around feeling guilty and distant from God. In hindsight, I don't think my church's teachings were incorrect, just incomplete. My view of God was narrow and small. — Francis Chan

The way I saw the characters these things just happened naturally. At the same time - and I know it's probably not apparent when you read the book - but I really tried to hold back because I didn't want it to become a cartoon. — Donald Ray Pollock

Again And Again And Again

You said the anger would come back

just as the love did.

I have a black look I do not

like. It is a mask I try on.

I migrate toward it and its frog

sits on my lips and defecates.

It is old. It is also a pauper.

I have tried to keep it on a diet.

I give it no unction.

There is a good look that I wear

like a blood clot. I have

sewn it over my left breast.

I have made a vocation of it.

Lust has taken plant in it

and I have placed you and your

child at its milk tip.

Oh the blackness is murderous

and the milk tip is brimming

and each machine is working

and I will kiss you when

I cut up one dozen new men

and you will die somewhat,

again and again. — Anne Sexton

I tried to just do things like make some money, be responsible, help out other artists who I see have had a similar path. — Ariel Pink

There's sex, and there's ... this." He met my eyes. "Just being with someone like this. This isn't something that can be bought or sold, and I couldn't manufacture it for someone no matter how much they tried to pay me for it." He ran the backs of his fingers down my cheek. "That's why I'm here tonight. Because I needed this. And here, with you, is the only place I can get it." He swallowed hard. "Or give it. — Lauren Gallagher

One night i rode home - it was a confession - and i came staggering across the yard and i fell into the rosebush and crawled up the stairs on my hands and knees and i was sick on the floor beside my bed. In the morning I tried to tell him I was sorry, and do you know what he said? 'Why, Tom, you were just jolly'. 'Jolly,' if I did it. A drunken man didn't crawl home. Just Jolly — John Steinbeck

So you never really tried to solve the problem.
Oh, c'mon. Can you ever "solve" poverty? Can you ever "solve" crime? Can you ever "solve" disease, unemployment, war, or any other societal herpes? Hell no. All you can hope for is to make them manageable enough to allow people to get on with their lives. That's not cynicism, that's maturity. You can't stop the rain. All you can do is just build a roof that you hope won't leak, or at least won't leak on the people who are gonna vote for you.
What does that mean?
C'mon ...
Seriously. What does that mean?
Fine, whatever, "Mister Smith goes to motherfuckin' Washington," it means that, in politics, you focus on the needs of your power base. Keep them happy, and they keep you in office. — Max Brooks

When they tried me out as a host on TV, I found that I just couldn't be that gregarious person. I was stranger than that. — Barbra Streisand

He felt a strange urge, right then, just to put his head down and walk past, off into the night and never look back. Then he wouldn't have to be the Bloody-Nine again... He could've gone far away, and started new, and been whoever he wanted. But he'd tried that once already, and it had done him no good. The past was always right behind him, breathing on his neck. It was time to turn around and face it. — Joe Abercrombie

Marcus Flutie slept with just about every girl on the Eastern Seaboard except me. Though, he tried to get into my panties when I was a freshman but turned him down because I refuse to disempower myself just for a few clit twitches. — Megan McCafferty

Easy, vampire." She pulled his hands away from his neck and held them against his chest. He was strong, though, and she had to plaster the weight of her body on his to ease his struggle and keep him from tearing at his own skin. "I know it hurts, but the ash is working." She hoped. God, she hoped. If she'd made things worse, she'd never forgive herself. Gradually, he stopped fighting, but he kept hold of her hands, even when she tried to extricate herself from his grip. Between her thighs, he was hot, his body so wide she figured she'd feel the tug of tightness in the morning. Dear God, what would sex with him be like, if just holding him still gave her muscle strains? And why in the world would her mind go there? — Larissa Ione

The bedlamite little hats in which American women have tried to out-lunatic each other for the past four years prove conclusively we don't dress to please anyone. We're just docile sheep who accept what's given us. — Beatrice Fairfax

Most of the songs I write are just very directly from my life. I don't have a big imagination. Whenever I tried to write from fantasy, it comes out sounding really fake. — Rivers Cuomo

Tom laughed at the owner's blunt response, and asked another question.
"Chief, how do I say something like, 'you're beautiful', in Russian?"
" ... 'Vi ocharovatelny'."
"Err ... Bee, acherabatennen."
However, hearing this, the Caucasian woman looked confused at Tom, and spoke to the owner behind the counter.
" ... What is this man saying? It is unintelligible. I question its relation to the Japanese language."
With a bitter smile, the owner turned his head towards the woman, and spoke to her.
"'Vi ocharovatelny'."
" ... Why do you suddenly speak these social compliments? Please concisely explain your reasoning."
"That's what that young man over there just tried to say to you."
"In which language, exactly? — Ryohgo Narita

I knew I was in love with Lorri when I started to wake up in the middle of the night furious and cursing her for making me feel the way she did. It was pain beyond belief. Nothing has ever hurt me that way. I tried to sleep as much as possible just to escape. I was grinding my teeth down to nubs. Now, years later, it's exactly the opposite. Now there is no pain, yet she still makes my heart explode. Now there is only fun and love and silliness. She drives me to frenzy, because I can never get enough. — Damien Echols

On the other hand he tried to point out to her that she shouldn't give money to the beggars in the street, as they'd only buy schnapps with it. But she kept doing it. "They can do what they like with the money," she said. When Ove protested she just smiled and took his big hands in hers and kissed them, explaining that when a person gives to another person it's not just the receiver who's blessed. It's the giver. — Fredrik Backman

I have felt alone all my life. I was always too smart, or working too hard, or too full of doubt to fit in with everyone else. But when I'm with you, I never feel alone, Will. Never. I feel seen, and I feel listened to, and I feel important and cared for. When I first met you, I told myself I had to be insane to think that someone like you would be interested in someone like me. But it didn't stop me from falling in love with you, because loving you is as easy and as natural as breathing for me. This may shock you, but my love doesn't come with conditions or requirements. It absolutely doesn't require physical exam, that is for sure. It just is, Will. And it's unstoppable, because, believe me, I've tried to stop it. So I guess what I'm trying to say in my usual inarticulate, rambly, too-wordy way, is that I'm not going anywhere. No matter what. — Sarah Mayberry

At first he had appreciated only the material quality of the sounds which those instruments secreted. And it had been a source of keen pleasure when, below the narrow ribbon the violin part, delicate, unyielding, substantial and governing the whole, he had suddenly perceived, where it was trying to surge upwards in a flowing tide of sound, the mass of the piano-part, multiform, coherent, level, and breaking everywhere in melody like the deep blue tumult of the sea, silvered and charmed into a minor key by the moonlight. But at a given moment, without being able to distinguish any clear outline, or to give a name to what was pleasing him, suddenly enraptured, he had tried to collect, to treasure in his memory the phrase or harmony - he knew not which - that had just been played, and had opened and expanded his soul, just as the fragrance of certain roses, wafted upon the moist air of evening, has the power of dilating our nostrils. — Marcel Proust

Kaidan had been captivated by the store owner's deep Texan accent. He asked a ridiculous number of questions just to keep the man talking. He then tried to repeat the man's accent when we got in the car. "Where are y'all young'uns headed? We got us some maps over yonder by them there h-apples."
I laughed out loud as he butchered the man's beautiful drawl.
"He did not say 'over yonder'!"
"I've always wanted to say that. I love Americans. You've got a nice little accent, though not nearly as wicked as his."
"I do?"
He nodded.
Aside from the occasional y'all, I didn't think I sounded Southern, but I guess it's hard to say about your own self. — Wendy Higgins

He read the verses backwards but then they were not poetry. Then he read the flyleaf from the bottom to the top till he came to his own name. That was he: and he read down the page again. What was after the universe?
Nothing. But was there anything round the universe to show where it stopped before the nothing place began?
It could not be a wall; but there could be a thin thin line there all round everything. It was very big to think about everything and everywhere. Only God could do that. He tried to think what a big thought that must be; but he could only think of God. God was God's name just as his name was Stephen. — James Joyce

We call ourselves Homo sapiens
man the wise
because our intelligence is so important to us. For thousands of years, we have tried to understand how we think: that is, how a mere handful of matter can perceive, understand, predict, and manipulate a world far larger and more complicated than itself. The field of artificial intelligence, or AI, goes further still: it attempts not just to understand but also to build intelligent entities. — Stuart J. Russell

Apart from these parental physical jerks, he did not train his body; he merely inhabited it. A friend had once shown what he called gymnastics for the intelligentsia. You took a box of matches and threw its contents on the floor, then bent down and picked them up, one by one. The first time he tried it himself, he lost patience and stuffed all the matches back in handfuls. He persevered, but the next time, just as he was bending down, the telephone went, and he was needed at once; so the housekeeper was detailed to pick up the matches instead. — Julian Barnes

Hunter's dead," Taylor said without preamble. "It was these . . . these things. They came crawling up out of him and were eating him, oh God, I mean, it was like . . . I mean he was crying and Dekka prayed with him and he tried to fry his own brain just like he did with Harry only I guess it didn't work, I guess he couldn't do it, so Sam . . ." She swallowed. "Anyone have some water?"
"What about Sam?" Astrid demanded.
"He did it for him. Sam. I mean, he . . . Hunter was, you know . . . so Sam." She pantomimed raising her hands, like Sam, like he would do when using his power.
Astrid closed her eyes and crossed herself.
"Rest in peace," Edilio said and crossed himself as well.
"Sam burned the boy?" Howard asked. Then, bitterly sarcastic said, "Yeah, you all pray to Jesus. Because Jesus is really providing a lot of help here. Sounds to me like Sam was the one doing what had to be done. — Michael Grant

Don't make me out to be something worth saving. We both know I'm a waste." His voice was so quiet. "I wish I was better at telling you why you have to stay here. I wish I could put into words the part of my heart that has your name written on it. That part hurts right now. You have to be here. You love life too much. You're so important. I wish I could make you understand this." He tried to smile at her valiant efforts. "I would keep you if I could. You can sleep here, right on this couch. Beckett, I will let you hold this baby when it comes." She touched her stomach. "Does that tell you how much you mean to me? It's the only thing I can come up with." He shrugged. "Mouse would be disappointed. He'd feel like he didn't do his job if you died ... Eve loves you. Wherever she is - in this strip club - is that what you've been wishing for?" Beckett shook his head. "No, right? She loves you. You can't kill someone she loves. You just can't. — Debra Anastasia

I go into the crowd almost everyday and I really really really despise it when people try to steal my shoes. That is a thing where they're proabably like 'oh, you can just go out and buy a new pair'. Like yeah, but those are my shoes. How would you feel if I tried to steal your shoes? — Jack Barakat

It would be kind of ill to see Rachel McAdams win an Oscar [for Spotlight] - I don't think people give her credit for her range, she started in a kind of character with younger demographic-aged films and really made a push to be taken more seriously and got a lot of opportunities and knocked it out the park. But I feel like Jennifer Jason Leigh deserves one, maybe not just for Hateful Eight but for [Anomalisa] and everything. Like, I tried to watch Adaption again, that's rough! — Bun B.

There was just such a man when I was young - an Austrian who invented a new way of life and convinced himself that he was the chap to make it work. He tried to impose his reformation by the sword, and plunged the civilized world into misery and chaos. But the thing which this fellow had overlooked, my friend, was that he had a predecessor in the reformation business, called Jesus Christ. Perhaps we may assume that Jesus knew as much as the Austrian did about saving people. But the odd thing is that Jesus did not turn the disciples into strom troopers, burn down the Temple at Jerusalem, and fix the blame on Pontius Pilate. On the contrary, he made it clear that the business of the philosopher was to make ideas available, and not to impose them on people. — T.H. White

I tried to use batting gloves at the beginning of every spring training up until 1999. It just didn't feel good. — Vladimir Guerrero

When you choose the sword over a gun, just like Green Arrow chooses an arrow over a gun and Catwoman chooses a whip over a gun, you have to be highly skilled and highly trained. I can grab Green Arrow's bow, but I'm not strong enough to shoot it. I can grab Catwoman's whip, but have you ever tried to whip a whip? It's not easy. — Ann Nocenti

Most eyes have more than one color, but usually they're related. Blue eyes may have two shades of blue, or blue and gray, or blue and green, or even a fleck or two of brown. Most people don't notice that. When I first went to get my state ID card, the form asked for eye color. I tried to write in all the colors in my own eyes, but the space wasnt big enough. They told me to put 'brown'. I put 'brown', but that is not the only color in my eyes. It is just the color that people see because they do not really look atr other people's eyes. — Elizabeth Moon

But she couldn't dismiss easily his light touch with her. No pushing or pressing, none of that herding and corralling bullshit, unlike any of her old boyfriends. And maybe who you fell for and who you eventually loved wasn't rational, no matter how hard you tried to list pros and cons and sum the results. You couldn't think your way through it, not all the way. Maybe just the scent of somebody carried more weight than everything else put together. — Charles Frazier

If Daddy could see me now. I spent the morning with Rebecca at the Indianapolis Speedway, at an auto museum filled with Nascars and racing paraphernalia. Do you remember when we used to watch all five hundred laps with him, every year? I never understood what it was that made auto racing such a biggie for him - it's not like he ever tried the sport himself. He told me once when I was older that it was the absolute speed of it all. I liked to watch for crashes, like you. I liked the way there'd be a huge explosion on the track and billows of ebony smoke, and the other cars would just keep a straight course and head right for the spin, into this sort of black box, and they'd come out okay. I — Jodi Picoult

I tried to imagine myself part of a pack of guys who picked up local public school girls on weekends. It was hard to envision, but I was definitely willing to try. Not the pickup part. Just the being in a posse part. — Bill Konigsberg

I went to bed and woke in the middle of the night thinking I heard someone cry, thinking I myself was weeping, and I felt my face and it was dry.
Then I looked at the window and thought: Why, yes, it's just the rain, the rain, always the rain, and turned over, sadder still, and fumbled about for my dripping sleep and tried to slip it back on. — Ray Bradbury

The ships tried to block their exit for several heartbeats before they realized just how suicidal Caillen really was. He'd slam into them before he'd yield. In a game of header, he refused to blink or swerve. Fuck them. If he was going to die, so were they. Just as he would have hit them, they veered off sharply, out of the way. Laughing — Sherrilyn Kenyon

It was true. Sugar did treat her bees like next of kin but then again, they were.
Along with her manners, the accent she tried so hard to soften, a single china cup covered in blue daisies and a weathered box of essential oils, they were all she carried with her from her past. Her bees relied on her for shelter and food but she relied on them too. She made her living from their honey, not just the healthful liquid itself but from the salves and gels and tinctures and remedies she created and sold at farm stands or farmers' markets wherever she lived.
It was the most symbiotic of relationships. — Sarah-Kate Lynch

I've tried every which way for writing lyrics - everything from using really bizarre imagery and metaphors, sort of obscuring the facts of what I'm singing about, all the way over to a song like 'Losing My Mind,' where you're just reading my thoughts as they're occurring. — Rivers Cuomo

My friend Bo had just finished skinny-dipping when one of those bastards came trotting out of the woods and bit his dick clean off." "Just bit it off? Just like that?" "Yeah," I said. "Then that bastard pig put it on a stick and heated it over the campfire while Bo ran home and tried to explain it to his mama. — Nick Wilgus

Just what she needed. More filth in her soul. Someday, maybe, she would explode from it, someday maybe, every rotten thing that had every been done to her and every rotten thing she'd ever done would erupt from her in a fountain of sewage and sorrow, all those secrets she kept even from herself spilling out and adding to the muck she could never wash off no matter how hard she tried.
She'd never been bound by magic to keep those secrets. Just by her own shame. — Stacia Kane

Chloe. Always Chloe with him and his brother. I know I sound like a whiny brat when I complain, but I think I have a good reason. I'd just discovered that I was a witch and my mother was a bitch - the murderous kind. I was now on the run with three kids who didn't want me along.
No matter how hard I tried to keep up and help out, the guys only cared about Chloe. If I ran in front of this bus to push her to safety, they'd race to her side to see if she was okay. Probably give me crap for bruising her when I shoved her out of the way. — Kelley Armstrong

You ever hear the saying 'The third time's the charm'? It isn't. It's just a way of saying that you've tried something twice and failed and you're too stubborn or stupid to quit and move on.

- Ernest Stone — Ruth Ford Elward

I think the thing I've always tried to do is - and I didn't plan it, it just started to come out that way - is try to make challenging music that flirts with accessibility. — Trent Reznor

The first time I kissed you, you had just cut off your hair with a plastic knife. You were in restraints and your lips were completely chapped and dry from the tranquilizers. The next day you tried to kill me with a torn-off piece of bedsheet. I've seen you at your worst. You hardly need to dress up for me. — Amelia Atwater-Rhodes

That boy," he said. "I've done him ever favor I could. Some folks you can't do nothing with. Just sorry. God knows I've done plenty of drinking and stuff in my time, but I be damn if I ever tried to cheat anybody out of any money. — Larry Brown

And it may be that history, as Michel Foucault tried to convince us, is a list of discrete, disconnected processes whose joint impact is not linked to any one of them but to their fusion into one big explosion. In that case, history is not just a linear movement of endless American support for Israel against, and at the expense of, the Palestinian cause but a more distorted, curved line of ups and downs that indicate possible changes in the future. Moreover, a concerted effort to bring about such a change is a worthy goal - inside and outside the United States. But what we have this year is the ominous call at the 2006 AIPAC convention for the United States to attack and invade Iran.38 — Noam Chomsky

... And here it is: You don't win races by wishing, you win them by running faster than everyone else. And to do that you have to train hard and strive your utmost, and sometimes even that isn't enough, because another runner just might be more talented than you are. Here's the truth: If you want something, you can have it, but only if you want everything that goes with it, including all the hard work and the despair, and only if you're willing to risk failure. That's the problem with Karl: He was afraid of failing, so he never really tried. — Philip Pullman

I always felt I had a hole in my heart, this big black hole that made me feel lonely and empty and worthless. I tried to fill it, everybody tries in some way, and it just got bigger and bigger. — James Frey

What are you smiling about? Do you have gas?" Drew joked.
"Hey, Mommy, Carter has a HUGE wiener," Gavin said around a mouthful of cookie, holding his
hands up in the air about three feet apart, like you do when you're telling someone how big the fish is you
just caught.
Claire quickly reached over and pushed Gavin's arms down while everyone else at the table laughed.
I just sat back and smiled and tried to keep my anaconda penis tucked under the table so it wouldn't scare
anyone. — Tara Sivec

I just see me, an ordinary girl. I know my life is not typical, but I have tried to stay really grounded and true to myself. My family really helps me with that. — Zendaya

Feminism hasn't failed, it's just never been tried. — Hilary Mantel

Whether or not belive in Fate comes down to one thing: who you blame when something goes wrong. Do you think it's your fault - that if you'd tried better, worked harder, it wouldn't have happened? Or do you just chalk it up to circumstance?
I know poeple who'll hear about the people who died, and will say that it was God's will. I know people who'll say it was bad luck. And then there's my personal favorite: They were just in the wrong place at hte wrong time.
Then again, you could say the same thing about me, couldn't you? — Jodi Picoult

Attempt something creative that you have never tried before. Write a poem, draw a self-portrait, design the plot for a movie, or tackle some other creative activity. Even spending just a few minutes working creatively on something can help you relax and spark new ideas that are relevant to other parts of your life. — Max Ogles

Just so. You tried to establish a fact from a lack of evidence. Unless the inquiry has been so exhaustive as to explore every possibility, the lack of evidence should never be used to ground a statement of fact. Unlikelihood certainly, but no more. A prematurely assumed fact blocks further inquiry. — Jonathan Renshaw

The Yishuv covered itself with glory. Just as in World War I the British glorified the Arab revolt - so they tried to hide the efforts of the Yishuv in World War II. No country gave with so much vitality to the war. But the British Government did not want the Jews to use this as a bargaining point for their homeland aspirations later on. Whitehall and Chatham House kept the Yishuv's war effort one of the best secrets of the war. — Leon Uris

You've always tried to pretend you don't need anyone, Tash, but you do. We all do. So just let me be there for you. -Sophie — Julia Llewellyn Smith

Have you fallen in love, Will Henry?"
"That's stupid."
"What is? Love, or my question?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know? You've tried that trick once. What do you suppose it will work better the second time?"
"I don't love her. She bothers me."
"You have just defined the very thing you denied. — Rick Yancey

I got that amazing feeling you get when you know you are going to lose it in the best, most self-righteous way. I just leaned back and yelled, "FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK YOU." Then I chased him as he tried to get away from me. "You rich motherfucker! Who do you think you are? You're not better than me. Fuck you and your fucking opinions, you piece of shit. — Amy Poehler

I've tried counting sheep like everyone recommends, but what tends to happen is that my brain thinks it's seen the same sheep twice and that messes up my count, and when I think there's no more sheep to count, another three will come running along and startle me. Or just as I think I've finished counting, an elephant comes running in. By this point I'm wide awake. — Karl Pilkington

I guess we need to find a way to the quarry?" Jesper said.
Wylan coughed. "No we don't, just a general store."
"But you told Kaz the mineral - "
"It's present in all kinds of paints and enamels. I wanted to make sure I had a reason to go to Olendaal."
"Wylan Van Eck, you lied to Kaz Brekker." Jesper clutched a hand to his chest. "And you got away with it! Do you give lessons?"
Wylan felt ridiculously pleased - until he thought about Kaz finding out. Then he felt a little like the first time he'd tried brandy and ended up spewing his dinner all over his own shoes. — Leigh Bardugo

I always liked the magic of poetry but now I'm just starting to see behind the curtain of even the best poets, how they've used, tried and tested craft to create the illusion. Wonderful feeling of exhilaration to finally be there. — David Knopfler

Without a doubt, the next few minutes would be the most hellishly exciting in my life. Grinding pain and killer fatigue waited just beyond the word, "Partez." But I tried to ignore those prespects, and concentrate on the priceless feelings that also awaited. I thought about the perfect strokes we would take, and about the merciless surge of power we would unleash in the last 500 meters. — Brad Alan Lewis

I heard a choking sound behind me. When I looked back, Cannoli was hanging from the backpack harness with her hind legs circling frantically in the air. She looked like she was riding a bike just above ground level.
"Cannoli," I yelled. I unhooked her and made sure she was breathing on her own. When I tried to get her back in the backpack, she whimpered. I talked to her soothingly yet firmly, then tried again. This time she started howling like I was hurting her.
People turned and stared as they walked by. "What are you looking at?" I said to one couple. I suddenly felt true remorse for every time I'd stared at a parent with a toddler throwing a tantrum. I made a vow to be a better aunt to Tulia's kids if I ever made it out of this parking garage. I pleaded with Cannoli one more time. — Claire Cook

The image of God I was raised with was this: God is an angry bastard with a killer surveillance system who had to send his little boy (and he only had one) to suffer and die because I was bad. But the good news was that if I believed this story and then tried really hard to be good, when I died I would go to heaven, where I would live in a golden gated community with God and all the other people who believed and did the same things as I did ... this type of thinking portrays God as just as mean and selfish as we are, which feels like it has a lot more to do with our own greed and spite than it has to do with God. — Nadia Bolz-Weber

When I did the first edit of Les plages, it was very dry and very square in a way. I was just saying the minimum. I said, Well, if this is the minimum, I don't make it. So I tried to make it more refined. I tried to find images, allegorical images, that I could use to express things that I didn't want to say or didn't want to show or I was not able to find how to show. — Agnes Varda

Among the women, a spontaneous cheer went up, which Liz was surprised to find herself joining, and this was when (she was on her fifth drink) she realized both that she was completely drunk
not just tipsy, not merely buzzed
and also that she was much happier than she'd been an hour or two before. She felt a retroactive remorse for all the Eligible contestants she'd deemed trashy and idiotic from the comfort of her living room; apparently, like teriyaki pizza and bee venom facials, getting wasted on a reality-TV show was not to be knocked until tried. — Curtis Sittenfeld

I tried golf for a while, but I wasn't very good at it, so I didn't play a lot of golf. I enjoy all sports, not just football. I like basketball, baseball, and I got into the World Cup. So really, sports in general are my life, and football specifically. — John Madden

My negotiation skills are are on par with George Bush's reading ability. And just like Dubya, every time I've tried to put forth an effort, I am reminded that my only true strength lies in drinking. — Chelsea Handler

I tried to step back quickly but James grabbed my hand. "C'mon," he said "this'll be fun." Geez ... What's your definition of fun? Cuz mines not to possibly get killed my first day here. Or maybe that's just a personal goal, but still ... — Bella Shadow

Each word he said was boring, but collectively the melody of them lulled me. I tried to resist, but just the weight of him, in pounds and ounces, was a relief. — Miranda July

When you see a fish you don't think of its scales, do you? You think of its speed, its floating, flashing body seen through the water. Well, I've tried to express just that. If I made fins and eyes and scales, I would arrest its movement, give a pattern or shape of reality. I want just the flash of its spirits. — Constantin Brancusi

Why did you do this?" He was shaking. "Just tell me why."
I tried to muster up some of the righteous indignation that I'd felt on Friday night as I said, "You knocked over my gravestone!" But even to my ears the words sounded tinny and pathetic.
Dan's face was pale. "It was just a gravestone, Chelsea. And it was a mistake. I told you that already, and I meant it. I've never lied to you. My God, can't you tell the difference between a gravestone and a person you love? Can't you tel which one matters?"
But if I had to point to the real problem in my life, it's that I've never known the difference between a gravestone and a person I love. I have never known which is which until it's too late.
"All's fair in love and war," I reminded him, aiming for Tawny's tone. But my voice came out sounding just like me.
"Oh, yeah? And which is this?" he asked. "Love or war? — Leila Sales

No one had ever said anything like that to Evie. Her parents always wanted to advise or instruct or command. They were good people, but they needed the world to bend to them, to fit into their order of things. Evie had never really quite fit, and when she tried, she'd just pop back out, like a doll squeezed into a too-small box. — Libba Bray

If I could, I would take you with me," he said, his voice barely more than a whisper.
She tried to pull away from him. "You would not. You would grow tired of me in a few weeks."
He shook his head, pulling her tight against him. "No ... I could never grow tired of you."
"How can you be so sure?" she asked.
He brushed tendrils of hair from her face. "I have craved to know you for years ... even just to hear you speak my name ... a single touch of your hand on mine ... "
He kissed her softly, his lips tasting hers. "I want you to be mine ... I want you always."
- 'unknown script' 2012 — Faye Hall

Came Honker's trip to Slice City along about then: our sax-man got a neck all full of the sharpest kind of steel. So we were out one horn. And you could tell: we played a little bit too rough, and the head-arrangements Collins and His Crew grew up to, they needed Honker's grease in the worst way. But we'd been together for five years or more, and a new man just didn't play somehow. We were this one solid thing, like a unit, and somebody had cut off a piece of us and we couldn't grow the piece back so we just tried to get along anyway, bleeding every night, bleeding from that wound. ("Black Country") — Charles Beaumont

I've never had a very quiet voice. I tried in choir to make it smaller, and it just didn't work out. And I listened to a lot of soul music when I was growing up on my own accord. But I was mostly into Mama Cass and Gladys Knight, and they all had big voices too; just different than mine. — Beth Ditto

They went to the tree. Daemon dismounted and leaned against the tree, staring in the direction of the house. The stallion jiggled the bit, reminding him he wasn't alone. "I wanted to say good-bye," Daemon said quietly. For the first time, he truly saw the intelligence - and loneliness - in the horse's eyes. After that, he couldn't keep his voice from breaking as he tried to explain why Jaenelle was never going to come to the tree again, why there would be no more rides, no more caresses, no more talks. For a moment, something rippled in his mind. He had the odd sensation he was the one being talked to, explained to, and his words, echoing back, lacerated his heart. To be alone again. To never again see those arms held out in welcome. To never hear that voice say his name. To ... Daemon gasped as Dark Dancer jerked the reins free and raced down the path toward the field. Tears of grief pricked Daemon's eyes. The horse might have a simpler mind, but the heart was just as big. — Anne Bishop

As adults we choose our own reading material. Depending on our moods and needs we might read the newspaper, a blockbuster novel, an academic article, a women's magazine, a comic, a children's book, or the latest book that just about everyone is reading. No one chastises us for our choice. No one says, 'That's too short for you to read.' No one says, 'That's too easy for you, put it back.' No one says 'You couldn't read that if you tried
it's much too difficult.'
Yet if we take a peek into classrooms, libraries, and bookshops we will notice that children's choices are often mocked, censured, and denied as valid by idiotic, interfering teachers, librarians, and parents. Choice is a personal matter that changes with experience, changes with mood, and changes with need. We should let it be. — Mem Fox

I've tried many other hairstyles, but it just doesn't work. — Rod Stewart

I've always been someone who's really tried to live in the here and now. My memory isn't very good so maybe that's why, but it just seems like I've been living this life, my current chapter, for a really long time and I don't really remember what it was like before. It's just been sort of ingrained in me. What I deal with day to day. — Jude Law

Lee nodded, his smile somehow bigger like he was trying not to laugh then his eyes moved to Hector and he said, "I tried to stop it."
Hector looked at Lee then looked at me then he muttered, "Oh fuck."
"It was Ally's idea," Lee told Hector.
"What was Ally's idea?" Hector asked Lee.
"It was not Ally's idea!" I cried.
"It wasn't!" super-power-eared Ally yelled from the open back window of Lee's Explorer. "It was Sadie's idea. I just was offering moral support."
"Shut up, Ally!" Indy shouted out the open passenger side window.
"I will not shut up! I'm not taking the fall for this one!" Ally shouted back. — Kristen Ashley

I sometimes can't do movies just for the money. I really can't. I mean, I've tried. Believe me, I'd love to just take the money and run. — Sam Rockwell

Some were encased in gold leaf hammered to an incredible thinness. We were supposed to eat these, gold and all. Some were still in their shells, and when cracked open these proved to contain the sort of party favors esteemed by wealthy hosts: perfumes, pearls, gems, golden chains, and so forth. While the ladies made delighted sounds I tried to figure out how they had gotten those items inside the shells, but to no avail. I could see no hole or seam in the complete shells. Maybe, I thought, they just fed the things to the chickens and ducks and this was the result. — John Maddox Roberts

We could sit around and talk if you'd like."
"Okay." She crossed her arms and tried to look casual. "So what's up?"
"Considering what you're wearing beneath that sheet, and what we just heard in the hallway, you might want to rephrase that particular statement. — Jill Shalvis

Kate, I need to use the toilet," he called through the door.
"You've just had hours in the sea. Couldn't you have gone then?"
"Mum told me to get out of the water first."
"What, even the ocean?"
"It's wrong to pollute." He tried to sound serious. — Barbara Elsborg

Just take a risk. Go for it. I think if you crash and burn trying, it's still going to be better than if you never tried at all. — Roderick Mackinnon

I've been playing piano my whole life, but I'd never tried to understand how compositions are made, really. Try to imagine if you'd loved paintings your whole life but had never painted one. My aspiration now is just to understand. — Caio Fonseca

The shrimp's protein and ours are not exactly the same, but they're so
similar that if you turned up in court and tried to convince a judge that your
version was not a badly concealed plagiarism, you'd be very unlikely to win.
In fact, you'd be a laughing stock, for rhodopsin is not restricted to vent shrimp
and humans but is omnipresent throughout the animal kingdom.... Trying to persuade a judge that your rhodopsin is not plagiarised
would be like trying to clajm that your television set is fundamentally different
from everyone else's, just because it's bigger or has a flat screen. — Nick Lane

I think I've tried to stay true to my music since the beginning. It's kind of hard because of the access and technology but I just do what I do. — Brian McKnight

I was harder than Dante. I think I'd tried to hide that hardness from him because I'd wanted him to like me. But now he knew. That I was hard. And maybe that was okay. Maybe he could like the fact that I was hard just as I liked the fact that he wasn't hard. — Benjamin Alire Saenz

Is there anything you want to do before we put our heads in plastic boxes for two days?'
I thought about this for a second, then held the side of her face and kissed her.
We both zipped up our suits just in time to see the reactor blow: a column of green radioactive fire, belching black smoke. Di squeezed my hand, our big boxy heads knocked clumsily together, and I tried to think of something romantic to say.
'Well, I guess that's why they all die of cancer. — Tom Francis

I mean, every single time I was there with Mahesh, I just tried to learn something of his game, because he's, you know, one of the best doubles players that's been around ever. — Daniela Hantuchova

Just because she tried to eat us doesn't mean she was wrong — Jesse Petersen

When 'American Pie' happened, I was so lucky to get that opportunity and I just tried to do a good job in that genre. But the films that inspired me as a kid were, like, Malcolm McDowall in 'A Clockwork Orange.' He was my hero. — Seann William Scott

Before I got divorced, I was personally unfamiliar with trial, or at least trial of serious, heart-wrenching proportions. I figured that life went smoothly if you tried hard, and if you messed up, or things weren't working out, you just tried harder. — Kristin Armstrong

She was just a mechanic, and he was the prince with all the charms she pretended to be immune to. And he was there, before her, while she tottered on a single foot and tried to calm her rapidly beating heart. How she could barely meet his gaze. How he leaned forward, forced her to see him, smiled. There. That moment. That smile. Again and again and again. — Marissa Meyer

Kammy jerked upright. It was as though the trees had parted beneath the pressure of the storm and a bolt of lightning had struck her. She had never entered the mouth for it had always been much too small. Yet, she had never seen anything else enter it either. The thought alone made her feel sick with excitement and fear. A small voice told Kammy that such a reaction was ridiculous, it was just a squirrel. But warmth spread to the tips of Kammy's fingers as they stretched forward. She could see now that it was not a burrow at all, but a tunnel large enough for her to fit through. She was quite sure that she would not even have to bend her head. The same small voice tried to speak again but Kammy could not hear it through the rush of blood in her ears.
Kammy stepped inside the mouth of the forest and felt herself flipped upside down. — Natalie Crown

The picture of Chelsea and me that flashed around the world showed a happy mother-daughter team perched on our pachyderm and watching a rare Asian rhino. Later, when we got back to Washington, James Carville remarked: "Don't you just love it? You spent two years trying to get people better health care and they tried to kill you. You and Chelsea rode an elephant, and they loved you! — Hillary Rodham Clinton

Like many a Yank before me, I have tried to explain to European friends that Americans actually know soccer quite well, that many of us played it in school and college, but that, well, we just don't find it quite as exciting as, say, what we call football. — Serge Schmemann

You feel bad about yelling in a graveyard after you just tried to have sex with me in a church? — Liliana Hart

I like the story about me being pregnant. It was in some Australian magazine, on the front page! I was like, 'Wow, that's just [insane].' And it's not even ironic. I don't even think the article [tried to justify it]; it was just a headline. The article was just like, nothing. — Robert Pattinson