No Friends Left Quotes & Sayings

I didn't get to grow up and pull away from her and bitch about her with my friends and confront her about the things I'd wished she'd done differently and then get older and understand that she had done the best she could and realize that what she had done was pretty damn good and take her fully back into my arms again. Her death had obliterated that. It had obliterated me. It had cut me short at the very heigh of my youthful arrogance. It had forced me to instantly grow up and forgive her every motherly fault at the same time that it kept me forever a child, my life both ended and begun in that premature place where we'd left off. She was my mother, but I was motherless. I was trapped by her, but utterly alone. She would always be the empty bowl that no one could full. I'd have to fill it myself again and again and again. — Cheryl Strayed

So I spoke to my old friend Bruce and told him I was feeling it, his loss of Clarence. We talked for quite a while, and there is no need to go into what two old friends had to say to each other at this point, except to say that two old friends spoke to each other about their music, their muses, their partners in crime, their proof, their friendship, their souls and their lives. Ben Keith was my Clarence Clemons. Clarence Clemons was Bruce's Ben Keith. When he died last year it touched me to the core. I don't want to ever think of any one else playing his parts or occupying his space. No one could. I can't do those songs again unless it's solo. So I told Bruce, "Waylon once looked at me and said, 'There's very few of us left.'" He liked that. I told him when he looked to his right I would be there. That's enough. I'm not talking about that anymore. — Neil Young

Angelus: Now that's everything, huh? No weapons ... No friends ... No hope. Take all that away ... and what's left? Buffy: Me. — Joss Whedon

In particular, we must take account of the well-known and striking saying of Jesus to the dying brigand beside him, recorded by Luke (23.43). 'Today,' he said, 'you will be with me in paradise.' 'Paradise' is not the final destination; it is a beautiful resting place on the way there. But notice. If there is anyone in the New Testament to whom we might have expected the classic doctrine of purgatory to apply, it would be this brigand. He had no time for amendment of life; no doubt he had all kinds of sinful thoughts and desires in what was left of his body. All the standard arguments in favour of purgatory apply to him. And yet Jesus assures him of his place in paradise, not in a few days or weeks, not if his friends say a lot of prayers and masses for him, but 'today. — N. T. Wright

What is the usual reaction among our friends and neighbors if in a family something unexpected happens? ... Telephone and [email] are immediately put to work ... and the incident is discussed for days on end. It is no wonder there is no time left in which to ponder on what it might mean, what message God might want to bring home to us by permitting this or that to happen in our lives ... 'To ponder' is an all-but-forgotten art in our days. Who thinks? We don't need to anymore. The TV and [internet] do it for us. — Maria Augusta Von Trapp

What about Tiny?" Maripat asked shyly. "Well, I left him in my room so my mother wouldn't see him." " 'Cause you hadn't convinced her to let you keep him yet," Mark said reasonably. "Did you leave the cats to keep him company?" "Yes," Augusta said. "And did they become best friends?" Maripat asked, happily sensing the end of the story. "No," Augusta said, knowing she was in too deep. "He ate them. — Luanne Rice

It is the acid test of nonviolence that in a nonviolent conflict there is no rancor left behind, and in the end the enemies are converted into friends. — Mahatma Gandhi

If I should die, I have left no immortal work behind me - nothing to make my friends proud of my memory - but I have loved the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remembered. — John Keats

In reading, friendship is restored immediately to its original purity. With books there is no forced sociability. If we pass the evening with those friends - books - it's because we really want to. When we leave them, we do so with regret and, when we have left them, there are none of those thoughts that spoil friendship: "What did they think of us?" - "Did we make a mistake and say something tactless?" - "Did they like us?" - nor is there the anxiety of being forgotten because of displacement by someone else. All such agitating thoughts expire as we enter the pure and calm friendship of reading. — Marcel Proust

George Burns was more athletic than you think he was. And he was a very social man
he loved people, he enjoyed life. He worked at living. Old George was a social lion, he got around and did things. That's the key right there. It starts with your brain. Some people, when they get to 60 years old have no interests anymore, have no friends left. George Burns was busy all the time doing something. — Jack LaLanne

Crosses the brown land, unheard. The nymphs are departed. Sweet Thames, run softly, till I end my song. The river bears no empty bottles, sandwich papers, Silk handkerchiefs, cardboard boxes, cigarette ends Or other testimony of summer nights. The nymphs are departed. And their friends, the loitering heirs of city directors; 180 Departed, have left no addresses. — T. S. Eliot

It is to this dimension of God, a God who cannot tolerate the reduction of a human being, fashioned in His image, to less than human status, that Job may be appealing. Job, in his extremity, is calling on God, saying, "I have no one left. I am without family. My friends have deserted me. You who are the Father of all humanity, is it not Your obligation to atone for my children's deaths as their go'el and to extract me from my current situation as my go'el?" Zophar — Harold S. Kushner

I have many friends who are married - not many who are happily married, but many married friends. The few happy ones are like my parents: They're baffled by my singleness. A smart, pretty, nice girl like me, a girl with so many interests and enthusiasms, a cool job, a loving family. And let's say it: money. They knit their eyebrows and pretend to think of men they can set me up with, but we all know there's no one left, no one good left, and I know that they secretly think there's something wrong with me, something hidden away that makes me unsatisfiable, unsatisfying. — Gillian Flynn

The Friend That You've Outgrown Here's to the friend that you've outgrown, The one whose name is left unknown. The one who wiped away your tears, And sought to hold your hand, When others turned the other way, No beginning, just an end. She's the one you turned to, The one that you called friend. She laughed with you, she cried with you, And felt it was her duty, To remind you of your worth, And all your inner beauty. When others' eyes could only dwell, Upon your exposed outer shell. They saw a fat girl steeped in braces, Not seeing you they turned their faces. But she was there to whisper, When others didn't care. She held your secrets in her heart, That friends like you could share. You never had to be alone, But now she is, 'cause you've outgrown Her for those others whose laughs you share, As you run carefree through the air. Time has eased your form and face, But she's the one who knew your grace When those who you now call your friend Saw no beginning . . . only end. C. S. Dweck — Jack Canfield

Those who floated in the ark were weightless and had weightless thoughts. They were neither hungry nor satisfied. They had no happiness and no fear of losing it. Their heads were not filled with petty official calculations, intrigues, promotions, and their shoulders were not burdened with concerns about housing, fuel, bread, and clothes for the children. Love, which from time immemorial has been the delight and the torment of humanity, was powerless to communicate to them its thrill or its agony. Their prison terms were so long that no one even thought of the time when he would go out into freedom. Men with exceptional Intellect, education, and experience, but too devoted to their families to have much of themselves left over for their friends, here belonged only to friends. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

I tell myself I'm fine on my own, but am I? No friends to fall back on, no relationships, no support. Left to my own devices, I have no devices. — Jael McHenry

Patience never wants Wonder to enter the house: because Wonder is a wretched guest. It uses all of you but is not careful with what is most fragile or irreplaceable. If it breaks you, it shrugs and moves on. Without asking, Wonder often brings along dubious friends: doubt, jealousy, greed. Together they take over; rearrange the furniture in every one of your rooms for their own comfort. They speak odd languages but make no attempt to translate for you. They cook strange meals in your heart that leave odd tastes and smells. When they finally go are you happy or miserable? Patience is always left holding the broom. — Jonathan Carroll

No, no, it's not all random, if it really was all random, the universe would abandon us completely. and the universe doesn't. it takes care of its most fragile creations in ways we can't see. like with parents who adore you blindly. and a big sister who feels guilty for being human over you. and a little gravelly-voiced kid whose friends have left him over you. and even a pink-haired girl who carries your picture in her wallet. maybe it is a lottery, but the universe makes it all even out in the end. the universe takes care of all its birds. — R.J. Palacio

Dad seemed lost in a depressed daze. He had recently been saying privately that the evangelical world was more or less being led by lunatics, psychopaths, and extremists, and agreeing with me that if "our side" ever won, America would be in deep trouble. But by then Dad was dying and knew he had very little time left. There was no time to change his life or his new "friends." All — Frank Schaeffer

Meanwhile the Viscount of Sylvania, who could no longer walk, now seldom left his castle. His friends and his family were with him all day, and he could own up to the most blameworthy folly, the most absurd extravagance, state the most flagrant paradox, or imply the most shocking fault without his kinsmen reproaching him or his friends joking or disagreeing with him. It was as if they had tacitly absolved him of any responsibility for his deeds and words. Above all they seemed to be trying to keep him from hearing the last sounds, to muffle with sweetness, if not drown out with tenderness, the final creakings of his body, from which life was ebbing. — Marcel Proust

As they prepared themselves to go ashore no one doubted in theory that at least a certain percentage of them would remain on the island dead, once they set foot on it. But no one expected to be one of these. Still it was an awesome thought and as the first contingents came struggling up on deck in full gear to form up, all eyes instinctively sought out immediately this island where they were to be put, and left, and which might possibly turn out to be a friend's grave. — James Jones

The Great Thing
About long-time, all-time friends
is, no matter how many hours
(days, weeks, months, and, I assume,
years) you spend in differnt places, when you're finally in the same
room again, it's like you've never left
each other's side. And you realize
that your hearts have never
disconnected — Ellen Hopkins

Whoever is in charge of such things had been sparing with his blessings on the moment Benno was born. He had neither looks nor wit nor skill. He was not large or strong, he could not sing; in fact, he had a stammer, which on most occasions left him self-consciously mute. One gift only had been given, a gift as simple as it is rare: the gift of pure goodness. He knew, unerringly, what was right, what was kind, what would make people happy, and he did it without fail. His goodness took no effort; there was no internal scale to be balanced. He hoped for no reward and feared no hell. He was not clever- in his final year of school before the teachers despaired of him, he was asked how he would equitably divide a half-pound loaf of bread among himself and two friends. He said he would go without and his two friends would each have a quarter pound, and neither threats of failure not the switch could persuade him to change his answer. — Laura L. Sullivan

If you talked to your friends the way you talk to your body, you'd have no friends left at all. — Marcia Hutchinson

Mother my friends are no longer my friends
And the games we once played have no meaning
I've gone serious and shy and they can't figure why
So they've left me to my own daydreaming. — Suzanne Vega

As she died, Mary was alone on the planet as were Dwayne Hoover or Kilgore Trout. She had never reproduced. There were no friends or relatives to watch her die. So she spoke her very last words on the planet to Cyprian Ukwende. She did not have enough breath left to make her vocal cords buzz. She could only move her lips noiselessly.
Here is all she had to say about death: 'Oh my, oh my.'
...
Like all Earthlings at the point of death, Mary Young sent faint reminders of herself to those who had known her. She released a small could of telepathic butterflies, and one of these brushed Dwayne Hoover, nine miles away.
Dwayne heard a tired voice from somewhere behind his head, even though no one was back there. It said this to Dayne: 'Oh my, oh my.
... — Kurt Vonnegut

I had a dream about you; you were a zombie in a post-apocalyptic world. I was the only human left, you tried to bite me and I said no. We became good friends. — Rodney Jenkins

I have no friends," he said. "And if I do have any left it won't be for long. — Gabriel Garcia Marquez

When my female friends are left
By horrid spouses and lovers,
I commiserate. I send gifts-
Powwow songs and poems- and wonder
Why my gorgeous friends cannot find
Someone who knows them as I do.
Is the whole world dead and blind?
I tell my friends, "I'd marry you
Tomorrow." I think I'm engaged
To thirty-six women, my harem:
Platonic, bookish, and enraged.
I love them! But it would scare them-
No, of course, they already know
That I can be just one more boy,
A toy warrior who explodes
Into silence and warpaths with joy. — Sherman Alexie

Many of us are returning from a long journey during which we were forced to search for things that were of no interest to us. Now we realize that they were false. But this return cannot be made without pain, because we have been away for a long time and feel that we are strangers in out own land. It will take some time to find the friends who also left, and the places where our roots and treasures lie. But this will happen. — Paulo Coelho

father owned the building where your brother and his family rented a flat. When my father passed away a few years ago, he left the building to me. I became your brother's landlord. We've known the family for years. But when rumors of the Nazi invasion began several weeks ago, we made preparations to flee. We begged Philippe and Muriel to come with us. They are, I must say, our dearest Gentile friends. But they did not think Hitler would really do it. We pleaded with them, 'Come with us. There is no more time.' But they refused. I'm afraid we could not wait any longer. Last Tuesday we fled the city. It broke our hearts to leave our friends and our home, but we simply couldn't take a chance on being captured by the Germans. We hear they are sending Jews to work camps all over Europe. — Joel C. Rosenberg

I have my own set of survival techniques. I am patient. I know how to pack light. But my one might travel talent is that I can make friends with anybody. I can make friends with the dead. If there isn't anyone else around to talk to, I could probably make friends with a four-foot-tall pile of sheetrock. That is why I'm not afraid to travel to the most remote places in the world, not if there are human beings there to meet. People asked me before I left, do you have friends [there]?' and I would just shake my head no, thinking to myself, But I will. — Elizabeth Gilbert

Emile Saint-Blague had been a lively, versatile painter in his youth, but he had abused his energy by painting too many pictures; so that in what might have been the ripe period of his art he had nothing left but ideas. A man who has nothing left but ideas may be of great service to his friends, but he is of no use at all to himself. Emile was certainly an inspiration to his friends. — Laura Riding

We have created a democracy that links us all, and with it come not only opportunities but obligations. There are no gates or walls high enough. There are no bank accounts large enough to buy you and your family and your friends protection from the fear and hunger of those left behind or to isolate you from the consequences of growing social inequities. We are all in this boat together. And the fact that there isn't a hole at your end of the boat doesn't mean you are safe. — Arianna Huffington

I am back in my beloved city. The scene of desolation fills my eyes with tears. At every step my distress and agitation increases. I cannot recognize houses or landmarks I once knew well. Of the former inhabitants, there is no trace. Everywhere there is a terrible emptiness. All at once I find myself in the quarter where I once resided. I recall the life I used to live: meeting friends in the evening, reciting poetry, making love, spending sleepless nights pining for beautiful women and writing verses on their long tresses which held me captive. That was life! What is there left of it? Nothing. — Khushwant Singh

Why did I stay? My self-esteem was ruined for a very long time. I was socially isolated from my family and friends. I kept everything that was going on in my marriage a secret. I feared for my safety if I left him. I was financially dependent on my spouse. I am an educated woman who was working towards a master's degree when I met him. He persuaded me to stop school after the birth of our first son. Eventually, he trapped me in his web of lies. I believe I suffered from Stockholm syndrome for many years. It isn't easy to leave. Unless you have lived in an abusive relationship, a typical person wouldn't understand. It seems perfectly logical to an outsider that it would be easy to leave an abusive relationship. It truly isn't and walking away is terrifying for a victim. No one deserves to live his or her life as a prisoner. Love shouldn't hurt and abuse is not love. - Mary Laumbach-Perez — Bree Bonchay

Stricken down with consumption in 1819, Keats, after weeks in bed, wrote to Fanny Brawne: "Now I have had opportunities of passing nights anxious and awake, I have found thoughts obtrude upon me.'If I should die,' said I to myself,'I have left no immortal work behind me - nothing to make my friends proud of my memory - but I have loved the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remembered.'" "If I had had time" - this is the tragedy of all great men. Keats never wrote anything of importance after that; nevertheless, his friends are remembered because of him, and he has left behind him poems as immortal as English, and more perfect than Shakespeare.We — Will Durant

So doesn't that make the universe a giant lottery, then? you purchase a ticket when you're born. and it's all just random whether you get a good ticket or a bad ticket. it's all just luck. my head swirls on this, but then softer thoughts soothe, like a flatted third on a major chord. no, no, it's not all random, if it really was all random, the universe would abandon us completely. and the universe doesn't. it takes care of its most fragile creations in ways we can't see. like with the parents who adore you blindly. and the big sister who feels guilty for being human over you. and a little gravelly-voiced kid whose friends have left him over you. and even a pink-haired girl who carries your picture in her wallet. maybe it is a lottery, but the universe makes it all even out in the end. the universe takes care of all of its birds. — R.J. Palacio

What is there left to understand? Choice is an illusion. Freedom is conceit. The hands that reach out to guide your every step, your every thought, come not from the gods, for they are no less deluded than we - no, my friends, those hands come to each of us ... from each of us. — Steven Erikson

The miracle of the Atonement is not just that we can go home but that - miraculously - we can feel at home there. If Christ did not require faith and repentance, then there would be no desire to change. Think of your friends and family members who have chosen to live without faith and without repentance. They don't want to change. They are not trying to abandon sin and become comfortable with God. Rather, they are trying to abandon God and become comfortable with sin. If Jesus did not require covenants and bestow the gift of the Holy Ghost, then there would be no way to change. We would be left forever with only willpower, with no access to His power. If Jesus did not require endurance to the end, then there would be no internalization of those changes over time. They would forever be surface and cosmetic rather than sinking inside us and becoming part of us - part of who we are. — Brad Wilcox

Darla shook her head, a small smirk on her lips. "You're such a mom," she told Katherine.
Katherine stared at her, puzzled. "You're a mom, too," she said softly.
"No, I gave birth. That doesn't make me a mom. Not like you."
A look passed between the two women like none they had ever shared before. For a split second, Katherine felt a slight connection. "Well, you rest. I'll check on you later." She turned and left the room, a funny, unexplainable feeling inside her. — Deanna Lynn Sletten

Suddenly Saffron had a picture in her mind of Sarah waiting at the bottom of the wall, and she was angry with herself.
Something changed in Saffron at that moment. She knew all about feeling left out ... That was why she wanted her angel so badly; proof that she mattered as much as anyone else.
"I couldn't really climb the wall," she said. "And if I could, what if I got caught? What would I say?"
"You'd think of something."
"No. It was a stupid idea. Let's try your way, early in the morning."
"Before breakfast?"
"Yes. All right Mission Control?"
"All right," said Sarah. "All right, Superhero. — Hilary McKay

They would return to unwanted jobs, unloved families, unchosen friends, to drawing rooms, evening clothes, cocktail glasses and movies, to unadmitted pain, murdered hope, desire left unreached, left hanging silently over a path on which no step was taken, to days of effort not to think, not to say, to forget and give in and give up. — Ayn Rand

I have made new friends and have many new people that I know. But hey, you will always be a special part of my heart because no one has been able to replace the space you left in it. — Stephen Lobo

Away

There is no sorrow
Time heals never;
No loss, betrayal,
Beyond repair.
Balm for the soul, then,
Though grave shall sever
Lover from loved
And all they share.
See the sweet sun shines
The shower is over;
Flowers preen their beauty,
The day how fair!
Brood not too closely
On love, on duty;
Friends long forgotten
May wait you where
Life with death
Brings all to an issue;
None will long mourn for you,
Pray for you, miss you,
Your place left vacant,
You not there. — Walter De La Mare

Be so strong that nothing can disturb your peace of mind. Talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person you meet. Make all your friends feel there is something special in them. Look at the sunny side of everything. Think only the best, be as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own.
Forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future. Give everyone a smile. Spend so much time improving yourself that you have no time left to criticize others. Be too big for worry and too noble for anger. — Norman Vincent Peale

Her free hand was clenched in a fist. I held still, waiting for her to say something, to tell me she should have never left me here, where her friends might look to me for help.
Finally she looked at me. Her eyes were hard, but she'd let no tears fall. "This is where we blame those who are responsible, Cooper, she told me, her voice very soft. "The colemongers, and the bought Dogs at Tradesmen's kennel. We'll leave an offering for him with the Black God when all this is done, and we'll occupy ourselves with tearing these colemongers apart. all right? We put grief aside for now. — Tamora Pierce

I opened a book and in I strode.
Now nobody can find me.
I've left my chair, my house, my road,
My town and my world behind me.
I'm wearing the cloak, I've slipped on the ring,
I've swallowed the magic potion.
I've fought with a dragon, dined with a king
And dived in a bottomless ocean.
I opened a book and made some friends.
I shared their tears and laughter
And followed their road with its bumps and bends
To the happily ever after.
I finished my book and out I came.
The cloak can no longer hide me.
My chair and my house are just the same,
But I have a book inside me. — Julia Donaldson

When ladies as young, and good, and beautiful as you are," replied the girl steadily, "give away your hearts, love will carry you all lengths
even such as you, who have home, friends, other admireres, everything to fill them. When such as I, who have no certain roof but the coffin-lid, and no friend in sickness or death but the hospital nurse, set our rotten hearts on any man, and let him fill the place that has been a blank through all our wretched lives, who can hope to cure us? Pity us, lady
pity us for having only one feeling of the woman left, and for having that turned, by a heavy judgment, from a comfort and a pride, into a new means of violence and suffering. — Charles Dickens

If I should die," said I to myself, "I have left no immortal work behind me - nothing to make my friends proud of my memory - but I have lov'd the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had time I would have made myself remember'd. — Dan Simmons

Friends, there is no Left in American politics. — Gore Vidal

There is no rest for the striver. Just beyond the completion of each goal on our life-achievement "bucket list" looms another goal, and then another. Meanwhile, of course, the clock is ticking - quite loudly, in fact. We become breathless. And we have no time left for a calm and reflective appreciation of our twilight years, no deliciously long afternoons sitting with friends or listening to music or musing about the story of our lives. And we will never get another chance for that. — Daniel Klein

We're slammed at work and busy at home. Throw in an occasional outing with friends or significant others, and we're ready for bed at 10:00 PM every night. Really ready for bed. There's barely enough time in a day to cover all our mandatory obligations, so optional activities like novel writing, journaling, painting or playing music
things that feel great but no one will ever take us to task for shirking
are invariably left for another day.
Which is how most of us become 'one day' novelists. As in, 'One day, I'd really like to write a novel.' The problem is that that day never seems to come, and so we're stuck. — Chris Baty

I loved the solar smile he would turn on his friends at times
and on me
nonplussing us when he simply left it on us, full-beam, for such a long, long moment that we'd finally have no choice but to realize this was no social smile, no rote kind of friendliness: this was what it felt like to be completely seen and loved for a moment. — David James Duncan

The medal recipients, sixty-two in al, were summoned to the dais. Like many of the other men, Christopher was dressed in private clothes, having left the ranks at the conclusion of the war. Unlike the other men, Christopher was holding a leash. Attached to a dog. For reasons that had not been explained, he had been told to bring Albert to the presentation. The other Rifles whispered encouragements as Albert walked obediently beside Christopher.
"There's a good boy!"
"Look smart, fellow!"
"No accidents in front of the queen!"
"And all that goes for you too, Albert," someone added, causing the lot of them to snicker.
Giving his friends a damning glance, which only amused them further, Christopher took Albert to meet the queen. — Lisa Kleypas

It's not that you have lost touch with these people. You haven't. It's just that they have kept in such close touch with each other. When scrolling through your cell phone, you generally let their numbers be highlighted for a second, hovering, and then move along to people you have spoken to within the last month. It's not that you're a bad friend to these people. It's just that you're not a great one. They know the names of each other's coworkers and the blow-by-blow nature of each other's dramas; they go camping in the Berkshires together and have such sentences in their conversational arsenal as "you left your lip gloss in my bathroom." You have no such sentences. Your connection to your friends is half-baked and you are starting to forget their siblings' names, never mind their coworkers. But you're still in the play even if you're no longer a main character. — Sloane Crosley

First of all, you don't want me to get too hungry. Ever. I'm an ever worse bastard than normal and having starved for centuries, I'm not about to deprive myself again when I don't have to. Second, let me tell you something about your 'friends.' Deimos held me down while I was branded and then took me to the human realm where I was left with nothing. No clothes, no money. Not a damn thing to call my own. Hence the aforementioned starvation. A hundred years later, M'Ordant dumped my inside a Spartan prison camp and told the commander I was a traitor to their people. You don't really want to know what the Spartans did to people they thought betrayed them. D'Alerian had me put inside a Turkish prison in the fifteenth century where I was impaled after being tortured for three weeks. So you'll have to excuse me if I have a hard time feeling too sorry for them right now. At least no one's shoving a sharp spike up their asses. (Jericho) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

You gave me the truth today, so I'll share mine: even if it meant us being friends again, I don't think I would want to go back to how it was before - who I was before. And this ... " He jerked his chin toward the scattered crystals and the bowl of water. "I think this is a good change, too. Don't fear it."
Dorian left, and Chaol opened his mouth, but no words came out. He was too stunned. When Dorian had spoken, it hadn't been a prince who looked at him. It had been a king. — Sarah J. Maas

Martin had a period of relishing the Boston thug-writer George V. Higgins, author of The Friends of Eddie Coyle. Higgins's characters had an infectious way of saying 'inna' and 'onna,' so Martin would say, for example, 'I think this lunch should be onna Hitch' or 'I heard he wasn't that useful inna sack.' Simple pleasures you may say, but linguistic sinew is acquired in this fashion and he would not dump a trope until he had chewed all the flesh and pulp of it and was left only with pith and pips. Thus there arrived a day when Park Lane played host to a fancy new American hotel with the no less fancy name of 'The Inn on The Park' and he suggested a high-priced cocktail there for no better reason than that he could instruct the cab driver to 'park inna Inn onna Park.' This near-palindrome (as I now think of it) gave us much innocent pleasure. — Christopher Hitchens

While it's possible I just got sick and she arranged for me to be cleaned up and cared for - much as I do, or did, for my undergraduate friends - I have no idea why she might benefact me thus. I don't have a lot of faith in the milk of human kindness; it's generally been left out too long. Then again, I also didn't see why she might spend a night in drunken revels with me, either. I'm no prize, unless you count door prizes. Well, — Garon Whited

I send my friends e-mail messages about the progress of my garden, especially of my roses. It left them with the impression, I think, that I was concerned with nothing else. I felt no urgency in correcting that notion. People obsessed with their gardens have probably caused the least suffering in the world of any category of men. — David Brendan Hopes

No one fears death more than immortals. Humans adjust to their lot in life little bits at a time. They're introduced to the concept with goldfish, then move up to puppies, ancient relatives and reckless friends, each victim closer to them than the last. Death follows them through life, making itself known. Numbing them bit by bit until there is nothing left in them but resignation. We had no such preparation. We were never meant to die. — Kaitlin Bevis

They who know the agonies of an ambitious, indolent, doubting, self-accusing man, - of a man who has a skeleton in his cupboard as to which he can ask for sympathy from no one, - will understand what feelings were at work within the bosom of Sir Thomas when his Percycross friends left him alone in his chamber. — Anthony Trollope

Stunned, I sat down on the bed, reading the message over and over again, convinced I had misunderstood it in some way. I couldn't believe that Jack would have written something so cruel or been so cutting. He had never spoken to me in such a way before, he had never even raised his voice to me. I felt as if I'd been slapped in the face. Surely I deserved some explanation and, at the very least, an apology? I needed to talk to someone, badly, so it was sobering to realise there was no one I could call. My parents and I didn't have the sort of relationship that would allow me to sob down the phone that he had left me by myself and for some reason I felt too ashamed to tell any of my friends. Where had the perfect gentleman I'd thought him to be gone? Had it all been a facade, had he covered his true self with a cloak of geniality and good humour to impress me? — B.A. Paris

Valentine
my friends stitched it up with golden thread
like a red
satin pillow they gave me other whole ones too
roses and charms and red candles
milagros to repair the real one
they told me i was no longer allowed to give it away
a pretty pin cushion
a piece of mexican folk art
a hundred beating poems left unanswered
like a thing to wear around the neck
they said you must heal we will protect you
but i sat weeping at the computer forging ahead anyway
with the small stitched thing struggling in my chest
it knew that it had needed to be torn
so that it could recognize and receive the hundred kindnesses
traveling across three thousand miles at the speed of light
a storm of petals and beautiful words and tiny hearts to keep it
company — Francesca Lia Block

After the September 11th tragedy in New York City, people began to tell others what their loved ones, who had been trapped in the twin towers in New York, had said to them in frantic telephone conversations or email messages. Those who received calls from mobile phones from the doomed planes also told their stories. Some re-listened to messages left on answerphones. And as they shared their experiences, it was immediately evident that the same three words kept coming up time and time again. Those words did not refer to size of salary or bonuses, nor to the type of car recently purchased or expensive holidays taken. No. Lovers said them to lovers, husbands to wives, friends to friends and parents to kids: 'I love you.' 'Tell Suzanne, I love her. — Rob Parsons

My head don't work any more and it's hard for me to understand how anybody could care if he lived or died or was dying or cared about anything but whether or not there was liquor left in the bottle and so I said what I said without thinking. In some ways I'm no better than the others, in some ways worse because I'm less alive. Maybe it's being alive that makes them lie, and being almost not alive that makes me sort of accidentally truthful
I don't know but
anyway
we've been friends ... And being friends is telling each other the truth ... — Tennessee Williams

In short, he was a dope. Clevinger was one of those people with lots of intelligence and no brains, and everyone knew it except those who soon found it out. In short, he was a dope. He often looked to Yossarian like one of those people hanging around modern museums with both eyes together on one side of a face. It was an illusion, of course, generated by Clevinger's predilection for staring fixedly at one side of a question and never seeing the other side at all. Politically, he was a humanitarian who did know right from left and was trapped uncomfortably between the two. He was constantly defending his Communist friends to his right-wing enemies and his right-wing friends to his Communist enemies, and he was thoroughly detested by both groups, who never defended him to anyone because they thought he was a dope. He was a very serious, very earnest and very conscientious dope. — Joseph Heller

You, Bedouin of Libya who saved our lives, though you will dwell forever in my memory yet I shall never be able to recapture your features. You are Humanity and your face comes into my mind simply as man incarnate. You, our beloved fellowman, did not know who we might be, and yet you recognized us without fail. And I, in my turn, shall recognize you in the faces of all mankind. You came towards me in an aureole of charity and magnanimity bearing the gift of water. All my friends and all my enemies marched towards me in your person. It did not seem to me that you were rescuing me: rather did it seem that you were forgiving me. And I felt I had no enemy left in all the world. — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

Houses, like people, are apt to become rather eccentric if left too much on their own; this house was the architectural equivalent of an old gentleman in a worn dressing-gown and torn slippers, who got up and went to bed at odd times of day, and who kept up a continual conversation with friends no one else could see. — Susanna Clarke

Instead of things I'm good at, it might be faster to list the things I can't do. I can't cook or clean the house. My room's a mess, and I'm always losing things. I love music, but I can't sing a note. I'm clumsy and can barely sew a stitch. My sense of direction is the pits, and I can't tell left from right half the time. When I get angry, I tend to break things. Plates and pencils, alarm clocks. Later on I regret it, but at the time I can't help myself. I have no money in the bank. I'm bashful for no reason, and I have hardly any friends to speak of. — Haruki Murakami

Casting back her head, Arya gazed up at the twinkling sky, her long neck gold with firelight, her face pale with the radiance of the heavenx. "Do you ask out of friendly concern or your own self-interest?" She gave an abrupt, choked laugh, the sound of water falling over cold rocks. "Never mind. The night air has addled me. It has undone my sense of courtesy and left me free to say the most spiteful things that occur to me."
"No matter."
"It does matter, because I regret it, and I shall not tolerate it. Did I love Faolin? How would you define love? For over twenty years, we traveled together, the only immortals to walk among the short-lived races. We were companions ... and friends. — Christopher Paolini

A man once asked me ... how I managed in my books to write such natural conversation between men when they were by themselves. Was I, by any chance, a member of a large, mixed family with a lot of male friends? I replied that, on the contrary, I was an only child and had practically never seen or spoken to any men of my own age till I was about twenty-five. "Well," said the man, "I shouldn't have expected a woman (meaning me) to have been able to make it so convincing." I replied that I had coped with this difficult problem by making my men talk, as far as possible, like ordinary human beings. This aspect of the matter seemed to surprise the other speaker; he said no more, but took it away to chew it over. One of these days it may quite likely occur to him that women, as well as men, when left to themselves, talk very much like human beings also. — Dorothy L. Sayers

Imagine if you were the last Shadowhunter left on earth, imagine if all your family and friends were dead, imagine if there were no one left who even believed in what you were. Imagine if you were on the earth in a billion, billion years, after the sun had scorched away all the life, and you were crying out from inside yourself for just one single living creature to still draw breath alongside you, but there was nothing, only rivers of fire and ashes. Imagine being that lonely. and then imagine there was only one way to fix it. Then imagine what you would do to make that thing happen. — Cassandra Clare

There is simply no dignified way for a woman to live alone. Oh, she can get along financially perhaps (though not nearly as well as a man), but emotionally she is never left in peace. Her friends, her family, her fellow workers never let her forget that her husbandlessness, her childlessness - her selfishness, in short - is a reproach to the American way of life. — Erica Jong

I would sooner lose my best friend than my worst enemy. To have friends, you know, one need only be good-natured; but when a man has no enemy left there must be something mean about him. — Oscar Wilde

[On New York City:] Were all America like this fair city, and all, no, only a small proportion of its population like the friends we left there, I should say that the land was the fairest in the world. — Frances Trollope

Come let us be friends for once. Let us make life easy on us. Let us be loved ones and lovers. The earth shall be left to no one. — Yunus Emre

When I was younger all kinds of people talked to me," she
said. "Told me all sorts of things. Fascinating stories, beautiful,
strange stories. But past a certain point nobody talked to me
any more. No one. Not my husband, my child, my friends ...
no one. Like there was nothing left in the world to talk about.
Sometimes I feel like my body's turning invisible, like you can
see right through me. — Haruki Murakami

I'm thirty-eight, going on forty. I'm not like Naoko. There's nobody waiting for me to get out, no family to take me back. I don't have any work to speak of, and almost no friends. And after seven years, I don't know what's going on out there. Oh, I'll read a paper in the library every once in a while, but I haven't set foot outside this property for seven years. I wouldn't know what to do if I left." "But maybe a new world would open up for you," I said. "It's worth a try, don't you think?" "Hmm, you may be right," she said, turning her cigarette lighter over and over in her hand. "But I've got my own set of problems. I — Haruki Murakami

He had left a certain mode of life and chosen another and between that life and this a river ran, as impassable as the river of death. And now he wanted to get back madly, desperately, but he couldn't, not even though he knew that the river was nothing but the inhibitions of his own mind ... A normal man who has lived utterly alone for a long time ceases to be normal. A solitary who has cut himself off from human contact comes to have a terror of his fellow humans. A coward who had abandoned all responsibility is afraid to shoulder it again. A failure cannot trust to success. A sufferer who has been broken by life dare not be friends with it again ... It was only his own mind that kept him back but a man's mind can be his greatest friend or his greatest enemy, according as it serves or binds his will, and his was his enemy. Its terrors controlled him. He was bound hand and foot by his own weakness. It was no use. He was a good as dead. I cannot get back. — Elizabeth Goudge

Whereupon then can I hope, or wherein may I trust, save only in the great mercy of God, and the hope of heavenly grace? For whether good men are with me, godly brethren or faithful friends, whether holy books or beautiful discourses, whether sweet hymns and songs, all these help but little, and have but little savour when I am deserted by God's favour and left to mine own poverty. There is no better remedy, then, than patience and denial of self, and an abiding in the will of God. — Thomas A Kempis