Once You're Gone Quotes & Sayings

You may have noticed that people in bus stations, if they know you also are alone, will glance at you sidelong, with a look that is both piercing and intimate, and if you let them sit beside you, they will tell you long lies about numerous children who are all gone now, and mothers who were beautiful and cruel, and in every case they will tell you that they were abandoned, disappointed, or betrayed--that they should not be alone, that only remarkable events, of the kind one reads in a book, could have made their condition so extreme. And that is why, even if the things they say are true, they have the quick eyes and active hands and the passion for meticulous elaboration of people who know they are lying. Because, once alone, it is impossible to believe that one could ever been otherwise. Loneliness is absolute discovery. — Marilynne Robinson

And then the years were gone, and he was back at Winterfell once more, wearing a quilted leather coat in place of mail and plate. His sword was not made of wood, and it was Robb who stood facing him, not Iron Emmett.
Every morning they had trailed together, since they were big enough to walk; Snow and Stark, spinning and slashing about the wards of Winterfell, shouting and laughing, sometimes crying when there was no one else to see. They were not little boys when they fought, but knights and mighty heroes. "I'm Prince Aemon the Dragonknight," Jon would call out, and Robb would shout back, "Well, I'm Florian the Fool." Or Robb would say, "I'm the Young Dragon," and Jon would reply, "I'm Ser Ryam Redwyne."
That morning he called it first. "I'm Lord of Winterfell!" he cried, as he had a hundred times before. Only this time, this time, Robb had answered, "You can't be Lord of Winterfell, you're bastard-born. My lady mother says you can't ever be the Lord of Winterfell. — George R R Martin

Love never dies. Love will continue. Love keeps on beating when you're gone. Love never dies once it is in you. Life may be fleeting; love lives on! Life may be fleeting! Love lives on... — Andrew Lloyd Webber

No writing is effortless. I'm not saying you can't have a good day where the words just kind of flow, but even those words have to be edited. Probably more than once. And I'm not saying a character hasn't somehow gone in a different direction that I wanted her to go, but that was me, not her. I let her get away from me. I let her roam free and nine times out of ten, the result is not good. I have to go back and start over because she veered off the path of my book. She changed the vision. And I did that. Not her. — Darynda Jones

Your heart is like a great river after a long spell of rain, spilling over its banks. All signposts that once stood on the ground are gone, inundated and carried away by that rush of water. And still the rain beats down on the surface of the river. Every time you see a flood like that on the news you tell yourself: That's it. That's my heart. — Haruki Murakami

The odd superstitions touched upon were all prevalent among children and slaves in the West at the period of this story - that is to say, thirty or forty years ago. Although my book is intended mainly for the entertainment of boys and girls, I hope it will not be shunned by men and women on that account, for part of my plan has been to try to pleasantly remind adults of what they once were themselves, and of how they felt and thought and talked, and what queer enterprises they sometimes engaged in. THE AUTHOR. HARTFORD, 1876. CHAPTER I "TOM!" No answer. "TOM!" No answer. "What's gone with that boy, I wonder? You TOM! — Mark Twain

In a surreal gift from the universe, time both stands still and flies past you in that singular moment when you find out someone you once loved is gone. — Rachel Thompson

Musicians are probably the most uncomfortable people in themselves in the world. Happiness, I think, only exists when you're a child and once you go past 11, unfortunately it's gone. — Andrea Corr

Every city is a ghost.
New buildings rise upon the bones of the old so that each shiny steel bean, each tower of brick carries within it the memories of what has gone before, an architectural haunting. Sometimes you can catch a glimpse of these former incarnations in the awkward angle of a street or filigreed gate, an old oak door peeking out from a new facade, the plaque commemorating the spot that was once a battleground, which became a saloon and is now a park. — Libba Bray

If an angel should be winged from Heaven, on an errand of mercy to our country, the first accents that would glow on his lips would be, Beware! Be cautious! You have everything to lose; nothing to gain. We live under the only government that ever existed which was framed by the unrestrained and deliberate consultations of the people. Miracles do not cluster. That which has happened but once in six thousand years cannot be expected to happen often. Such a government, once gone, might leave a void, to be filled, for ages, with revolution and tumult, riot and despotism. — Daniel Webster

We don't have a choice in how or when our bad days will blindside us. But what we do choose is how we allow them to leave us once they're gone. You can use those moments as a catalyst to spur you on to greater things or you can let it be the event that breaks you and leaves you shattered and forever lost in darkness. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I was brought up by great parents and great grandparents who told me, 'Never, ever think that you're better than anyone else or that what you do is so important that the world won't miss you once you're gone,' and I kind of translate that into the stardom thing. — Yolanda Adams

When you're alive, you don't dwell on how you're going to spend your time once you're dead. You just figure you're gone, and the rest will pretty much take care of itself. Or you think you're not really going to die. You're going to be the first person in the history of the world who doesn't have to. Maybe that's some kind of lie our brains tell us to keep us from going crazy while we're alive. — Margaret Stohl

Doctor: Nyssa, we can't get you out of there just yet. I'm sorry.
Nyssa: I know.
Doctor: The TARDIS has gone missing. I'm sorry, I have to concentrate-
Nyssa: I know, Doctor. You don't have to keep saying you're sorry.
Doctor: We'll come for you. When all of this is over we'll follow the comet and get you back.
Nyssa: You once said much the same thing to somebody else. — Eddie Robson

Hello, old friend. And here we are. You and me, on the last page. By the time you read these words, Rory and I will be long gone. So know that we lived well and were very happy. And above all else, know that we will love you always. Sometimes I do worry about you though. I think once we're gone you won't be coming back here for awhile. And you might be alone. Which you should never be. Don't be alone, Doctor. And do one more thing for me. There's a little girl waiting in a garden. She's going to wait a long while, so she's going to need a lot of hope. Go to her. Tell her a story. Tell her that if she's patient, the days are coming that she'll never forget. Tell her she'll go to see and fight pirates. She'll fall in love with a man who'll wait two thousand years to keep her safe. Tell her she'll give hope to the greatest painter who ever lived. And save a whale in outer space. Tell her, this is the story of Amelia Pond. And this is how it ends. — Steven Moffat

If you're gonna leave, I wish you'd just leave. Why do you keep coming back if you're not going to stay? Because even when you're gone, you're never really gone ... I won't get over it if you keep coming back. Losing you once was hard enough. And now you're here again and everything's coming back. I'm going to get screwed. And I can't do it again. — Brodi Ashton

When you have kids, you instantly feel that you do not want to do them wrong. Those dads that go off to Florida and start a new life, I couldn't imagine that: seeing my kid once every Christmas, every three years. If I'm gone for six days it feels like too much. — Adam Carolla

Harry had read once, somewhere, that the opposite of happiness wasn't sadness, but boredom; and the author had gone on to say that to find happiness in life you asked yourself not what would make you happy, but what would excite you. And by the same reasoning, hatred wasn't the true opposite of love. Even hatred was a kind of respect that you could give to someone's existence. If you cared about someone enough to prefer their dying to their living, it meant you were thinking about them. — Eliezer Yudkowsky

Graves aren't for the dead. They're for the loved ones the dead leave behind them. Once those loved ones have gone, once all the lives that have touched the occupant of any given grave had ended, then the grave's purpose was fulfilled and ended. I suppose if you looked at it that way, one might as well decorate one's grave with an enormous statue or a giant temple. It gave people something to talk about, at least. Although, following that logic, I would need to have a roller coaster, or maybe a Tilt-A-Whirl constructed over my own grave when I died. Then even after my loved ones had moved on, people could keep having fun for years and years. Of course, I'd need a slightly larger plot. — Jim Butcher

Don't ever believe that you are going to be peaceful-life is not like that. When you are changing all the time, you've got to continue to keep adjusting to change, which means that you are going to be constantly facing new obstacles. That's the joy of living. And once you are involved in the process of becoming, there is no stopping. You're doomed! You're gone! But what a fantastic journey! Every day is new. Every flower is new. Every face is new. Everything in the world is new, every morning of your life. Stop seeing it as a drag! — Leo Buscaglia

pointed to glass panes high on the wall. "How do we get up there?" said Jenny. "And once we're out, how do we get out of here?" Cora thought a minute. "There's a barn out back with horses. We'll take them. Can you ride?" "Yes, I can ride, but what if they catch us? And which way do we go?" "They won't even know we're gone until much later. By then we'll be in town. Galena is only a few miles away. We went through it on the way here, remember? We'll go straight to the sheriff there and tell him what happened. Now help me move some tables and chairs." They assembled a rickety pile that gave them access to the high window, which was loose enough — Jordan St. John

My 13-year-old daughter leaves the house at 7:15 every morning and takes a smelly city bus to school way uptown. It's like 8 degrees out, and it's dark and she's got this morning face and I send her out there to take a bus. Meanwhile, my driver is sitting in a toasty Mercedes that's going to take me to work once both kids are gone. I could send her in the Mercedes and then have it come back to get me, but I can't have my kid doing that. I can't do that to her. Me? I earned that f - ing Mercedes. You better f - ing believe it. — Louis C.K.

I've thought that perhaps that's why women are so often sad, once the child's born," she said meditatively, as though thinking aloud. "Ye think of them while ye talk, and you have a knowledge of them as they are inside ye, the way you think they are. And then they're born, and they're different - not the way ye thought of them inside, at all. And ye love them, o' course, and get to know them they way they are ... but still, there's the thought of the child ye once talked to in your heart, and that child is gone. So I think it's the grievin' for the child unborn that ye feel, even as ye hold the born one in your arms. — Diana Gabaldon

With werewolves gone and fire stoked, Sidheav stopped shaking. The tea, once it arrived, had its customary effect
engendering comfort and loosening the tongue. *That's tea for you*, thought Sophronia, *the great social lubricant.* Soon they had the whole story out of her. No wonder tea was considered a vital weapon of espionage. — Gail Carriger

There's some idea there, and the power of it comes from the fact that most of the time you'll never be able to answer what it is. It's just there. It's just a magic moment that you can feel in your gut that it's there, and you're willing to go there and sleep there and go through the hardship and fight for it. Once you start answering it too clearly then the magic is gone. — Kalle Lasn

You're alive, Bod. That means you have infinite potential. You can do anything, make anything, dream anything. If you can change the world, the world will change. Potential. Once you're dead, it's gone. Over. You've made what you've made, dreamed your dream, written your name. You may be buried here, you may even walk. But that potential is finished. — Neil Gaiman

One man can go where a group cannot, and manage on very little, particularly a rough adventurer such as he. More the point, he risks only himself when he goes: you much consider that in your charge is an inexpressibly valuable dragon, whose loss must be of greater importance than even this mission."

"Oh, pray, let us be gone at once," said the inexpressibly valuable dragon, when Laurence had carried the question, still unresolved, back to him. "It sounds very exciting to me. — Naomi Novik

Nothing Twice Nothing can ever happen twice. In consequence, the sorry fact is that we arrive here improvised and leave without the chance to practice. Even if there is no one dumber, if you're the planet's biggest dunce, you can't repeat the class in summer: this course is only offered once. No day copies yesterday, no two nights will teach what bliss is in precisely the same way, with exactly the same kisses. One day, perhaps, some idle tongue mentions your name by accident: I feel as if a rose were flung into the room, all hue and scent. The next day, though you're here with me, I can't help looking at the clock: A rose? A rose? What could that be? Is it a flower or a rock? Why do we treat the fleeting day with so much needless fear and sorrow? It's in its nature not to stay: today is always gone tomorrow. With smiles and kisses, we prefer to seek accord beneath our star, although we're different (we concur) just as two drops of water are. — Wislawa Szymborska

Simon laughed heartily. "I'm afraid the rest of us have to find talents to get our women into bed. Of course once they're there, I have other talents that keep them right where they are."
"Handcuffs hardly count," Christian said offhandedly.
"If you mean the ladies cuffing me to the bed so they can explore Hunt Island," he said, rubbing his chest, " ... then point taken. These hands are capable of making any female climax by the mere brush of a pinky across her bare breast."
"I must have gone to the wrong island," I said with a private laugh. — Dannika Dark

It's naive to think that anyone is just one person, that there's a real you. What is real? You can only exist in one moment, and then that moment is gone. And there's a new moment, a new you. And you can't even say you're the sum of all your parts, because you can never be all your parts at once. — Sherry Ashworth

Let me explain. Say you have an eating disorder like anorexia - you've probably been hiding the condition for a long time. After months or years, you face your demons, with or without therapy, you admit you're ill and eventually decide you want to recover. But this is only half the battle. Once start to eat again, once you begin to gain weight, it's unbelievably stressful. Having gone from absolute control over every calorie which goes into your mouth, you're now being forced to double, maybe even triple that amount. You're being forced to consume unsafe substances like butter, oil, nuts. Every mouthful takes a colossal effort. In your rigid anorexic mindset, not being underweight equates to being overweight. Not being hungry equates to greed. Giving up an eating disorder is frightening. It is almost impossible to imagine that the process will ever be ok. — Emma Woolf

For years I didn't realize this because so many others had more. We were surrounded by extreme affluence, which tricks you into thinking you're in the middle of the pack. I mean, sure, we have twenty-four hundred square feet for only five humans to live in, but our kids have never been on an airplane, so how rich could we be? We haven't traveled to Italy, my kids are in public schools, and we don't even own a time-share. (Roll eyes here.) But it gets fuzzy once you spend time with people below your rung. I started seeing my stuff with fresh eyes, realizing we had everything. I mean everything. We've never missed a meal or even skimped on one. We have a beautiful home in a great neighborhood. Our kids are in a Texas exemplary school. We drive two cars under warranty. We've never gone a day without health insurance. Our closets are overflowing. We throw away food we didn't eat, clothes we barely wore, trash that will never disintegrate, stuff that fell out of fashion. — Jen Hatmaker

A city finds its life through the humans who inhabit it. When they go, what is truly left? Just silent stones, witnesses to the history but mute in its telling, remaining thus while slowly turning to rubble. It saddens me that life's moments are thus lost, that one cannot experience the past in the same rich vibrancy as the present. You live the moments and then relegate them to memory, now just two-dimensional shadows, pictures without depth, stripped of their purest emotion, their tactile connections no longer accessible. You try to recall, but can bring back only a fraction of the event lived. The rest is gone, never to be as full and complete as it was in that one place at that one time. That was what I thought as I studied these stone remains; that all the tangible things experienced here abide somewhere in time, but can never again be wholly re-animated, now just ghosts imbedded in the crumbling walls and in the fading memories of those who once lived here. — Michael Puttonen

Since I am from Spain, once the morning has gone, I like to take a nap while falling asleep to black and white movies. It feels less lonely. There is a comfort in hearing their voices, like when you're a child and your mother tells you a story before bedtime. — Jordi Molla

Growing up happens in a heartbeat. Once day you're in diapers, the next day you're gone. But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul. I remember a place, a town, a house, like a lot of houses. A yard like a lot of other yards. On a street like a lot of other streets. And the thing is, after all these years, I still look back... with wonder.
-Kevin from the finale of the Wonder Years — Daniel Stern

The truth is there isn't anything to me at all. All I know is that I can't sleep well, I can't dream well and I'm quite in love with you. That's all there is to me. My greatest feature is my admiration for you. I know it's not healthy. Like my insomnia. Like my dreamless nights. You make living alright. My nightmares come when I think of a night without Valeria. That's when I realise you're dead. That's when I remember you've been gone for years. That's when I remember I'm awake. And I wait for this dream called Life to leave me to my peace once and for all and forever. — F.K. Preston

Once she was gone, I knelt next to Annabeth and felt her forehead. She was still burning up.
"You're cute when you're worried," she muttered. "Your eyebrows get all scrunched together."
"You are not going to die while I owe you a favor," I said. "Why did you take that knife?"
"You would've done the same for me."
It was true. I guess we both knew it. Still, I felt like somebody was poking my heart with a cold metal rod. — Rick Riordan

I got uncertain from this, I'll be perfect from now on. But all my promises, they're out the window once you're gone. You pack your bags. You say I love you but I cannot stay. — Tegan Quin

Pressure hulls collapse at the speed of sound. Once that starts, you're inside your own little imploding atomic bomb, and you're gone. — Graham Hawkes

Oh, I suppose they're not exactly gone, those green boys. It's rather like a sapling turning into a tree. Can't scrape off the bark, and whittle it down until you find that sapling again, now can you? No, of course not. The sapling becomes an oak. Forever changed. The realities of that war will remain inside us through heaven or hell. Best try and face it, Ty. Running from it won't help. You'll never turn back into the innocent sapling you once were." Robert lifted his glass and grinned. "My friend, we've become a pair of gnarled old trees. — Kathleen Baldwin

You're staring blankly at the fifties now. I'm thirty-ish. Once you were my teacher, my master and I was your student, your apprentice. College years long gone and a decade between us. I think of you every winter and my heart still stops dead, my mouth opening and shutting as if you were still here. I lost something when I found you, something ancient. — Abigail George

It may be all very well in Dickens, but when you read Dickens you're reading a long ballad from a vanished world, where everything has to come together in the end like an equation, where the balance of what was once disturbed must be restored so that the gods can smile again. A consolation, maybe, or a protest against a world gone off the rails, but it is not like that any more, my world is not like that, and I have never gone along with those who believe our lives are governed by fate. They whine, they wash their hands and crave pity. I believe we shape our lives ourselves, at any rate I have shaped mine, for what it's worth, and I take complete responsibility. But of all the places I might have moved to, I had to land up precisely here. — Per Petterson

I don't know. We have everything we need to be happy, but we're not happy. Something's missing. I looked around. The only thing I positively knew was gone was the books I'd burned in ten or twelve years. So I thought books might help."
"You're a hopeless romantic," said Faber. "It would be funny if it were not serious. It's not books you need, it's some of the things that once were in books. The same things could be in the "parlour families" today. The same infinite detail and awareness could be projected through the radios and televisors, but are not. No, no, it's not books at all you're looking for! Take it where you can find it, in old phonograph records, old motion pictures, and in old friends; look for it in nature and look for it in yourself. Books were only one type of receptacle where we stored a lot of things we were afraid we might forget. — Ray Bradbury

We should go boldly where man has not gone before. Fly by the comets, visit asteroids, visit the moon of Mars. There's a monolith there. A very unusual structure on this potato shaped object that goes around Mars once in seven hours. When people find out about that they're going to say 'Who put that there? Who put that there?' The universe put it there. If you choose, God put it there ... — Buzz Aldrin

A piece of me is gone," she told me once while we were bra shopping. "I think we're made up of all these different pieces and every time someone goes, you're left with less of yourself. — Melina Marchetta

I'd never really thought past the whole dying-for-the-sake-of-the-world part of things. When you're alive, you don't dwell on how you're going to spend your time once you're dead. You just figure you're gone, and the rest will pretty much take care of itself. — Kami Garcia

It is critical to your family's well being and to your kids' self-esteem that you like (not just love) your youngsters. What does "like" mean? Here's an example. It's a Saturday and you're home by yourself for a few hours - a rare occurrence! Everyone has gone out. You're listening to some music and just puttering around. You hear a noise outside and look out to see a car pulling up in the driveway. One of your kids gets out and heads for the front door. How do you feel in your gut right at that moment? If it's "Oh no, the fun's over!" that may not be like. If it's "Oh good, I've got some company!" that's more like like. Liking your children and having a good relationship with them is important for lots of reasons. The most important reason, though, may be that it's simply more fun. Kids are naturally cute and enjoyable a lot of the time, and you want to take advantage of that valuable quality. And they only grow up with you once. — Thomas W. Phelan

See, forgiveness doesn't happen all at once. It's not an event
it's a process. Forgiveness happens while you're asleep, while you're dreaming, while you're inline at the coffee shop, while you're showering, eating, farting, jerking off. It happens in the back of your mind, and then one day you realize that you don't hate the person anymore, that your anger has gone away somewhere. And you understand. You've forgiven them. You don't know how or why. It sneaked up on you. It happened in the small spaces between thoughts and in the seconds between ideas and blinks. That's where forgiveness happens. Because anger and hatred, when left unfed, bleed away like air from a punctured tire, over time and days and years. Forgiveness is stealth. At least, that's what I hope. — Barry Lyga

I collected their papers. The ones that blew into Brooklyn. They were just there at first. I didn't even know what they were. But once I did, I went all over the place, picking them up. I don't know what to do with them. I mean, they're meaningless now, but they still exist. You can't throw out something like that. You can't make them gone like that. — David Levithan

If you can go out with your live show and turn people on to that, where you have that fan base that's religious and they're going to come see you when you're in that town, once your radio success is gone and you're not a mainstream guy anymore you can still go out and play your shows. — Jason Aldean

You're a dreamer, boy," he said. "Your mind is on the moon, and from the looks of things, it's never
going to be anywhere else. You have no ambitions, you don't give a damn about money, and you're
too much of a philosopher to have any feeling for art. What am I going to do with you? You need
someone to look after you, to make sure you have food in your belly and a bit of cash in your pocket.
Once I'm gone, you'll be right back where you started. — Paul Auster

If you don't say what you need to say when you have a chance ... you'll regret it. Even if you're mad, say it. Scream it into the world while you still have a chance to. Because once life passes you by, it's gone. And so are the words left unspoken. — Brittainy C. Cherry

In the theatre, once you've gone about eight rows back, everybody else is just listening to you. You're very small, and nobody can really see what you're doing. — Francesca Annis

If there's anything you want to ask your parents, ask them before they go, because once they go, they're gone. — Robert Carlyle

For God's sake, if I learned anything during this damn trial it's that the only way someone can leave you is if you let them. And I'm not doing that, Dee. It may look like that today, or tomorrow, or even a month from now, but one day you're going to wake up and see that this whole time you've been gone, you've only been headed back to where you started. And I'll be there, waiting." He leans forward and kisses me once, feather-light, on the lips. "It's not like I'm not letting you go," he murmurs. "I'm just trusting you enough to come back. — Jodi Picoult

Change doesn't happen overnight. There's no button that's pushed to magically alter everything. Change happens little by little. Day by day. Hour by hour.
It's the ticking of a secondhand, moving painstakingly, as it makes its way around the clock. You don't realize it until it's already over, the minute gone forever, as you're thrust right into the next one, the time still ticking away, whether you want it to or not.
Before long you have a hard time remembering the world as it once was, the person you were then, too focused on the world around you instead.
A world full of promise. A world full of excitement. — J.M. Darhower

I mean, why would someone do this?! Why do people fall in love if it means there is a chance of feeling this way? What the fuck is wrong with humans?! HUMANS ARE FUCKING SICK AND TWISTED! I mean, I get it - it feels good, you know? Being in love, being happy." Her body trembled as the tears fell faster than she could take breaths. "But when that magical rug is ripped out from under you, it takes all the happy and good feelings with it. And your heart? It just breaks. It breaks and it's unapologetic. It shatters into a million pieces, leaving you numb, blankly staring at the pieces because all your free will, all the common sense you once had in your life is gone. You gave up everything for this bullshit thing called love, and now you're just destroyed. — Brittainy C. Cherry

I got another chestful of air in, tore loose with it. 'Somebody help me! You people standing around looking, isn't there one of you will help me? I brought my wife here last night; now she's gone and they're trying to tell me I never -'
("All At Once, No Alice") — Cornell Woolrich

You're alive ... That means you have infinite potential. You can do anything, make anything, dream anything. If you change the world, the world will change. Potential. Once you're dead, it's gone. Over. You've made what you've made, dreamed your dream, written your name. — Neil Gaiman

You know, I've certainly gone through periods, once I got into this business, where I tried to adopt maybe a more sophisticated style, 'cause they give you all these free clothes. — Edward Burns

There are many diamonds in the world and if you lose your favorite, you can work hard, earn a lot of money and get another one to replace it. But the moments of your life aren't like that. Once they're gone, they'll never return. Each and every one is the most precious thing in existence. You can never meaningfully compare one moment with any other. You can never meaningfully compare your life with anyone else's. No matter how rich someone else may be, no matter how happy they look, no matter how enlightened they seem, they can never be you. Never, ever, ever. Only you can live your life. — Brad Warner

The arrow is the intention. It is what unites the strength of the bow with the centre of the target. The intention must be crystal-clear, straight and balanced. Once the arrow has gone, it will not come back, so it is better to interrupt a shot, because the movements that led up to it were not sufficiently precise and correct, than to act carelessly, simply because the bow was fully drawn and the target was waiting. But never hold back from firing the arrow if all that paralyses you is fear of making a mistake. If you have made the right movements, open your hand and release the string. Even if the arrow fails to hit the target, you will learn how to improve your aim next time. If you never take a risk, you will never know what changes you need to make. Each arrow leaves a memory in your heart, and it is the sum of those memories that will make you shoot better and better. — Paulo Coelho

The gifts of an honorable, well-lived life are in those who will miss you once you're gone. — Donald E. Williams Jr.

We can't all leave this country, Bijan had told me-this is our home. The world is a large place, my magician had said when I went to him with my woes. You can write and teach wherever you are. You will be read more and heard better, in fact, once you are over there. To go or not to go? In the long run, it's all very personal, my magician reasoned. I always admired your former colleague's honesty, he said. Which former colleague? Dr. A, the one who said his only reason for leaving was because he liked to drink beer freely. I am getting sick of people who cloak their personal flaws and desires in the guise of patriotic fervor. They stay because they have no means of living anywhere else, because if they leave, they won't be the big shots they are over here; but they talk about sacrifice for the homeland. And then those who do leave claim they've gone in order to criticize and expose the regime. Why all these justifications? — Azar Nafisi

What else can I do? Once you've gone this far you aren't fit for anything else. Something happens to your mind. You're overqualified, overspecialized, and everybody knows it. Nobody in any other game would be crazy enough to hire me. I wouldn't even make a good ditch-digger, I'd start tearing apart the sewer-system, trying to pick-axe and unearth all those chthonic symbols - pipes, valves, cloacal conduits ... No, no. I'll have to be a slave in the paper-mines for all time. — Margaret Atwood

TV happens. And once it's happened, it's gone. When it's gone, you move on, no tears, no tantrums, no videotape. — Mary Schmich

Time changes its nature in prisons and hospitals. In this cosmogony it both races and drags itself. For anyone who hasn't been a long-term patient or prisoner - or both, like Sharmila - there is no way to imagine what evenings are like when you are locked in - the indeterminate hour when the sun has gone down but night hasn't fully set in. It haunts you. In a hospital, especially one where air-conditioning and double-glass windows don't shield you from the real world, there are mixed sounds that rise up from every floor; murmurs, shallow breaths, the sounds of pain and healing. Once the final inspections are done and the trays and bowls carried away, a shroud of silence falls over everything. It can be strangely tranquil, or eerily desolate. — Anubha Bhonsle

James Brown hid everything, and in the game of instant information he lost big-time, because the information machine turns a truth into a lie and a lie into the truth, transforms superstitions and stereotypes into fact with such ease and fluidity that after a while you get to believing as I do, that the media is not a reflection of the American culture but rather is teaching it. As long as James Brown was selling records he let that craziness run. He didn't care. The media worked in his favor and helped fuel his success. But it killed his public reputation and once the success was gone once the head disappeared, the body followed. — James McBride

It's no accident that most ads are pitched to people in their 20s and 30s. Not only are they so much cuter than their elders...but they are less likely to have gone through the transformative process of cleaning out their deceased parents' stuff. Once you go through that, you can never look at *your* stuff in the same way. You start to look at your stuff a little postmortemistically. If you've lived more than two decades as an adult consumer, you probably have quite the accumulation, even if you're not a hoarder...I'm not saying I never buy stuff, because I absolutely do. Maybe I'm less naive about the joys of accumulation. — Roz Chast

When she had gone, Thorne let out a low whistle. "I know, I know. She seems a little" - crossing his eyes, he swirled both fingers around his ears - "but it's really part of her charm, once you get to know her. — Marissa Meyer

Now that Dad was gone I was starting to see how mortality was bound up in things like that cold, arc-lit sky. How the world is full of signs and wonders that come, and go, and if you are lucky you might see them. Once, twice. Perhaps never again. The albums on my mother's shelves are full of family photographs. But also other things. A starling with a crooked beak. A day of hoarfrost and smoke. A cherry tree thick with blossom. Thunderclouds, lightning strikes, comets and eclipses: celestial events terrifying in their blind distances but reassuring you, too, that the world is for ever, though you are only a blink in its course. — Helen Macdonald

Once you win, you have no doubt that you can win. So you have gone through it once, and you can do it again. — Ivan Lendl

Is there a reason you are here?" he finally demanded.
With complete nonchalance she replied, "Well,I've brought my trunks. I do believe I'm moving in."
"The hell you are!"
"Nice of you to welcome me in your usual boorish manner" was all she said to that.
A muscle ticked in his jaw. It made not a jot of difference that he'd just gone to Norford and back this morning to bring her here himself. That had been his idea.Her coming here on her own was her idea,and it make him suspicious.
"Don't start your manipulations already," he warned her. "Answer my question."
"Why am I still here? Shall we start with the obvious reason? Because I really am pregnant and once my pregnancy starts to show,I do not want to be in a position to have people ask me who my husband is and not believe me when I tell them that it's you."
"And the not-so-obvious answer?"
"Because you make me so furious that I spite myself to spite you! — Johanna Lindsey

Was it love when somebody filled a space in your life that yawned inside you, once they had gone? — J.K. Rowling

She was bad at love. There were people in the world who were good at love and people who were bad at it. She was bad. She used to think she was good at love, that it was intimacy she was bad at. But you had to have both. Love without intimacy, she knew, was an unsung tune. It was all in your head. You said, "Listen to this!" but what you found yourself singing was a tangle, a nothing, a heap. It reminded her of a dinner party she had gone to once, where dessert was served on plates printed with French songs. After dinner everyone had had to sing their plate, but hers had still had whipped cream on it, and when it came her turn, she had garbled the notes and words, frantically pushing the whipped cream around with a fork so she could see the next measure. Oh, she was bad, bad like that, at love. — Lorrie Moore

Most good roles are written for young men. We are fixated on youth. So however much people say there is nothing wrong with being bald, the reality is once the hair is gone, you might not get the parts. — Ian Hart

I have seen the sun break through
to illuminate a small field
for a while, and gone my way
and forgotten it. But that was the pearl
of great price, the one field that had
treasure in it. I realize now
that I must give all that I have
to possess it. Life is not hurrying
on to a receeding future, nor hankering after
an imagined past. It is the turning
aside like Moses to the miracle
of the lit bush, to a brightness
that seemed as transitory as your youth
once, but is the eternity that awaits you. — R.S. Thomas

Why do people fall in love if it means there is a chance of feeling this way? What the fuck is wrong with humans?! HUMANS ARE FUCKING SICK AND TWISTED! I mean, I get it - it feels good, you know? Being in love, being happy." Her body trembled as the tears fell faster than she could take breaths. "But when that magical rug is ripped out from under you, it takes all the happy and good feelings with it. And your heart? It just breaks. It breaks and it's unapologetic. It shatters into a million pieces, leaving you numb, blankly staring at the pieces because all your free will, all the common sense you once had in your life is gone. You gave up everything for this bullshit thing called love, and now you're just destroyed." I — Brittainy C. Cherry

Oh, Doctor, if you need a real good woman, you won't find a better lady than our teacher." "That so?" "Yep. Teacher . . . well, she really cares for us. And I just know she'd make a great ma someday." "Thank you, son." The boy nodded solemnly, as if he'd just done Eli the greatest of favors. Dr. Baldwin coughed. And once the boys were gone, Eli turned to look at his old friend. "What?" "Oh, nothing. — Jody Hedlund

Once upon a time there was an island visited by ruin and inhabited by strange peccant creatures. "It's a sad place," I say, "and too much like my own life." He nods. "You mean, the losing struggle against inscrutable blind forces, young dreams brought to ruin." "Yes," I tell Coover, "my young dreams are gone. I lost the struggle a long, long time ago. — Rabih Alameddine

Sometimes you want something so badly, you get caught up; you lose yourself in that hunger. But then, once it is gone, you have a chance to reassess -to decide what it is you're truly after. Half of the time, it's not what you originally thought it would be. — Jenna Moreci

One day you'll meet someone who will consume your very soul. When you meet that person, you'll know. And if that person ever tries to leave you, fight for them, because once they're gone, life will become a chore. — Belle Aurora

Like a needle jabbed into your arm, reality stings you, hurting you more than your skin and flesh. You realize that you're nobody. The electricity's gone out, the darkness is your sudden enemy...you have to protect yourself from the dark. Otherwise the world goes out, along with the artificial lights from the power plant. The night once again disintegrates into atoms, changes from cultivated to wild, fitting itself afterward into its original black hues, its cat skin. — Georgi Tenev

There's a certain kind of existential freedom that comes to people who realize that all the things that they hold onto and that they think define them, once they're gone, there's this new freedom to determine the way you're going to live your life. — Donal Logue

Don't give me some stupid lecture about war when the person we're talking about losing is you!" I said, surprised by the savagery in my tone. At least my voice didn't shake.
His face blurred and I tasted salt on my lips. It was warm, warm like Pritkin's hands coming up and framing my face, his thumbs brushing over my eyelids, soft as his fingers in my hair. "One person is not so important in the scheme of things", he said, and his voice was gentle, gentle when it never was, and that almost broke me.
But you are important, I thought. And yet he couldn't see that. In Pritkin's mind, he was an experiment gone wrong, a child cast out, a man valued by his peers only for his ability to kill the things they feared. Just once, I wished he could see what I did.
"Then neither is this", I said, leaning in and pressing my mouth to his, the kiss lightened by desperation and weighted down by everything he meant to me. — Karen Chance

He said a fortuneteller had told Mum's fortune once, and after that, she's never gone out on sea again. It was years ago, but she never has. Not once." said Conner
"What did the fortuneteller say?" I asked
"Dad wouldn't tell me. It must have been something really bad though."
"maybe the fortuneteller said that Mum would die by drowning." I suggested.
"Don't be stupid Saph. A fortuneteller wouldn't ever say that to someone. You're going to drown, that'll be ten pounds please — Helen Dunmore

After you're gone, people will forget your name, no matter how important it was, and your face, no matter how pretty it was, and what you said, no matter how clever any of it sounded.
The things you've done will crumble and fade and the places you once loved, will change and be given new names.
You are only here for one moment and it lasts exactly one lifetime. — Pleasefindthis

When the Deep Purple falls,
Over sleepy garden walls,
And the stars begin to flicker in the sky,
Thru the mist of a memory
You wander back to me,
Breathing my name with a sigh.
In the still of the night,
Once again I hold you tight,
Tho' you're gone, your love lives on
When moonlight beams.
And as long as my heart will beat
Lover, we'll always meet
Here in my Deep Purple dreams. — Rebecca Wells

The Army had your soul, once you'd been in it all those years - there were things you couldn't shake off so easy, because they'd gone deep into you, and it was painful when they came out, because of the roots they'd grown, right deep down in your guts.
Name and number? Watson, 606. Smarten up there, Private Watson! You're a soldier now, you know, not a bloody jelly fish! Get that salute right, private! Sir! Sir! Sir! Corporal, what's your unit? Corporal Watson, dress that man! You are in charge of this rabble, Corp'l Watson? Sir! Report to my quarters, Sarnt Watson, oh six hundred hours! You should know better than that, Sergeant - now get those men in order! Sir! Sir! Sir!
Hold, Watty. — Elleston Trevor

I hate you for all the years I 'll have to live without you. How can a heart hurt this much and still go on beating? How can I feel this bad without dying from it?
I 've bruised my knees with praying to have you back. None of my prayers have been answered. I tried to send them up to heaven but they 're trapped here on earth, like bobwhites beneath the snow. I try to sleep and it's like I 'm suffocating.
Where have you gone?
Once you said that if I wasn't with you, it wouldn't be heaven.
I can't let go of you. Come back and haunt me. Come back. — Lisa Kleypas

Morpheus takes in my dour expression and turns back to Jeb. "My word. You're leaving her in my care? How very mature and trusting of you, pseudo elf." He grips Jeb's shoulder. "If you'd like to get an early start, you can forgo the new clothes. She won't be wearing them once you're gone, anyway. Consider it my contribution to the cause." — A.G. Howard

Once you have gone first class, everything else is coach. — Jeffrey Fry

Madeira is a wine like no other. It is fine wine in extremis. Heat and air, both the sworn enemies of most wines and wine makers, conspire to turn madeira into one of the most enthralling of the world's wines as well as the most resilient. Wines from the nineteenth and even the eighteenth centuries still retain an ethereal, youthful gloss, even after spending what is, in wine terms, an aeon in cask and bottle. Having gone through this extreme and often extensive ageing process, madeira is virtually indestructible. Once the cork is removed, the wine comes to no harm, even if the bottle is left on ullage for months, even for years on end. If ever there was a wine to take away with you to a desert island, this is it. — Richard Mayson

Stop and think as you pass by, she hissed. As you are now, so once was I. — Kat Rosenfield

Meat, to me, it's slightly boring. Hold on, I love meat too, but only once in a while. You get a piece of meat, and you put it in your mouth, you chew, the first five seconds, all the juices flow around your mouth, they're gone, and then you are 20 more seconds chewing something that is tasteless at this point. — Jose Andres

When someone you love dies, and you're not expecting it, you don't lose her all at once; you lose her in pieces over a long time - the way the mail stops coming, and her scent fades from the pillows and even from the clothes in her closet and drawers. Gradually, you accumulate the parts of her that are gone. Just when the day comes - when there's a particular missing part that overwhelms you with the feeling that she's gone, forever - there comes another day, and another specifically missing part. — John Irving

What did you discover about the shooter?" Jude asked as he struggled to sit upright.
"Once I spotted him on the rooftop, I ran up the back stairs to follow him. He was long gone, but he left something behind," Sussex said.
"Oh?"
"Yes, I'll take it upon myself to investigate it."
Jude opened his eyes, his stare focused on the duke. "Do you need my help?"
Alynwick snorted. "A soiled dove with a broken wing," he drawled. "What use would you be?"
Jude grumbled, "I'll be fine by the morning. — Charlotte Featherstone

The scripts for Marco Polo are absolutely, positively fantastic. The challenge of making that show in China has proved to be as formidable as we feared. It's not like making a movie in China where, once you load up and you leave, you're gone. We have to be able to come back and capture something that's going to feel like a major feature film, on a television budget, and do it, hopefully season after season, so we are taking more time than the producers thought. — Chris Albrecht

Sometimes, through the window of a car coming the other way, she caught a glimpse if a stranger's face, then it was gone, like a book you open then close at once. — Cornelia Funke

What, exactly, is a father if not a man who, once you're grown and gone and out in the world making your own mistakes, all good advice be damned, waits patiently for you to return? And if you don't, well then, you don't. He understands that risk. He knows whose choice it is. — Julia Glass