Stay Alive Quotes & Sayings

Silence, daughter. Stay alive. — Amy Harmon

Love is how you stay alive, even after you are gone. — Mitch Albom

My main goal is to stay alive. To keep fooling myself into hanging around. To keep getting up every day. Right now I live without inspiration. I go day to day and do the work because it's all I know. I know that if I keep moving I stand a chance. I must keep myself going until I find a reason to live. I need one so bad. On the other hand maybe I don't. Maybe it's all bullshit. Nothing I knew from my old life can help me here. Most of the things that I believed turned out to be useless. Appendages from someone else's life.
Everything I have I would give to not know what I know. To not feel emptiness as my constant companion. To not look into this room and be reminded why I'm in it. I'm not getting enough air. The room feels so small all of a sudden. It's pathetic to be this lonely and know it. To keep breathing. To be silent and alone. And to know. — Henry Rollins

But poetry, romance, love, beauty? These are what we stay alive for! — N.H. Kleinbaum

Tell me what you want me to do, and I'll do it, he whispered again. I'll do anything for you.
I closed my eyes at the comfort huh that came from his words. I'd had to be strong for so long. I'd had to fight and scrap and struggle to stay alive. Everyone else depended upon me. And it felt so good to lean on someone else for a change and to know I wasn't alone. — Jody Hedlund

Here everything is planned for killing. The ground is ready to receive us, the bullets are ready to hit us, the spots where the shells will explode are fixed in time and space, just like the paths of our destiny which will inevitably lead us to them. And yet we want to stay alive and we use all our mental strength to silence the voice of reason. We are well aware that death does not immortalise a human being in the memories of the living, it simply cancels him out. — Gabriel Chevallier

An investigator has to have a defense arsenal. Heck, every woman alive should have one if she wants to stay that way. — Deb Baker

The object was not to stay alive but to stay human. — Leah Wilson

I need you to be my person. I need to see you. And hear you. I need you to stay alive. And I need you to stop kissing other people just because they're standing next to you when the ball drops. — Rainbow Rowell

i will stay alive. — Dave Pelzer

To die for a cause is insanity; man's greatest cause is to live; his biggest purpose is to stay alive! Only fools die for a cause! Which cause can be superior to man's life? — Mehmet Murat Ildan

Daughter, he said in a voice like old wood breaking, can you ever forgive me?
I could only answer his question with one of my own. Putting my hand over his mouth, I whispered, Which of us would not sell all we had to stay alive? — Emma Donoghue

Now that I think of it, maybe she loves him because all his problems give her so much to pray about, and when you're as old as she is , and your body is like enough already, you need some pretty powerful reasons to stay alive. — Ruth Ozeki

But, somewhere in there, I did have the thought that this really fits in with my thinking about what I wanted to do; with what has to be done by a writer in order to stay alive as a writer. — A.E. Van Vogt

Straight away, remove yourself from the field of spiritual progression , stay away from contemplation and skillful discourse, do not do research or meditate on the divinities, and stop concentrating and reciting textbooks! Tell me, what is the absolute nature of reality which allows no room for doubt? Listen carefully! Stop holding on to this or that, inhabit your true absolute nature, and peacefully enjoy the essence of what it is to be alive! — Abhinavagupta

But even now, especially now, it seems to me that women have a strength about them that men never had. And I wonder how did men always get portrayed in the movies and such as the strong ones? How did it come to be that women are made to look like the weak ones who need protectin'? Truth is, it's men who need the protectin'. Really they do. Women have the strong thing inside of them and the can get through anything. They just can. They're used to pain of child birthing - pain no man knows - and some women being battered around and not treated right through all the centuries and having to learn at a real young age how to stay alive on the inside when the outside is being hurt real bad. Most all women know that. But men. Those poor men. They just don't have the inside strength the women do. It's harder for men to feel pain. — Sarah Felix Burns

You can't feel crazily grateful to be alive your whole life any more than you can stay passionately in love forever - or grieve forever, for that matter. Time makes us all betray ourselves and get back to the busywork of living. — Tim Kreider

I wish in one sharp, abrupt swell, that I could stay. What a beautiful word that is. Stay with me. Stay home. Stay alive. — Kristan Higgins

You've got to keep fighting - you've got to risk your life every six months to stay alive. — Elia Kazan

I felt Leo's hand on my face, cool and smooth and utterly inhuman. He stroked back my hair, and his voice was curiously gentle when he said, "I would have been most . . . discommoded had you died."
"Yeah. That's why I stay alive," I said, my native snark coming back online, as if I had rebooted that file, "to keep you from being 'discommoded'." I'd have to look that one up. — Faith Hunter

If you stay alive for no other reason do it for spite — Maria Bamford

I stay up late; I'm like a vampire. I stay up until, like, 6 A.M. and then sleep till 4 P.M. I lay in bed till it's dark, and then I come alive in the night. — Jacob Whitesides

I've found that watching is the quickest way to learn, and the safest way to stay alive." Alucard — V.E Schwab

Is how you stay alive. — Mitch Albom

You can find things in the traditional religions which are very benign and decent and wonderful and so on, but I mean, the Bible is probably the most genocidal book in the literary canon. The God of the Bible - not only did He order His chosen people to carry out literal genocide - I mean, wipe out every Amalekite to the last man, woman, child, and, you know, donkey and so on, because hundreds of years ago they got in your way when you were trying to cross the desert - not only did He do things like that, but, after all, the God of the Bible was ready to destroy every living creature on earth because some humans irritated Him. That's the story of Noah. I mean, that's beyond genocide - you don't know how to describe this creature. Somebody offended Him, and He was going to destroy every living being on earth? And then He was talked into allowing two of each species to stay alive - that's supposed to be gentle and wonderful. — Noam Chomsky

He'll die first, we both know it, but I don't know ... I really don't know how long I'll stay alive without him. That's the part Shaun doesn't know. I don't intend to be an only child for long. — Mira Grant

When it comes down to it, I believe that, having made the decision to bring children into the world, I owe it to them to be as present as I can in their daily lives and to try my best to stay alive until they've made it through to adulthood. — Deborah Copaken Kogan

Holy habits are that: the disciplines, the routines by which we stay alive and focused on Him. At first we choose them and carry them out; after a while they are part of who we are. And they carry us. — Mark Buchanan

I noticed you tore down Donovan's house."
He lifted his gaze until it locked with mine. "He's alive because he left town. His house chose to stay. It paid the price. — Darynda Jones

I must admit that you fascinate me, Superior. Your life would seem to be entirely unbearable. And yet you fight so very, very hard to stay alive. With every weapon and stratagem. You simply refuse to die."
"I am ready to die." Glokta returned his gaze, like for like. "But I refuse to lose." ~Bayaz and Glokta — Joe Abercrombie

Lana's going through them one at a time. Healing them. She's amazing."
Sam thought he heard something extra in Edilio's voice. "She's cute too, huh Edilio?"
Edilio's eyes went wide and started blushing. "She's just...you know..."
Sam slapped his shoulder. "Good luck with that."
"You think she...I mean, you know me, I'm just..." Edilio stammered his way to a stop.
"Dude, let's see if we can stay alive. Then you can ask her out or whatever. — Michael Grant

You're scaring me," Jack's voice finally cut through, and I opened my eyes, barely able to see him. "okay, good, yes, breathe. Breathing helps one stay alive,I've found.What on earth is so bad about a stupid school saying no?" "My life"-I gasped-"is over.It's over. Everything." He frowned dubiously. "Who would want to go to a place called Georgetown, anyhow? Ridiculous. Now,I could understand your devastation if it had a distinguished name like, say, Jacktown, but as it is,you're overreacting. Why do you want to go to more school? I went once for a few hours and nearly lost my mind. — Kiersten White

I did this to stay alive. Because you are a vicious, stupid, impotent man. - Shira, to Kadir — Alwyn Hamilton

World Affairs Councils are great organizations. They help keep people throughout our country alive to important developments in world affairs and underscore that, in the country, we stay engaged and we are part of the world. — George Schultz

You'd be surprised at what you'd do to stay alive. — Brent Weeks

The reasons for depression are not so interesting as the way one handles it, simply to stay alive. — May Sarton

And my life - and my mess of a mind - needed shape. I had 'lost the plot'. There was no linear narrative of me. There was just mess and chaos. So yes, I loved external narratives for the hope they offered. Films. TV dramas. And most of all, books. They were, in and of themselves, reasons to stay alive. — Matt Haig

Like a wild animal, the soul is tough, resilient, resourceful, savvy, and self-sufficient: it knows how to survive in hard places. I learned about these qualities during my bouts with depression. In that deadly darkness, the faculties I had always depended on collapsed. My intellect was useless; my emotions were dead; my will was impotent; my ego was shattered. But from time to time, deep in the thickets of my inner wilderness, I could sense the presence of something that knew how to stay alive even when the rest of me wanted to die. That something was my tough and tenacious soul. — Parker J. Palmer

Any of us probably could do more important things than we are doing. Any of us could use some changes in our tasks. But none of us - and still stay alive and sane - could do without something to do. — L. Ron Hubbard

Because I think that's what love is- everything but children's love, anyway - loving the wounds we give each other, and that we can't help giving each other; you can't stay alive if you don't hurt people. — J.R. Salamanca

What if I mess up?"
"Oh, you will. You'll mess up, you'll make mistakes, you'll break things. Some you'll be able to piece together, and others you'll lose. That's all a given. But there's only one thing you have to do for me."
"What's that?"
"Stay alive long enough to mess up again. — Victoria Schwab

People have told me about organized crime in the fashion industry, but I can't talk about that. I'm looking to stay alive. — Calvin Klein

Killing oneself is, anyway, a misnomer. We don't kill ourselves. We are simply defeated by the long, hard struggle to stay alive. When somebody dies after a long illness, people are apt to say, with a note of approval, "He fought so hard." And they are inclined to think, about a suicide, that no fight was involved, that somebody simply gave up. This is quite wrong. — Sally Brampton

Now he had recognized himself as a dead man it became important to stay alive as long as possible. — George Orwell

In the end, we're just their caretakers, Mike. We get them for a little while and then they live their lives. I just want him to stay alive and healthy until we let him go. The rest will be up to him." Mike — Harlan Coben

Whatever our path, whatever the color or grain of our days, whatever riddles we must solve to stay alive, the secret of life somehow always has to do with the awakening and freeing of what has been asleep. — Mark Nepo

The thing I don't say is: I want to stay alive. the reason I don't say it is because, given that fat folder in front of him, he'd never believe it. And here's something else he'd never believe
I'm fighting to be here in this [crappy], messed-up world. Standing on the ledge of the bell tower isn't about dying. It's about having control. It's about never going to sleep again. — Jennifer Niven

RIGOROUS HONESTY Who wishes to be rigorously honest and tolerant? Who wants to confess his faults to another and make restitution for harm done? Who cares anything about a Higher Power, let alone meditation and prayer? Who wants to sacrifice time and energy in trying to carry A.A.'s message to the next sufferer? No, the average alcoholic, self-centered in the extreme, doesn't care for this prospect - unless he has to do these things in order to stay alive himself. TWELVE STEPS AND TWELVE TRADITIONS, p. 24 I am an alcoholic. If I drink I will die. My, what power, energy, and emotion this simple statement generates in me! But it's really all I need to know for today. Am I willing to stay alive today? Am I willing to stay sober today? Am I willing to ask for help and am I willing to be a help to another suffering alcoholic today? Have I discovered the fatal nature of my situation? What must I do, today, to stay sober? — Alcoholics Anonymous

Girls who stay true to themselves manage to find some way to respect the parts of themselves that are spiritual. They work for the betterment of the world. Girls who act from their false selves are often cynical about making the world a better place. They have given up hope. Only when they reconnect with the parts of themselves that are alive and true will they again have the energy to take on the culture and fight to save the planet. — Mary Pipher

So I ask you, can you walk a mile? Every day, rain or shine, pain or gain, because you know you have to just to stay alive, just to breathe. Can you walk that mile? — Bella Andre

I confidently predict the collapse of capitalism and the beginning of history. Something will go wrong in the machinery that converts money into money, the banking system will collapse totally, and we will be left having to barter to stay alive. Those who can dig in their garden will have a better chance than the rest. I'll be all right; I've got a few veg. — Margaret Drabble

Then the Announcer would transform: into a screen through which to glimpse the past-or into a portal through which to step.
This Announcer was sticky,but she soon pulled it apart,guided it into shape. She reached inside and opened the portal.
She couldn't stay here any longer. She had a mission now: to find herself alive in another time and learn what price the Outcasts had referred to, and eventually,to trace the origin of the curse between Daniel and her.
Then to break it.
The others gasped as she manipulated the Announcer.
"When did you learn how to do that?" Daniil whispered.
Luce shook her head. Her explanation would only baffle Daniil.
"Lucinda!" The last thing she heard was his voice calling out her true name.
Strange,she'd been looking right at his stricken face but hadn't seen her lips move. Her mind was playing tricks.
"Lucinda!" he shouted once more, his voice rising in panic,just before Luce dove headfirst into the beckoning darkness. — Lauren Kate

I've known all sorts of fear - fear of pain, fear of discovery, fear of capture. This is new. This is the kind of fear that teaches me the difference between trying to stay alive, and wanting to live. — Amanda Bouchet

Swallow Daughter, pull them in, those words that sit upon your lips. Lock them deep inside your soul, hide them 'til they've time to grow. Close your mouth upon the power, curse not, cure not, 'til the hour. You won't speak and you won't tell, you won't call on heav'n or hell. You will learn and you will thrive. Silence, daughter. Stay alive. — Amy Harmon

But : We're still human. Human because we keep on battling against all these horrors, the horrors caused and not caused by us. We battle not in order to stay alive, that would be too materalistic, for we are body and spirit, but in order to love each other. — Kathy Acker

For the first time I understood why people come back from Alaska with fifty pictures of glaciers or return from a honeymoon in Tahiti with fifty pictures of the same sunset. The world is so beautiful in these places, it is impossible to register that there will be more, more, more. Surely this is it. Negotiate with your ailing camera battery. How can it not stay alive for this? How can you believe that twenty minutes from now there will be an even taller forest, an even wider waterfall? We are only as good as our most extreme experiences. — Sloane Crosley

Fuck 'em. Call it whatever you want. Maybe it's just two people clinging to each other to stay alive. Maybe sometimes that's all love gets to be. And, maybe, if they hold onto each other long enough ... maybe something good finally happens. — Rick Remender

Classics stay alive because a great actor or a great director wants to do them. — Scott Rudin

its alright
its alright
its alright — U2

With, or despite our scars, we stay alive. — Marilyn Hacker

When you are young and strong ... you can stay alive on your hatred" ... but realized later "They can take everything from me except my mind and heart"
Nelson Mandela from Long Walk to Freedom — Nelson Mandela

Remember to build each other up, to strengthen and sustain, to keep companionship lovely and alive. Remember dignity and respect; understanding; not expecting perfection; a sense of humor and a sense of what is sacred and serious; common purposes, common convictions, and the character to stay with a bargain, to keep a covenant - in these are the making of a good and solid marriage. — Richard L. Evans

You made him stay shut up in that house and he hated it, that's why he wanted to get out last night -"
"I was trying to keep Sirius alive," said Dumbledore quietly.
"People don't like being locked up!" Harry said furiously, rounding on him. "You did it to me all last summer - — J.K. Rowling

People's memories are maybe the fuel they burn to stay alive. — Haruki Murakami

We tell each other stories to help each other live. That's why I read poetry. I read poetry to stay alive. That's why I went to poetry in the first place, that's why I stay with it, that's why I'll never leave it. — Marie Howe

Josh wanted to be the one to break the color barrier. When the Dodgers signed Jackie Robinson he knew it was over for him. He wasn't going to make the big leagues, and he also knew that because of his health and his bad knees his career with the Grays was about over. He didn't know what to do with himself. They say a man can't die of a broken heart, and I guess that's true. But I'll tell you this, all of this sure lessened Josh's will to keep going, to keep fighting to stay alive. — Ted Page

Page 117 Sam says "You learn to live with it, with them. Because they do stay with you, even if they're not living, breathing people anymore. It's not the same crushing grief you felt at first, the kind that swamps you and makes you want to cry in the wrong places and irrationally angry with all the idiots who are still alive when the person you love is dead. It's just something you learn to accommodate. Like adapting around a hole. I don't know. It's like you become ... a doughnut instead of a bun." page 117 — Jojo Moyes

"I want to stay alive in pretty much 90% of my movies. Slaughtering isn't exactly what I'm going for, but I will play edgy for sure." — Miley Cyrus

Take out another notebook, pick up another pen, and just write, just write, just write. In the middle of the world, make one positive step. In the center of chaos, make one definitive act. Just write. Say yes, stay alive, be awake. Just write. Just write. Just write. — Natalie Goldberg

Pity the poor senator or representative trying to stay alive in the political jungle. At every turn, there's a danger: a constituent who actually wants something done. Or worse, a campaign donor who might be offended by that something. — Bill McKibben

Just stay alive, no matter what occurs! I will find you. No matter how long it takes, no matter how far. I will find you! — Daniel Day-Lewis

I have been lucky in my life to have met people that are special, so extraordinary talented that they somehow are on a different plane. Sometimes these amazingly talented people find a way to keep reinventing themselves to stay relevant and alive. Some fall under the crushing vibrancy of their own intensity. — Tamra Davis

Occasionally they would hear a harsh croak or a splash as some amphibian was disturbed, but the only creature they saw was a toad as big as Will's foot, which could only flop in a pain-filled sideways heave as if it were horribly injured. It lay across the path, trying to move out of the way and looking at them as if it knew they meant to hurt it.
'It would be merciful to kill it,' said Tialys.
'How do you know?' said Lyra. 'It might still like being alive, in spite of everything.'
'If we killed it, we'd be taking it with us,' said Will. 'It wants to stay here. I've killed enough living things. Even a filthy stagnant pool might be better than being dead.'
'But if it's in pain?' said Tialys.
'If it could tell us, we'd know. But since it can't, I'm not going to kill it. That would be considering our feelings rather than the toad's.'
They moved on. — Philip Pullman

It consumes you, it hurts you, it troubles you, it pushes you to extreme, it makes you cry, it makes you suffer, it makes you do everything, but it doesn't end you.
If it ends you, it's not love.
When love starts ruining you, you break and then you fight back. Eventually you fall out of love, but you don't die.
Love, suppots you, it makes you grow, it stands by, it makes you crave, it makes you tought, rough, and strong, and then you stay alive.
You don't die because of love, you die because you were never in love, even not with yourself. — Himmilicious

When we allow the walls around our hearts to become rigid, and stay that way, we assign ourselves a slow death. Like the very air and water that flows through our physical body to sustain it, love must flow through our heart to keep it supple, and to keep us truly alive. — Jeffrey R. Anderson

It's the most unhappy people who want to stay alive, because they think they haven't done everything they want to do. They think they haven't had enough time. They feel they've been shortchanged. — Carol Rifka Brunt

Christmas really is about all the cliches: health, happiness and love. A future with my family is the important thing ... to stay alive for them. — Sylvie Meis

Suddenly, she doesn't want to die. She has no real reason not to, no sudden revelation, except that it's equally pointless to die as not to die. Why doesn't she die? She lives because she's meant to live, because she's already alive and it's comparatively easy to stay that way. She lives because, even though she doesn't know what it is, there must be a reason why she's here in the first place. She lives because either she's not as brave as all the dead girls who've gone before her, or she's actually braver - it's hard to tell. — A.M. Homes

You're right." He cut me off. "I never understood this country. I never understood why he chose to leave everything else behind and stay for this. Not until I met you."
I felt like he'd pushed me, like I was falling and I needed him to reel those words back in to keep me standing straight.
"You /are/ this country, Amani." He spoke more quietly now. "More alive than anything ought to be in this place. All fire and gunpowder, with one finger always on the trigger. — Alwyn Hamilton

I need you to make a choice, Breanna. If you want things to stay as they are between us, then I need you to walk out that door. Otherwise, it's going to change."
She tilts her head as if she's as lost in emotion as I am. "It's already changed."
A part of me mourns for her. She's the firefly I'm not sure I'll be able to keep alive, but I shove those thoughts away. Breanna is here, and she isn't leaving, which means she's mine. — Katie McGarry

The price for being intelligent enough to be the first species to be fully aware of the cosmos might just be a capacity to feel a whole universe's worth of darkness. — Matt Haig

This year I, Molly Bigelow, resolve to stay alive.
That's it. — James Ponti

Dad, he's different. He's not going to take advantage of me."
"I hope not, 'cause I'd hate to go to prison for murder."
I laughed and went to hug him but he wasn't amused.
"Dad, I'll be ok. Caleb is a nice guy and very responsible. I promise you I won't do anything stupid and neither will he. I'm sure he wants to stay alive and keep his limbs intact. Ok?"
"Ok," he conceded with a sigh. — Shelly Crane

The more you stay focused on your breathing, the more you will benefit, particularly if you pay attention until the very end of the out breath and then wait a moment before you inhale again. As you continue to breathe and notice the air moving in and out of your lungs you may think about the role that oxygen plays in nourishing your body and bathing your tissues with the energy you need to feel alive and engaged. — Bessel A. Van Der Kolk

In order to drill into young men the need to stay alert and stay alive, I used to punish offenders with my fists, boots and rifle butt, and with stockade time. — David Hackworth

Slavish obedience to the clerics, who know how to squeeze every last drop of advantage out of religion, is killing our girls. We must speak-blaspheme, if necessary; be accused of being apostates, if that is what is required. Muslims are taught that Islam put an end to the Arabian practice of burying alive newborn baby girls because they were considered worthless and a burden, but as long as we stay quiet in the face of the abomination of child marriage, we are effectively burying our girls alive today. — Mona Eltahawy

think I was inspired by a commercial for an old board game called Stay Alive. — John Darnielle

And as much as I'm telling her to stay here, I still want her to choose to come with me. To say fuck sanity and healing and closure. To say that I am the only thing she needs to be well and whole and alive. But we both know that's not true. — Katja Millay

Being alive and helping others to stay alive is the greatest personal success! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

We should have stories in common, I found myself thinking. We should have stories, and jokes no one understands, and memories that we know will stay alive because neither of us will let the other forget. — Kamila Shamsie

You know, comments about style always seem strange to me - 'why do you work in this style, or in that style' - as if you had a choice in the matter ... What you're doing is trying to stay alive and continue and not die. — Philip Guston

She stepped closer to him, closer still, until her breasts touched his jacket, watching his eyes all the time. "My darling Jack." She lifted herself up on tiptoe and awkwardly kissed the side of his mouth. "I'm yours. You know that."
His control broke. His hands fisted in her hair and he kissed her hard, almost savagely. He knew he was bruising her mouth but he couldn't stop himself. It was as if her mouth were giving him life. He would stay alive as long as he was kissing her. — Lisa Marie Rice

My mother Thetis tells me that there are two ways in which I may meet my end. If I stay here and fight, I will not return alive but my name will live forever: whereas if I go home my name will die, but it will be long ere death shall take me. — Homer

Such is the human being: when he is afraid, he sees enemies everywhere and thinks the only chance to stay alive is to exterminate them. — Jason Stearns

Each new thing he encountered in life impelled him in a direction that fully convinced him of its rightness, but then the next new thing loomed up and impelled him in the opposite direction, which also felt right. There was no controlling narrative: he seemed to himself a purely reactive pinball in a game whose only object was to stay alive for staying alive's sake. — Jonathan Franzen

Here's some advice. Stay alive, says Haymitch, and then bursts out laughing. I exchange a look with Peeta before I remember that I'm having nothing more to do with him. I'm surprised to see the hardness in his eyes. He generally seems so mild.
'That's very funny,' says Peeta. Suddenly, he lashes out at the glass in Haymitch's hand. It shatters on the floor, sending the bloodred liquid running toward the back of the train. 'Only not to us.'
Haymitch considers this a moment, then punches Peeta in the jaw, knocking him from his chair. When he turns back to reach for the spirits, I drive my knife into the table between his hand and the bottle, barely missing his fingers. I brace myself to deflect his hit, but it doesn't come. Instead, he sits back and squints at us.
'Well, what's this?' says Haymitch. 'Did I actually get a pair of fighters this year? — Suzanne Collins

But the living must fear death, or they would not struggle to stay alive. — Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

In times of unrest and in an unstable economy, it is very easy to let your attitude slip and begin feeling sorry for yourself. This is precisely when you want to practice healthy attitudinal rules to stay alert, alive and enthusiastic. Don't ever lose the zest for life and life won't lose its zest for you. Say something positive to every person you meet today. — Bob Proctor

How are you feeling, man?" he asks me.
"Great," I tell him, and it is purely the truth. Doves clatter up out of a bare tree and turn at the same instant, transforming themselves from steel to silver in the snow-blown light. I know at that moment that the drug is working. Everything before me has become suddenly, radiantly itself. How could Carlton have known this was about to happen? "Oh," I whisper. His hand settles on my shoulder.
"Stay loose, Frisco," he says. "There's not a thing in this pretty world to be afraid of. I'm here."
I am not afraid. I am astonished. I had not realized until this moment how real everything is. A twig lies on the marble at my feet, bearing a cluster of hard brown berries. The broken-off end is raw, white, fleshly. Trees are alive.
"I'm here," Carlton says again, and he is. — Michael Cunningham

What's so fascinating about New Yorkers is that each person has a whole lexicon of personal logic in the way that they decipher and do what has to be done to enjoy, stay alive, take pleasure in this place. — Spalding Gray