The Stranger Upstairs Quotes & Sayings

The beautiful thing about books was that anyone could open them. — Victoria Schwab

I was far away from home, haunted & tired with travel, in a room I'd never seen, hearing the hiss of steam outside, the creak of the old wood, footsteps upstairs & all the sad sounds.
I looked at the cracked high ceiling & really didn't know who I was for about 15 strange seconds.
I wasn't scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger & my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost.
I was halfway at the dividing line between the East of my youth & the West of my future. — Jack Kerouac

To be locked into partisan politics doesn't permit you to think clearly. — Rudy Giuliani

I don't think the way to succeed is by doing something aggressive. Aggression is weak-minded. — Agnes Martin

Anthropocentrism gave rise to boredom, and when anthropomorphism was replaced by technocentrism, boredom became even more profound. — Lars Fr. H. Svendsen

Stravinsky used Mother Goose. He was influenced by Mother Goose, indirectly, but very beautifully. — Gyorgy Ligeti

Dependence is not patriotism. A man does not love his mother if he hangs about her to the point of burdening her with a weak, feckless son. — Maria Montessori

In the three years since our nation began operations in Iraq, more than 2,500 Americans have been killed and more than 18,000 Americans have been seriously wounded. — Ike Skelton

I woke up as the sun was reddening; and that was the one distinct time in my life, the strangest moment of all, when I didn't know who I was - I was far away from home, haunted and tired with travel, in a cheap hotel room I'd never seen, hearing the hiss of steam outside, and the creak of the old wood of the hotel, and footsteps upstairs, and all the sad sounds, and I looked at the cracked high ceiling and really didn't know who I was for about fifteen strange seconds. I wasn't scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger, and my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost. — Jack Kerouac

Milk, blood, tears, urine, semen. — Henri Cole

Pope John Paul II, who has a mystique without a politique. He has no armies, no publicity directors, no propaganda machine and comes from the smallest state in all the world. — Fulton J. Sheen

At the beginning of each session, one of us will begin talking about some random idea, another person will chime in or change the subject, and miraculously, after twenty minutes, we find that we have zeroed in on a question that everyone is passionate about. What continues to astonish me is the frequency with which religion slips into the room, unbidden but persistent. — Alan Lightman

In media coverage of the war, Afghans are often characterized as corrupt and deceitful. There has certainly been plenty of corruption and deceit in this conflict, but why? What inspires these behaviors? In 'Green on Blue,' I wanted to render a world that is often overlooked: that of the average Afghans who are helping America wage its war. — Elliot Ackerman

But how do you ever know that you know a person? — Anita Shreve

Life itself, she thought, as she went upstairs to dress for dinner, was stranger than dreams and far, far more disordered. — Nancy Mitford

Art is what gets communicated at a live show, which is why live shows are so amazing. To communicate in a different way is a mixed message. It devalues everything. — Alex Scally

Well, I, you know, I think at PIMCO we always try and be open with the press and the public. I mean, isn't that what voters want from their politicians? Mohamed El-Erian, our CEO, writes several op-eds a week. — Bill Gross

Mike Huckabee said he's the only person who has fought the Clinton political machine and won. As opposed to Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders, who's the only person who fought a fax machine and lost. — Jimmy Fallon

THE WHISTLER
All of a sudden she began to whistle. By all of a sudden
I mean that for more than thirty years she had not
whistled. It was thrilling. At first I wondered, who was
in the house, what stranger? I was upstairs reading, and
she was downstairs. As from the throat of a wild and
cheerful bird, not caught but visiting, the sounds war-
bled and slid and doubled back and larked and soared.
Finally I said, Is that you? Is that you whistling? Yes, she
said. I used to whistle, a long time ago. Now I see I can
still whistle. And cadence after cadence she strolled
through the house, whistling.
I know her so well, I think. I thought. Elbow and an-
kle. Mood and desire. Anguish and frolic. Anger too.
And the devotions. And for all that, do we even begin
to know each other? Who is this I've been living with
for thirty years?
This clear, dark, lovely whistler? — Mary Oliver