They Know Me Here Quotes & Sayings

Think of my Pleasure in Solitude, in comparison of my commerce with the world - there I am a child - there they do not know me not even my most intimate acquaintance - I give into their feelings as though I were refraining from irritating a little child - Some think me middling, others silly, other foolish - every one thinks he sees my weak side against my will; when in thruth it is with my will - I am content to be thought all this because I have in my own breast so graet a resource. This is one great reason why they like me so; because they can all show to advantage in a room, and eclipese from a certain tact one who is reckoned to be a good Poet - I hope I am not here playing tricks 'to make the angels weep': I think not: for I have not the least contempt for my species; and though it may sound paradoxical: my greatest elevations of Soul leave me every time more humbled - Enough of this - though in your Love for me you will not think it enough. — John Keats

Loretta, I love you. Not like they told you love is, and I didn't know this either, but love don't make things nice - it ruins everything. It breaks your heart. It makes things a mess. We aren't here to make things perfect. The snowflakes are perfect. The stars are perfect. Not us. Not us! We are here to ruin ourselves and to break our hearts and love the wrong people and *die*. The storybooks are *bullshit*. Now I want you to come upstairs with me and *get* in my bed! — John Patrick Shanley

Or possibly- forgive me- you simply haven't decided what you want from life yet; you haven't found anything that you truly want to hold onto. That changes everything, you know. Students and very young people can rent with no damage to their intellectual freedom, because it puts them under no threat: they have nothing, yet, to lose. Have you noticed how easily the very young die? They make the best martyrs for any cause, the best soldiers, the best suicides. It's because they're held here so lightly: they haven't yet accumulated loves and responsibilities and commitments and all the things that tie us securely to this world. They can let go of it as easily and simply as lifting a finger. But as you get older, you begin to find things that are worth holding onto, forever. All of a sudden you're playing for keeps, as children say, and it changes the very fabric of you. — Tana French

They aren't perfect. They aren't much. They didn't grow me in their bellies or a lab or adopt me through the embassy. I don't know the total truth about them, or the truth behind the truths. But it doesn't matter. For better, for worse, here we are. What we have is one another.
This is my family now. — Margaret Stohl

As they began to tie me, I wanted to yell out, to release some of my fear that way, but I held it in. Imogen wouldn't be that far from here yet, and I didn't want her to know what was about to happen.
If it was possible to scream on the inside, though, I was, and the sound of it was deafening. — Jennifer A. Nielsen

Hana?" Lena says softly. "Are you okay?"
That single stupid question breaks me. All the metal fingers relax me at once, and the tears they've been holding back come surging up at once. Suddenly I am sobbing and telling her everything: about the raid, and the dogs, and the sounds of skulls cracking underneath regulator's nightsticks. Thinking about it again makes me feel like I might puke. At a certain point, Lena puts her arms around me and starts murmuring things into my hair. I don't even know what she's saying, and I don't care. JUst having her here - solid, real, on my side - makes me feel better than I have in weeks. Slowly I manage to stop crying, swallowing back the hiccups and sobs that are still running through me. I try to tell her that I've missed her, and that I've been stupid and wrong, but my voice is muffled and thick — Lauren Oliver

I know you don't like the traffic here. I'm sorry that you're burdened with this."
I muttered, "Not liking the traffic is an understatement. People don't know how to drive here. They're crazy."
"We can take back roads with the least traffic on the way, and we'll be driving only to the outskirts of Mumbai, not through the city as before. It shouldn't be too bad. You're a good driver."
"Ha, easy for you to say. You'll just sleep in the back the whole way."
Ren touched my cheek with his fingers and gently turned my face to his. "Rajkumari, I want to say thank you. Thank you for staying and helping me. You don't know what this means to me."
I mumbled, "You're welcome. And rajkumari means?"
He flashed me a brilliant white smile and deftly changed the subject. — Colleen Houck

I feel like [throughout] my entire career and life, that I've been judged by people who really did not know me. But I definitely think that they probably were right to assume what they had assumed about me, because there was so little to go on out there. If you only see videos of me being crazy and hearing little things here and there, then obviously you're not going to have any idea who I really am. — Nicki Minaj

I didn't do it on purpose." His arms went around her. "I just ... I just needed to keep you up here." He walked her backward until her knees met the edge of her bed, and they both tumbled onto the mattress. "In this bed."
He stroked her hair, fanning it out over the pillows, and framed her face in his hands. "But I couldn't discern what it was you needed to feel safe. I tried everything. Finally, tonight, you gave me the answer. Light. So now you have as many candles as you please. But now it's gone all wrong. Because you're here in this bed. But I'm here, too. And God help me, Izzy." His brow pressed to hers, and his weight settled over her, crushing and warm. "I don't know how to leave. — Tessa Dare

They don't sleep here." My brow furrows. "How do you know?" "I just know," he says. "I can tell by looking at it." Before I can ask him any more, the curtain in the living room moves. The door yanks open, my mother appearing, eyes wide. She looks frantic. "Karissa," she shouts, her voice high-pitched, full of panic. "Oh God. Get away from him, sweetie." I blink a few times, caught off guard, as Naz slips his arms around me, pulling me flush against him. One arm encircles my waist as his other settles along my chest, — J.M. Darhower

It's a gift," she said, her voice funny, deep with emotion. "Watching you all get close, witnessing all that happened making you closer, feeling that love. But it was another gift, maybe even a bigger one, precious, knowing that sharing it makes people I don't know laugh. It makes them happy. Some of them write to me. They tell me bad things are happening in their lives. But they read my book and it takes them away. It makes them smile. Laugh. Even if for moments, or better yet hours, they can forget the bad, be with us here at Fortnum's, and laugh." She tipped her head to the side. "That's beautiful. So how can it be wrong? — Kristen Ashley

When I leave here, will this shop vanish the way they do in the stories?" "I'm afraid so, yes." "Why do they always do that?" The old man sighed. "You know, you're the first one who ever asked me that." But — Harlan Ellison

All I know about the Jews is what my grandfather taught me. "They are the most godless people," he used to say. "They start off from the idea that good must happen here, not beyond the grave. Therefore, they work only for the conquest of this world. — Umberto Eco

Even judges' children hear something about the world, they go to the Black Sea like everyone in the country. They look out and feel the same urge to go somewhere, feel it tugging at them from head to toe. You don't have to be particularly bad off to think: This can't be a the life I get. The judges' children know as well as Lilli and me that the same sky that looks down on the border guards stretches all the way to Italy or Canada, where things are better than here. One way or the other, the attempt will be made, whether sooner or later, in this way or that. — Herta Muller

Because, you see, the cruel gods are stronger than the kind gods, and they will always beat them in the end. You doubt it? Look at the world, my brother, my sister. And so the spirit of Roth is here with me also, and battles for my soul. And I don't know who will win. — Anthony McGowan

A BIRTHDAY
Something continues and I don't know what to call it
though the language is full of suggestions
in the way of language
but they are all anonymous
and it's almost your birthday music next to my bones
these nights we hear the horses running in the rain
it stops and the moon comes out and we are still here
the leaks in the roof go on dripping after the rain has passed
smell of ginger flowers slips through the dark house
down near the sea the slow heart of the beacon flashes
the long way to you is still tied to me but it brought me to you
I keep wanting to give you what is already yours
it is the morning of the mornings together
breath of summer oh my found one
the sleep in the same current and each waking to you
when I open my eyes you are what I wanted to see. — W.S. Merwin

So here he sits one drunk nigger in a puclic libary after closing, with the book open in front of me and the bottle of Old Kentucky on my left. 'Tell the truth and shame the devil,' my mom used to say , but she forgot to tell me that sometimes you can't shame Mr Splitfoot sober. The Irish know, but of course they're God's white niggers and who knows maybe they're a step ahead. — Stephen King

I'm here because they've killed almost all of us, but not all of us. And that's their mistake, son. That's the flaw in their plan. Because if you don't kill all of us at once, whoever's left are not going to be the weak ones. The strong ones- and only the strong ones- will survive. The bent but unbroken, if you know what I mean. People like me. And people like you. — Rick Yancey

Everybody goes through a lot of the same things, and I talk about those, and that's the key. You have to connect with your audience, and I might take them on a trip with me, tell them I went here and I went there and they'll go with me, you know, to hear the stories. — Chris Tucker

The kiss happened because they couldn't help it, and it was so sweet and so right that Damen felt a kind of ache. He pulled back. The realities of the outside world seemed to press at him. "I"-he couldn't say it.
"No. Listen to me." He felt Laurent's hand firm on the back of his neck. "I'm not going to let my uncle hurt you." Laurent's blue gaze was calm and steady, as if he had mad a decision and wanted Damen to know it. "It's what I came here last night to say. I'm going to take care of it."
"Promise me," Damen heard himself say. "Promise me we won't let him-"
"I promise. — C.S. Pacat

I Was Always Leaving"

I was always leaving, I was
about to get up and go, I was
on my way, not sure where.
Somewhere else. Not here.
Nothing here was good enough.

It would be better there, where I
was going. Not sure how or why.
The dome I cowered under
would be raised, and I would be released
into my true life. I would meet there

the ones I was destined to meet.
They would make an opening for me
among the flutes and boulders,
and I would be taken up. That this
might be a form of death

did not occur to me. I only know
that something held me back,
a doubt, a debt, a face I could not
leave behind. When the door
fell open, I did not go through. — Jean Nordhaus

Grimalkin sighed loudly, causing me to look back and Razor to hiss at him. "Am I the only one here who has any insight at all?" he said, looking to each of our faces. We stared at him, and he shook his head. "Drawing a blank, are you? Think about what you just said, human. Repeat that last phrase, if you would."
I frowned. "Isn't that where you want to be?"
He closed his eyes. "The next phrase, human."
"With all the other gremlins." He stared at me expectantly, and I raised my hands. "What? What are you getting at, Grim?"
Grimalkin thumped his tail. "It is times like these I am ever more grateful that I am a cat," he sighed. "Why do you think I brought you that creature, human? To keep up my stalking skills? I assure you, they are quite adequate already. Please attempt to use the brain I know is hidden somewhere in that head. — Julie Kagawa

The stones here speak to me, and I know their mute language. Also, they seem deeply to feel what I think. So a broken column of the old Roman times, an old tower of Lombardy, a weather-beaten Gothic piece of a pillar understands me well. But I am a ruin myself, wandering among ruins. — Heinrich Heine

Solange leaned back against the wall, bored. "Are you done yet?"
"Hell no," Lucy said. She'd left nose prints on the glass. Nicholas smirked up at her. She blushed. "Ooops. Busted."
"I told you they could hear your heartbeat," Solange said.
"Even from up here."
"I can't help it. Even if they all know they're pretty and are insufferably arrogant," she added louder. "Can they hear that?"
"Yes."
"Good." She glanced at me. "Yummy, right?"
"I'm sure Isabeau would rather recover, not ogle my brothers,"
Solange said. "You remember how stressed you were after the Hypnos?"
"Please," Lucy scoffed. "This is totally soothing. — Alyxandra Harvey

Goddamn. what is this shit?
early times, called j-bone. best little old drink they is. drink that and you wont feel a thing the next mornin.
or any morning.
whoo lord, give it here. hello early, come to your old daddy.
here, pour some of it in this cup and let me cut it with coca-cola.
can't do it, bud.
why not?
we done tried it. it eats the bottom out.
watch it suttree. don't spill none on your shoes
lord honey i know they make that old splo in the bathtub but this here is made in the toilet. he was looking at the bottle, shaking it. bubbles the size of gooseshot veered greasily up through the smoky fuel it held.
the last time i drank some of that shit i like to died. i stunk from the inside out. i laid in a tub of hot water all day and climbed out and dried and you could still smell it. i had to burn my clothes.
early times, he called. make your liver quiver.
(page 26) — Cormac McCarthy

I brought a picture with me that I had at home, of a girl in a swing with a castle and pretty blue bubbles in the background, to hang in my room, but that nurse here said the girl was naked from the waist up and not appropriate. You know, I've had that picture for fifty years and I never knew she was naked. If you ask me, I don't think the old men they've got here can see well enough to notice that she's bare-breasted. But, this is a Methodist home, so she's in the closet with my gallstones. — Fannie Flagg

We live in the best of worlds. But still, it's like we've lost something on the way to here: a sense of life. I can't know for sure, I might be the only one who's lost it. Maybe everybody else is living the now, thinking they're having it well. Anyhow, that motivated me to write the books. — Karl Ove Knausgard

I represent what is left of a vanishing race, and that is the pedestrian. That I am still able to be here, I owe to a keen eye and a nimble pair of legs. But I know they'll get me someday. — Will Rogers

I have to find Tobias, but I'll come back after I do and sit with you, okay?"
She finally looks at me, and her knee goes still. "They didn't tell you?"
My stomach clenches with fear. "Tell me what."
"Tobias was arrested," she says quietly. "I saw him siting with the invaders right before I came in here. Some people saw him at the control room before the attack
they say he was disabling the alarm system."
There is a sad look in her eyes, like she pities me. But I already knew what Tobias did.
"Where are they?" I say.
I need to talk to him. And I know what I need to say. — Veronica Roth

Don't you just hate it how people say 'I'm pressed' or 'I want to ease myself' when they want to go to the bathroom?" Doris asked. Ifemelu laughed. "I know!" "I guess 'bathroom' is very American. But there's 'toilet,' 'restroom,' 'the ladies.' " "I never liked 'the ladies.' I like 'toilet.' " "Me too!" Doris said. "And don't you just hate it when people here use 'on' as a verb? On the light!" "You know what I can't stand? When people say 'take' instead of 'drink.' I will take wine. I don't take beer." "Oh God, I know! — Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

If you want to know how important Portland is to me, there's no Saturday night gigs here. They weren't available. So our whole thing coming into Portland, which is going to be different from anybody else, any other city, is every night is Saturday night. — Garth Brooks

As a teenager I clearly remember mornings when I was getting ready for school when something would -just still me- and
I would lean forward and peer very intensely into the eyes of the girl in that mirror.
who is that? I didn't know . I looked into those eyes as if they had the answer to who I am
or who I could be.
So I would search the depths of those green and blue flecked eyes.
Calmly searching the eyes of this stranger as if I thought that if I looked deep enough, or long enough, I would find the answer to why I was even here.
I didn't know what I know now.
That I could only find out my identity,
who I was
when I stopped looking into my own eyes
and instead searched in the eyes of Jesus. Only He could REALLY tell me who I am. Who I can be. Who I will be ... — Laura A. Diaz

Well, here's one thing I think: MOST PEOPLE don't live like you and me and the kids we know in New York. And what's more, they DON'T WANT TO. I feel like a big doofus, but all of a sudden I'm realizing: there are lots of people who don't HAVE New York apartments or houses in Southampton and, get this, WOULDN'T WANT TO LIVE THERE ANYWAY. They'd probably think, "Wow, big, crowded place. Lotta snobs. How lame." On the other hand, they probably have their own Southamptons. Only it's someplace you and I would probably think is really lame. AMAZING that people can see the world from such totally different points of view. — Anna Murray

I don't want to go through it all again. All that time without you, always waiting, my foolish optimism that someday it would be different-"
"Your optimism was justified! Look at me. Look at us! This is different. I know it is, Daniel. I saw us in Helston and Tibet and Tahiti. We were in love, sure, but it was nothing like what we have now."
They'd dropped back farther, out of earshot of the others. They were just Luce and Daniel, two lovers talking in the sky. "I'm still here," she said. "I'm here because you believed in us. You believed in me."
"I did-I do believe in you."
"I believe in you, too." She heard a smile enter her voice. "I always have."
They were not going to fail. — Lauren Kate

It's my sixth year in the game so I've been here for a while now. You can expect the best me you've ever heard. I don't have any release dates in mind right now but I'm just making music and enjoying myself in the studio and having fun. When I get to a place where I feel comfortable saying a date or all of that, people will definitely know. I have a few dream collaborations on that album that I want, but they say if you blow out your candle and make a wish you can't tell people what you ask for or it won't come true. — Trey Songz

I had a neat stock of fixed opinions, but they dropped away one by one; and the further I get the less sure I am. I doubt if I have anything more for my present rule of life than following inclinations which do me and nobody else any harm, and actually give pleasure to those I love best. There, gentlemen, since you wanted to know how I was getting on, I have told you. Much good may it do you! I cannot explain further here. I perceive there is something wrong somewhere in our social formulas: what it is can only be discovered by men or women with greater insight than mine
if, indeed, they ever discover it
at least in our time. 'For who knoweth what is good for man in this life?
and who can tell a man what shall be after him under the sun? — Thomas Hardy

But the problem is that you don't dare to think about anything. You're afraid; you don't know where your thoughts might lead you. Everything inside you is confused. You keep your eyes closed and stay on the old path. They brought you here, I don't know why and it doesn't concern me, but you won't accept my explanations of human guilt. You think it's a joke. Maybe it is, but maybe one could develop quite a nice philosophical idea out of it — Mesa Selimovic

I won't live in L.A. again, hell no, my friends tell me s**t when they come over I don't want to hear. I don't even know who got married and who got pregnant. You turn on the news in L.A. and it is all gossip about people. All the stuff that is going on in the world right now and this gossip is the news? ... I love the BBC. I haven't heard myself mentioned on TV since I have been here. That has been really weird for me, and great. — Lindsay Lohan

I'm here to take you on a date."
I blinked. "A date?" I repeated as if it was a foreign word I'd never heard before.
"You know, where we go out, hold hands, cast longing glances at each other? It's tradition. You might have heard of it."
"But I have class."
"Class?" Now he was looking at me as if I was speaking a different language. "But it's ten o'clock at night."
"We have classes until midnight." I smiled pointedly. "The thing about vampires is that they kind of like the night. It's tradition. You might have heard of it?"
"Oh, smart mouth." He grinned back. "Sexy. — Alyxandra Harvey

I would love an extension, who wouldn't? If they offer me a $35 million-a-year extension, I'll sign it right now. I won't even read the contract. I'm just here to take care of business and I know can help give the city what it's looking for. — Shaquille O'Neal

I love all the girls who have my song on their myspaces. I love the people who come to my shows and put the pictures on here. I love the people at those shows who sing along with me. I love reading your stories in emails, some so touching they've given me chills. I love every single person who has wanted my autograph, because for the life of me I never really thought it would mean something to someone for me to write my name down. I love the little girls who stand in line with their mothers like I used to do. That was me. I love the couple who danced to my song at their wedding. Every comment, letter, and message. I love people who listen to the radio. I love every single person who is reading this, because you've let me into your life.
I love you all so much, I just wanted you to know. — Taylor Swift

They are examin'd skeptickally. "Not from the Press, are you?" " 'Pon my Word," cry both Surveyors at once. "Drummers of some kind's my guess," puts in a Countryman, his Rifle at his Side, "am I right, Gents?" "What'll we say?" mutters Mason urgently to Dixon. "Oh, do allow me," says Dixon to Mason. Adverting to the Room, "Why aye, Right as a Right Angle, we're out here to ruffle up some business with any who may be in need of Surveying, London-Style, - Astronomickally precise, optickally up-to-the-Minute, surprisingly cheap. The Behavior of the Stars is the most perfect Motion there is, and we know how to read it all, just as you'd read a Clock-Face. We have Lenses that never lie, and Micrometers fine enough to subtend the Width of a Hair upon a Martian's Eye-ball. This looks like a bustling Town, plenty of activity in the Land-Trades, where think yese'd be a good place to start?" with an amiability that Mason recognizes as peculiarly Quaker, - Friendly Business. — Thomas Pynchon

Animals are ever so psychic. There are some people who just can't come in here. The cats particularly seem to know. You can fool everybody, but landy M deary-me, you can't fool a cat. They seem to know who's not right, if you know what I mean. — Dewitt Bodeen

Books are similarly dangerous. The worst kind can change your life. It was a book that got me to the human world. And it is books that now keep me here. I don't know how some humans can stand to read so much. How can they bear to continue their dull, normal lives after reading such extraordinary ones? — Parinita Shetty

Many years ago a college professor told me the story about the lion tamer and the lion. So here's the clever lion tamer, with his little twirling stick, and there is the lion, prancing obediently to the machinations of the lion tamer. Clearly the lion tamer is in charge. But, asked my professor, who is actually more powerful, the lion tamer or the lion? Obviously it is the lion. Why then does the lion do the bidding of the lion tamer? Because the lion doesn't know its own power. We, the American people, have been exploited and stolen from and we have put up with it at least in part because we are awed by the power of the progressive lion tamers. I admit they do have power, but I am also saying we do not appreciate our own strength. — Dinesh D'Souza

I can only tell you how I felt. Ugly. disgusting. Stupid. Small. Worthless. Forgotten. It just feels like there's no choice. Like it's the most logical thing to do because what else is there? You think, No one will even miss me. They won't know I'm gone. The world will go on, and it won't matter that I'm not here. Maybe it's better if I was never here. — Jennifer Niven

Just say it, she thought. Say what everyone in this bunker is thinking. Say what we all know to be true. The truth that we are all going to die down here, and death is the end. Nobody wakes up to a heaven or paradise. Your life will be gone. You will be gone. Forever. Uncover the truth. Tear off the bandages of delusion. Open your hearts and minds to the real world. We were doomed the day we were born. We lived and we will die and the only immortals are the people who did something worth remembering while they lived. My genetics are prime. I am pleasing to the eyes of man and machine. A dripping fountain of pleasure. Their organic sanctuary. And in time? Aging. Fading. Graying. What am I? Who am I? What makes me human? Emotions? My conscience? The soul is an old testament myth. No one shall ascend anywhere except into annihilation. The dust of earth and stars are the only eternals, she said. — C.J. Anderson

Gibran says: Once I asked such a scarecrow, "I can understand the farmer who made you - he needs you. I can understand the poor animals - they don't have great intelligence to see that you are bogus. But in the rain, in the sun, in the hot summer, in the cold winter, you remain standing here: for what?" And the scarecrow said, "You don't know my joy. Just to make those animals afraid is such a joy that it is worth suffering rain, suffering sun, suffering heat, winter, everything. I am making thousands of animals afraid! I know I am bogus, there is nothing inside me, but I don't care about that. My joy is in making others afraid." I want to ask you: Would you like to be just like this bogus man - nothing inside, making somebody afraid, making somebody happy, making somebody humiliated, making somebody respectful? Is your life only for others? Will you ever look inside? — Osho

But they can't know how the dark space inside me is growing. I lie to them. I can't get out of the dark hole. 'Peace is here' it whispers. — Lurlene McDaniel

I think our generation has been called to apathy just as our grandparents were called to defeat fascism and the baby boomers were called to get divorced and fuck around for most of their adult lives before bankrupting the entire goddamn country when they retire. But we have the chance to do something really special here. Imagine a world where people didn't care enough to go to war over anything. Where some guy gets up in the morning and says, "I know God wants me to kill the infidels and keep gay people from marrying each other, but I just don't give a shit. I'm going back to bed." It would be paradise on earth. This is our mission. I think we can make it happen, but I really don't care either way. And that's called hope. — Paul Neilan

Then it is in me, too, the psychotic streak. A psychotic world we live in. The madmen are in power. How long have we known this? Faced this? And-how many of us do know it? ... Perhaps if you know you are insane then you are not insane. Or you are becoming sane, finally. Waking up. I suppose only a few are aware of all this. Isolated persons here and there. But the broad masses-what do they think? All these hundreds of thousands in this city, here. Do they imagine that they live in a sane world? Or do they guess, glimpse, the truth ... ? — Philip K. Dick

I don't know what I'm trying to say. I don't know what any of this is really about. Why we bother. Why we're here. Why we love. I had a family, and they were everything to me, and I didn't even know it when I had them. I had a girl, and she was everything to me, and I knew it every second I had her. I lost them all. Everything a guy could ever want. I found my way home again, but don't be fooled. Nothing's the same as before. I'm not sure I'd want it to be. — Kami Garcia

They think America is like a major league in entertainment. For me personally being here for the past year-and-a-half, I know some of the arguments and discrepancies African American actors have with the opportunities here. — Aml Ameen

She said, "I don't know why I come here. That's a fact." He shrugged. "Since you are here, maybe you could tell me a little about yourself?" She shook her head. "I don't talk about that. I just been wondering lately why things happen the way they do." "Oh!" he said. "Then I'm glad you have some time to spare. I've been wondering about that more or less my whole life. — Marilynne Robinson

I look around me, man . . . I'm trying to do what I've always done, to protect people, to keep them safe from the monsters - only I'm pretty sure I'm one of them. I can't figure out where I could have . . . what else I might have done . . ." I swallowed. "I'm lost. I know every step I took to get here, and I'm still lost." "Harry . . ." "And my friends," I said. "Even Thomas . . . I was stuck out on that island of the damned for a year. A year, Michael, and they only showed up a handful of times. Just Murphy and Thomas, maybe half a dozen times in more than a year. It's just a goddamned boat ride away, forty minutes. People drive farther than that to go to the movies. They know what I'm turning into. They don't want to watch it happening to me. — Jim Butcher

And here are trees and I know their gnarled surface, water and I feel its taste. These scents of grass and stars at night, certain evenings when the heart relaxes-how shall I negate this world whose power and strength I feel? Yet all the knowledge on earth will give me nothing to assure me that this world is mine. You describe it to me and you teach me to classify it. You enumerate its laws and in my thirst for knowledge I admit that they are true. You take apart its mechanism and my hope increases. At the final stage you teach me that this wondrous and multicolored universe can be reduced to the atom and that the atom itself can be reduced to the electron. All this is good and I wait for you to continue. But you tell me of an invisible planetary system in which electrons gravitate around a nucleus. You explain this world to me with an image. I realize then that you have been reduced to poetry: I shall never know. — Albert Camus

I do not know where I can find a better place than just here, to make mention of one or two other things, which to me seem important, as in printed form establishing in all respects the reasonableness of the whole story of the White Whale, more especially the catastrophe. For this is one of those disheartening instances where truth requires full as much bolstering as error. So ignorant are most landsmen of some of the plainest and most palpable wonders of the world, that without some hints touching the plain facts, historical and otherwise, of the fishery, they might scout at Moby Dick as a monstrous fable, or still worse and more detestable, a hideous and intolerable allegory. — Herman Melville

You know what this is?" Lula said. "This here's plane rage."
Plane rage isn't allowed. It got taken off the allowed activities list along with eating. If you make a scene they'll hual you off in leg irons." Stephanie said.
I'm tired of being stapped in here, too," Lula said. "This seat belt's too tight and it's giving me gas."
Anything else?"
There's no movie. — Janet Evanovich

On game days, I could be in the worst mood imagiable-a really bad mood. But sometimes, I'd get a call from the Make-A-Wish Foundation-there would be people, sometimes kids, who anted to meet me before they died. And the foundation would call on a game day and say, "There's kid dying here whose last wish is to see you. Can you just come and see him?" I'd get there and sometimes the kid would be comatose. One day, a kid woke up for a split second and smiled at me. I was told he'd been hanging on. The mom and dad called me later and said, "I don't know what yu did to him, but those few moments were wonderful." And I cried all the way to the game, just cried my eyes out.
It's very scary. It's uplifting, too, but so scary. And then ... I'm bitching because my breakfast is cold? — Charles Barkley

He kissed her again, bringing both hands up behind her head to hold her still, and his hot lips slanted sideways across her open moutb. Her head spun crazily. She was dizzy. She could not breathe in here. She would fall in front of the queen. They would all know what he had done. There was no time left, surely. The castle portcullis would swing up, the door would be opened and His Grace would see them!
He pulled his mouth away and said against her flushed cheek, I have never envied any other man his bed before this long, long week. Now two men will possess you and neither really loves you, Mary Bullen. Think of me when you spread your sweet thighs for them! — Karen Harper

Glancing back at me as I settled on the Harley, Cooper sighed. "My sister dresses like a slut, but most of the girls at school dress that way. They act like whores, but they're not. They just like dressing up and playing sexy. These guys are losers and they come here with these ideas about the country girls being easy. When they aren't easy, they make them easy. They look down at local girls and poor chicks like you. Now that they know where you work, they'll come hanging around to make you dance like a monkey. If that happens, you tell me and I'll hunt them down and make them dance. Do you understand? — Bijou Hunter

I do lay in some opinions here and there. For example, I don't think it should be socially acceptable for people to say they are "bad with names." No one is bad with names. That is not a real thing. Not knowing people's names isn't a neurological condition; it's a choice. You choose not to make learning people's names a priority. It's like saying, "Hey, a disclaimer about me: I'm rude." For heaven's sake, if you don't know someone's name, just pretend you do. Do that thing everyone else does, where you vaguely say, "Nice to see you!" and make weak eye contact. So, — Mindy Kaling

But to be a parent is to live in the past-present-future all at once. It is to hug your children and be intensely aware of how much smaller they felt last year ... even as you wonder how much bigger they will feel the next. It is to be a time-shifter, to marvel at the budding of their intellect, their verbal dexterity, their sense of humor ... at the same time rewinding and fast-forwarding ... to when they were younger, to when they'll be older. It is to experience longing for the here and now, which I know sounds flaky - sort of like complaining about being homesick when you're already home - but can happen, trust me, when you live in multiple time zones all at once. — Youngme Moon

There is no looking-glass here and I don't know what I am like now. I remember watching myself brush my hair and how my eyes looked back at me. The girl I saw was myself yet not quite myself. Long ago when I was a child and very lonely I tried to kiss her. But the glass was between us - hard, cold and misted over with my breath. Now they have taken everything away. What am I doing in this place and who am I? — Jean Rhys

My anger mounted. "What about your son and me? What about us? How can you even think of leaving me alone here with our baby boy? Telemachus needs his father. What's going to happen to us if you leave? Who will help me raise him? Who will take care of us? You know as well as I do some of the men around here are nothing but a bunch of scoundrels. Mark my words, Odysseus. The second you're gone, they'll swarm in here like bees around honey. They'll take over the place. I won't be able to do a thing to stop them. — Tamara Agha-Jaffar

I know a lot of people feel like they get eaten alive by New York, but I feel it more as a father figure or something - this huge presence watching over me. I definitely feel better and work freer here. — Dev Hynes

You know what the bodega is? It's the little Latin store, and they try to act like it's a grocery store. It has two aisles. And the guy, he always tries to help me, 'You looking for the bread?' I was like, 'Dude, I can see it right here, alright.' He's like, 'Hey, hey, it's in aisle two.' That's all you got, what are you talking about? — Godfrey

Because I can tell that I'm different from the others. And they can tell, too. The rest of the taps look at me and ask themselves what I'm doing here. I know they do. — Diana Peterfreund

The righteous will surround me, for you will deal bountifully with me" (v. 7). Here is staggering confidence in God! No matter what the wicked plot and how powerful they are, God is greater and he will deliver. Is this not the heart of the message of the gospel itself? No matter how great is our opponent - which, among other things, includes the sin and guilt of our own lives - God is greater, and his provision more fully revealed in Jesus Christ for our deliverance cannot fail. In Christ we know that the righteous will surround us, that God will deal bountifully with us. In Christ, we are invincible. — Anonymous

Good lord, look at you!" he cried, delighted at my grubbiness. "What have you been doing? You're filthy!" He looked me up and down admiringly, then said in a more solemn tone: "You haven't been screwing hogs again, have you, Bryson?"
"Ha ha ha."
"They're not clean animals, you know, no matter how attractive they may look after a month on the trail. And don't forget we're not in Tennessee anymore. It's probably not even legal here - at least not without a note from the vet." He patted the chair beside him, beaming all over, happy with his quips. "Come and sit down and tell me all about it. So what was her name - Bossy?" He leaned closely and confidentially. "Did she squeal a lot? — Bill Bryson

Therefore, to you, and to the fifty governors, I have a request. Please, do not send me politicians. We do not have the time to do the things that must be done through that process. I need people who do real things in the real world. I need people who do not want to live in Washington. I need people who will not try to work the system. I need people who will come here at great personal sacrifice to do an important job, and then return home to their normal lives. I want engineers who know how things are built. I want physicians who know how to make sick people well. I want cops who know what it means when your civil rights are violated by a criminal. I want farmers who grow real food on real farms. I want people who know what it's like to have dirty hands, and pay a mortgage bill, and raise kids, and worry about the future. I want people who know they're working for you and not themselves. That's what I want. That's what I need. I think that's what a lot of you want, too. — Tom Clancy

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

There were a lot of things I listened to, but so-called pop music never killed me, you know, the type of stuff that always seems to make it on the radio. The whole radio thing seems so ... it's like they've accepted the whole "new wave" thing only because this kind of pop element came into it. In Europe they really love emotion, but here it's like, "let's stay away from it because we might cry or something". — Tom Verlaine

Like Nadia, I wrestled with the evangelical tradition in which I was raised, often ungracefully. At times I've tried to wring the waters of my first baptism out of my clothes, shake them out of my hair, and ask for a do-over in some other community where they ordain women, vote for Democrats, and believe in evolution. But Jesus has this odd habit of allowing ordinary, screwed-up people to introduce him, and so it was ordinary, screwed-up people who first told me I was a beloved child of God, who first called me a Christian. I don't know where my story of faith will take me, but it will always begin here. That much can never change. — Rachel Held Evans

I was raised in the Marine Corps and I was taught as a boy that you feed your own men before you feed yourself. It was my belief then, and it remains so today, that my platoon who loves and respect me will slaughter your platoon that hates you. But here is the great lesson I took from the plebe system - it let me know exactly the kind of man I wanted to become. It made me ache to be a contributing citizen in whatever society I found myself in, to live out a life I could be proud of, and always to measure up to what I took to be the highest ideal of a Citadel man - or, now, a Citadel woman. The standards were clear to me and they were high, and I took my marching orders from my college to take my hard-won education and go out to try to make the whole world a better place. — Pat Conroy

What trunk?" Velkan
"My trunk. I'm moving in" Esperetta
"In where?" Velkan
"My room. Here." Esperetta
Completely stunned and flabbgausted, he opened and closed his mouth, unable to speak.
Esperetta walked over to him and placed her finger on his chin before she closed his mouth. "I know you dont trust me, but tough shit."
"This is my home and you're my husband. I made a mistake and for that I'm sorry, but I'm through being an idiot." Esperetta
"Dark-Hunters can't be married." Velkan
"Well then, someone should have told Artemis before she made her bargain with you and brought me back to life, huh? You were created as a married Dark-Hunter. I hardly think they can complain now." Esperetta
She did have a point about that
"But
" Velkan
She ended his words with a kiss. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

We've got to stick together, that's all I know. We all drive each other crazy at times, but I don't want to end up here alone, like the Hermit. Then this really would be Hell. Humans do such terrible things to each other that sometimes my brain tells me they must be evil. But my heart still isn't convinced.
I just hope we can survive. — John Marsden

Thats why i'm staying here,"claire said."with you.tonight."shane took in a deep breath."clothes stay on." "mostly,"she agreed. "you know,your parents really are right about me."claire sighed."no,they're not.nobody knows you at all,i think.not your dad,not even michael.your a deep,dark mystery,shane."he kissed her for the first time since she'd entered the room,a warm press of lips to her forehead."i'm an open book." she smiled."i like books." "hey,we've got something in common." i'm taking off my shoes." "fine.shoes off." "and my pants." "dont push it claire. — Rachel Caine

Here's the thing: I am not only a creature of civilization, I'm an asthmatic person. I will only live so long as I have stockpiled the proper inhalers. I'm effectively a cyborg. You know how in Jurassic Park, they bred those dinosaurs with the lysine deficiencies, so if they ever got off the island, they'd die? That's me. — John Hodgman

I knew it! I knew you'd hate my body!" She slammed her hands on her hips, marched over to the bed, and glared down at him. "Well, for your information, mister, all those cute little sex kittens in your past might have had perfect bodies, but they don't know a lepton from a proton,and if you think that I'm going to stand here and let you judge me by the size of my hips and because my belly's not flat, then you're in for a rude awakening." She jabbed her finger at him. "This is the way a grown woman looks, buster! This body was designed by God to be functional, not to be stared at by some hormonally imbalanced jock who can only get aroused by women who still own Barbie dolls"
"Damn. Now I've got to gag you." With one swift motion, he pulled her down on the bed, rolled on top of her, and covered her lips with his own. — Susan Elizabeth Phillips

You know, developments here remind me of the Internet. That old computer network, invented by the American scientific community. It was all about free communications. Very simple and widely distributed - there was never any central control. It spread worldwide in short order. It turned into the world's biggest piracy copy machine. The Chinese loved the Internet, they used it and turned it against us. They destroyed our information economy with it. Even then the net didn't go away - it just started breeding its virtual tribes, all these nomads and dissidents. — Bruce Sterling

I don't know if I want to go to New York. They'll have to pay me a lot more money because I like it here in Kansas City. — Roger Maris

I was telling them about back home and how all the boys were chasing me because I was half-caste, and they said I was dissing myself. So now I say biracial, and I'm supposed to be offended when somebody says half-caste. I've met a lot of people here with white mothers and they are so full of issues, eh. I didn't know I was even supposed to have issues until I came to America . Honestly, if anybody wants to raise bi-racial kids, do it in Nigeria — Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

That's how the world works, doesn't it?"
"That's how it can work. You're such a snob,Brian."
He looked up,flabbergasted. "What?"
"You're such a snob,and the worst kind of snob-the kind who thinks he's broad-minded. Now that I know that,you don't bother me at all."
The stable phone rang,delighting her. Whoever was on the other end not only had perfect timing but they had her gratitude.It gave her great pleasure to see the absolute shock on Brian's face as she walked to the phone.
"Royal Meadows Riding Academy. Would you hold one moment,please." With a friendly smile,she laid a hand over the receiver. "Really,I can finish up here.I'm keeping you from your work."
"I'm not a snob," he finally managed to say.
"Of course you wouldn't see it that way. Can we discuss this another time? I need to take this call."
Irked,he shoved the scoop back in the grain. "I'm not the one wearing bloody diamonds in my ears," he muttered as he stalked out. — Nora Roberts

Why did you come back? 'Tis not safe." "I came back to finish what we last started." Did he mean their near embrace in the barn? Before Pa came in? His mouth was warm against her ear, his fingers stroking her hair, which frayed at the touch of his callused hand. "I came back to ask you to be my wife." The words, so long wished for, were every bit as sweet as she'd hoped they'd be. But here in this shadowed corner, with Pa so ill ... "Do you love me? Or do you feel pity for me, alone, almost fatherless?" "Not pity, Morrow. Love. The love between a man and a woman." Her lips parted in a sort of wonder. "Have you ever been in love?" "Not till now ... not till you." "Then how can you be ... sure?" "I know my mind, my heart. — Laura Frantz

Sophie dear,' I said. 'Are you in love with him - with this spider-man?'
'Oh, don't call him that - please - we can't any of us help being what we are. His name's Gordon. He's kind to me, David. He's fond of me. You've got to have as little as I have to know how much that means. You've never known loneliness. You can't understand the awful emptiness that's waiting all round us here. I'd have given him babies gladly, if I could ... I - oh, why do they do that to us? Why didn't they kill me? It would have been kinder than this ... '
She sat without a sound. The tears squeezed out from under the closed lids and ran down her face. I took her hand between my own.
I remembered watching. The man with his arm linked in the woman's, the small figure on top of the pack-horse waving back to me as they disappeared into the trees. Myself desolate, a kiss still damp on my
cheek, a lock tied with a yellow ribbon in my hand. I looked at her now, and my heart ached. — John Wyndham

Hey, here come our ladies. Just looking at them gives you the uh, doesn't it?" McNab gave the sound a push that was unmistakably sexual as he grinned down the long corridor where Peabody got off the glide with Eve.

Then he shot Roarke a quick look. "I mean the uh me for mine, you for yours. It's not like I get the uh for the lieutenant, for which she would kick my ass, then leave you to turn what was left of it into bloody dust. Which She-Body would then grind into the earth before she set it on fire. I was just saying."

"I know what you were saying." McNab could, invariably, entertain him. "And I couldn't agree more, with everything including the bloody dust. They are compelling women. — J.D. Robb

Master, I'm afraid. I am, truly. This place scares me. At home, I know who I am, what to do. I'm the Warden's daughter, I know where I stand. But this is a dangerous place, full of pitfalls. All my life, I've known it was waiting for me, but now I'm not sure I can face it. They'll want to absorb me, make me one of them, and I won't change. I won't! I want to stay me."
Jared sighed and she saw his dark gaze was fixed on the veiled window.
"Claudia, you're the bravest person I know. And no one will change you. You will rule here, though it won't be easy ... — Catherine Fisher

I want to correct something I told you once,' she says. 'You asked me once if I thought white people wish that Puerto Rican and black people would just die or go away. I thought it over and I changed my mind. I don't think they wish that we would die. I think they wish that we were never born. Now that we're here, I think they don't know what they ought to do. I think that that's the biggest problem in their minds about poor people.' She adds politely, 'I'm not talkin' about all of the white people. Some of them feel this way. Some of them don't. Some of them don't feel nothin'. Some are nice people but they can't get nothin' done and so they put it out of mind. — Jonathan Kozol

Should I be worried?" He set down the bread. I smiled. "No. But go easy on him. He hasn't had to see me with anyone for a while. It's ... strange for him. Hearing the stories and now, seeing you here." "What are the stories?" "Oh, you know. Dark, handsome stranger whisking off innocent, sweet, loved-by-all Riley Johnson. Corrupting her weekends before sending her back a ruined woman." "Oh, is that what they're saying?" His mouth curved. I nodded, widening my eyes. "Oh yes. It's quite the scandal. — Alessandra Torre

Jeb's eyes look like they might pop ... so do the veins in his neck. He makes a sound - somewhere between a cough and a moan - mesmerized by my rocking hips. He stands. "Would you get down? You're going to hurt yourself."
"No. Come up here with me." I raised my arms over my head and roll my pelvis seductively. "It's a wake-up dance for Skittles. You know, like the Native Americans used to do to bring down rain."
Jeb gawks. "I seriously doubt Native Americans moved like that." — A.G. Howard

What do they do in these [private] clubs, anyway? Sit around saying things like 'Thank God I'm here. No Jews! What fun! This is living, huh? Look! No Jews! I don't know when I've had a better time. And no women! Just men! And no blacks! Just whites! White men! White men who are not Jewish! It doesn't get any better than this.' To some people, apparently, this is a perfect description of injustice. To me, this is a perfect description of a gay bar in Iceland. — Fran Lebowitz

Keep calm, they said on television. Everything is under control. I was stunned. Everyone was, I know that. It was hard to believe. The entire government, gone like that. How did they get in, how did it happen? That was when they suspended the Constitution. They said it would be temporary. There wasn't even any rioting in the streets. People stayed home at night, watching television, looking for some direction. There wasn't even an enemy you could put your finger on. Look out, said Moira to me, over the phone. Here it comes. Here what comes? I said. You wait, she said. They've been building up to this. It's you and me up against the wall, baby. She was quoting an expression of my mother's, but she wasn't intending to be funny. — Margaret Atwood

She answered: please believe me, what has happened in my family is not what you think. I can say only this - that everything I learned about human decency I learned here. I learned nothing from you except how to be suspicious. I didn't know what hate was until I lived among you and saw you hating every day. They even had to pass laws to keep you from hating. I despise your quick answers, your slogans in the subways, and most of all I despise your lack of good manners: you'll never have 'em as long as you exist. — Harper Lee

See? Injustice. Here we are, risking our lives to rescue Kai and this whole planet, and Adri and Pearl get to go to the royal wedding. I'm disgusted. I hope they spill soy sauce on their fancy dresses."

Jacin's concern turned fast to annoyance. "Your ship has some messed-up priorities, you know that?"

"Iko. My name is Iko. If you don't stop calling me the 'ship,' I am going to make sure you never have hot water during your showers again, do you understand me?"

"Yeah, hold that thought while I go disable the speaker system."

"What? You can't mute me. Cinder! — Marissa Meyer

On top of the good was a hideously ugly bronze statue in the modern style. The statue was of a couple, dressed in togas, wrapped in an embrace. Cupped in their hands was a piece of fruit. I couldn't be sure, because realism did not appear to be the artist's specialty, but it looked to me like a pomegranate.
"Good God," Frank, who'd trailed after us, said when he saw the statue. "Rector's even sicker than any of us thought. I've never wished I was blind before, like Graves, but I do now, because then I'd never have to look at that again."
"Frank," John said, his gaze on my face. "Be quiet."
"But what do they do in here?" Frank wanted to know. "Have picnics with their dead relatives and admire their ugly art? — Meg Cabot

Ask me, then, if I believe in the spirit of the things as they were used, and I'll say yes. They're all here. All the things which had uses. All the mountains which had names. And we'll never be able to use them without feeling uncomfortable. And somehow the mountains will never sound right to us; we'll give them new names, but the old names are there, somewhere in time, and the mountains were shaped and seen under those names. The names we'll give to the canals and mountains and cities will fall like so much water on the back of a mallard. No matter how we touch Mars, we'll never touch it. And then we'll get mad at it, and you know what we'll do? We'll rip it up, rip the skin off, and change it to fit ourselves. — Ray Bradbury

There's someone here."
"I know." She said, "Where's Scott?"
"I'm not sure," He said, "I thought you were going to wait outside with Nichole and Matt."
"We decided to come in."
"You mean they're in here too?"
"Yes."
"Okay ... " He said calmly, "You stay here."
She nodded as he turned to go.
"Oh, and Carrie."
"Yes?"
"Could you actually listen to me this time?" He asked with a faint smile on his face. — Julia Barkey

Am I a fruitcake? I don't know. Perception is reality, so if I sit here and say, "I'm not a fruitcake, I'm a lemon cake," it doesn't matter. What you see me as in your world is what I am; it doesn't matter what I am - do you know what I mean? To me, I know what my real problems are - and they're certainly not about cake. And that's just the way it is. — Macy Gray

If you gonna challenge my ways, know my history. Don't put nobody in my face that don't know about me, or they here to write an article on someone they thought was hot when they was hot. Come on, man. I been hot. — Raekwon