Saturday, July 30, 2011

Clinton Kelly

Scrunchies go with nothing.

Henry David Thoreau

I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.

from Walden

Friday, July 29, 2011

Ken Burns

All truth is manipulated, because the universe is chaotic. What we divine from it is the superimposition of some kind of order, whether it's religion, superstition, story and art, literature, science — all of them are an attempt to keep the wolf from the door. And that wolf is the panic of chaos.

Monday, July 18, 2011

Anita Brookner

I suppose what one wants really is ideal company and books are ideal company.

Monday, July 4, 2011

Walt Whitman

This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.

--from the preface of Leaves of Grass

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Neil Simon

If you can go through life without ever experiencing pain, you probably haven't been born yet. And if you've gone through pain and think you know exactly why, you haven't examined all the options.