Some Words I Like

I don’t know what to write about today. I could talk about work, but I don’t feel like it. I could talk about house progress, but I don’t feel like it. I could talk about job progress, but I don’t feel like it. I’m in a “I CANNOT WRIIIIIIITE” mood, but I committed to writing today. So here I am.

And since I can’t word, I’ll let others word for me. I’m gonna share some quotes that are special to me, and hopefully you’ll enjoy them as well.

Piss off. ~ Ezekiel

One of my personal favorites.

Become who you are. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

I love this sentiment. Love it.

Nourish yourself with grand and austere ideas of beauty that feed the soul…seek solitude. ~ Eugène Delacroix

No problem here, though sometimes I fear the ideas are too grand and austere!

If I stayed here, something inside me would be lost forever – something I couldn’t afford to lose. It was like a vague dream, a burning, unfulfilled desire. The kind of dream people have only when they’re seventeen. ~ Haruki Murakami

“The answer is dreams. Dreaming on and on. Entering the world of dreams and never coming out. Living in dreams for the rest of time. ~ Haruki Murakami

It’s no secret I love Murakami. I know a lot of people think he’s overrated. To be fair, I had no fucking idea he was some famous author. Someone had Kafka on the Shore on a reading list, and I was transported when I read it. His words, his worlds, were enticing, maddening, emotional, real, surreal, transcendent. And the pursuit of his words and his ideas kept me going in dark times. I haven’t read all of his works yet – I was reading them back to back, but I had to stop because I am not in a hurry to not have any of his b0oks to look forward to.

Those two quotes above are probably self-explanatory as to why they’re meaningful to me. Dreaming and the pursuit of those dreams is what I’m clinging to right now. I cannot stop dreaming. I cannot stop pursuing those dreams. It is vital that I do not.

The best people possess a feeling for beauty, the courage to take risks, the discipline to tell the truth, the capacity for sacrifice. Ironically, their virtues make them vulnerable; they are often wounded, sometimes destroyed. ~ Ernest Hemingway

Isn’t that the fucking truth? What a beautiful sentiment, and I like to think that this is part of why I’m wounded. I just hope I don’t end up destroyed…but in the end, that’s up to me, isn’t it?

Hemingway is another that is either loved or hated, and I have no shame in saying I love his work.

Quit assuming others have it better, or you have it worse. Everyone suffers tremendously in life. It’s rude to belittle someone’s suffering, thinking yours is greater. Don’t judge someone’s suffering as better or worse. A dark life can be lived brightly, because pain gave great perspective and wisdom. An average and easy life can be its own kind of tragedy, suffering a mundane deadness. A great life can spoil under great fortune. It’s hard having nothing. It’s hard having everything. It’s hard. Suffering is very personal and cannot be measured by someone from the outside. Everyone suffers in different ways. Life is not a suffering contest; the contest is for compassion. ~ Bryant McGill

I used to be a lot better at this perspective. In fact, I used to remind others about this – that you never know what others are going through, no matter what it looks like on the outside. As I’ve grown older and more storm-tossed, I’ve grown more bitter. I know this, but I’m more concerned about it now as it’s been brought to my attention by others. “Don’t get so jaded you can no longer see the light, Stephanie.” “Don’t get so self-righteous in your struggles that you forget others struggle, too.” Important reminders, and I definitely need to work harder on seeing the good in people again. I readily admit I see more bad than good, and it’s dangerous for the psyche.

Oh my God, what if you wake up some day, and you’re 65, or 75, and you never got your memoir or novel written; or you didn’t go swimming in warm pools and oceans all those years because your thighs were jiggly and you had a nice big comfortable tummy; or you were just so strung out on perfectionism and people-pleasing that you forgot to have a big juicy creative life, of imagination and radical silliness and staring off into space like when you were a kid? It’s going to break your heart. Don’t let this happen. ~ Anne Lamott

Whew. That. Right. There. Is so fucking important. I’m incredibly guilty of passing up on experiences and opportunities because of self-doubt, self-loathing, fear, etc. I already live in regret of things I passed up for those reasons, and yet I continue to do so even now. I’m not gonna lay on my deathbed upset that someone saw my fat rolls. No. I’ll be upset that I didn’t jump in the ocean because this is my life, and I want to jump in the ocean…but I didn’t because fear. We must stop allowing fear dominion over our lives.

And finally, yet again, because I must remind myself of this on the daily:

~

GO

Quote Challenge Numéro Deux

Several lovely bloggers (seriously, like seventy-two of ya!) asked me to do the quote challenge again. But, because I’m a nogoodterribleverybad person, I only remember the first one who asked me: And that was Ndumiso Mncwabe over at Music Smells Like Noise. He has an original and creative blog going over there – I do hope you’ll check him out; he’s one of my favorites. And okay y’all, it was nowhere near seventy-two. More like seventy-one. Yeah. And I should have kept a list so I could give everybody a shout-out. My bad.

It’s been a while since I was asked, but I wanted to put a little more time between now and the first one I did. And it certainly doesn’t hurt that I’m a sucker for a good quote. And I’m doing it today because I’m in a supershitty mood so I need to do this to occupy myself.

(Disclosure thingy: I actually wrote this yesterday and scheduled it to post this morning. Since you’re all aware of my wild ups and downs, I’m probably in a better mood by now. But as of writing? FUCKTHEWORLDMAN. Not the worldman. The world, man. Because I don’t know who the Worldman is, but I’m not really keen on doing him.)

Y’all know, rebel that I am (snort), I’m gonna fuck the rules all up. If I recall correctly from last time, I’m supposed to do three quotes over the course of three days. But I think the new one going around has a twist: one or three quotes each day for three days, nominating three people each day.

And you homies oughta know by now that shit ain’t happenin’.

In fact, what I’m gonna do right now is give you a shitload of quotes all at once, and I’ll try to keep them all sufficiently moody to suit my mood. (How many times am I gonna say mood in this post? How many licks will it take to count them? Start licking and lemme know.) (Also ew. Stop licking your monitor.)

Here, lick Hubert Cumberdale. He tastes like soot and poo.

And then, I’m gonna nominate all of you. To gimme some quotes in comments. Or post some on your own pages. Whatever floats your goat. (I know it’s supposed to be boat. Don’t you think I know that? Goats are better than boats. Trust me.) (Oooo better still, a goat in a boat. Why didn’t I think of that?!)

But first, here’s some mood music to set the tone.

Ahhhhhh, that’s better. Nothing like some good ole ambient acid jazz trip hop (seriously will we ever agree on genres?). Now, where was I? Ah yes, to the quotes! I’m gonna share some that I keep in my own personal stash of quotey goodness.

Existential Mumbo Jumbo (that I love. So stop calling it mumbo jumbo. Jerk.)

On the walls of the cave, only the shadows are the truth. ~Plato

The time will come when diligent research over long periods will bring to light things which now lie hidden. A single lifetime, even though entirely devoted to the sky, would not be enough for the investigation of so vast a subject … And so this knowledge will be unfolded only through long successive ages. There will come a time when our descendants will be amazed that we did not know things that are so plain to them … Many discoveries are reserved for ages still to come, when memory of us will have been effaced. Our universe is a sorry little affair unless it has in it something for every age to investigate … Nature does not reveal her mysteries once and for all. ~Seneca

Whew. I love this stuff.

Isn’t that the truth? Can you really say you’ve experienced true passion without struggle? I know I can’t. Next up:

He was free, free in every way, free to behave like a fool or a machine, free to accept, free to refuse, free to equivocate; to marry, to give up the game, to drag this death weight about with him for years to come. He could do what he liked, no one had the right to advise him, there would be for him no Good or Evil unless he thought them into being. ~Jean-Paul Sartre

Oh yeah, I’m not even done.

Man cannot endure his own littleness unless he can translate it into meaningfulness on the largest possible level. ~Ernest Becker

This next one is one of my all-time favorite quotes. Ever. Period.

The wound is the place where the light enters you. ~Rumi

And that’s a damn good thing, because:

We’re all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other, but it doesn’t. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities; we are eaten up by nothing. ~Charles Bukowski

I should probably lighten the mood, huh? At least attempt to? Cuz damn.

Lightening the Mood, or At Least Attempting To

My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness. ~Dalai Lama XIV

That’s what I’m talkin’ about, yo. Next up:

The past beats inside me like a second heart. ~John Banville

Whoopsie. That wasn’t very light, was it? (But true.) Lemme try again:

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. ~Eleanor Roosevelt

Ahhh, that’s much better and an important one for me to remind myself of. I think I’ve got the hang of this now. Here we go:

“Words are events, they do things, change things. They transform both speaker and hearer; they feed energy back and forth and amplify it. They feed understanding or emotion back and forth and amplify it. ~Ursula K. Le Guin

I’m on a roll!

To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist; that is all. ~Oscar Wilde

Ooooops. My bad. Good quote, though. And true. Here, I’ll leave you with one final choice quote from my vaults:

How about you? What quoth ye?

Your mom goes to college.

This bitch just had the nerve to insult my hair. It was all up in my face. And I hate when my hair is all up in my face. But rather than cut it all off, I usually just put it in a clip or ponytail. Lacking both of those implements today, I twisted my hair into a bun. And it’s being held in place by a Mirado Black Warrior pencil. (Seriously. Those are the best pencils on earth. At least of the No. 2 variety.)

So she’s all…*points and laughs* you have a pencil in your hair. (No shit, Sherlock. And what are we, fucking EIGHT?)

So then I was all…

So then she was all…*huff* What? *eye roll* (Please bitch. Roll it harder. Roll it so hard you go blind. I’m begging you.)

But then I was all…

Because I knew I’d just slain her with my epic wit. Does it matter whether or not she understood? Not really. Because she knew she was beaten. You could see it in her eyes. I bet that’s the last look in a gazelle’s eyes as the cheetah’s teeth penetrate its throat.

No wonder you looked so smug, Kip. You knew what pure gold that line was. Thank you. We all thank you.

Housekeeping: Finishing up the 3-day quote challenge!

Here goes. Y’all ready for my final quotes for the challenge? I hope so. And I equally hope you’re ready to share more with me!

~

This one is quite special to me. I’ve always loved the poem – look, I know poems aren’t exactly what is meant by “quote.” But fuck it, just look at it as an extra-long quote that’s kinda sorta like a poem. Cuz it’s a fuckin’ poem! – but it became even more special to me in college. One of the best professors in the world would read it – and cry – at least once in every course he taught. For decades. The world is a sadder place with his absence. I hope I can live up to the dream he had for all of his students…to Carry the Message to Garcia (oooo another post idea) and to take the road less traveled by.

The Road Not Taken
~Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

That last part always choked him up, my professor. And he always ended with silent tears weaving down the crevices of his age-worn face. He was so dear to me and to so many others. He certainly took the road less traveled by, and I hope that I will in the end as well.

~

And last, but certainly not least. I know I’ll take the road less traveled by, because:

And that has made all the difference.

3-Day Quote Challenge: Day The Second

Alright Peoplleaneous,

I owe you a quote for Day 2 of the 3-Day Quote Challenge! But first! Thanks to everyone for sharing your quotes on the post and on your blogs. I love reading them – keep ’em coming!

Good god, that’s a shitton of exclamation points in a short time. I’m as hyper as five hummingbirds fighting over the same nectar. I’m as hyper as a ten-bee orgy. (OHMYGOSH Y’ALL. THAT’S WHERE THE BEE GEES GOT THEIR NAME FROM! THAT’S WHY THEY HAD NIGHT FEVER.) Take your pick. I’m hyper, y’all. And it doesn’t necessarily equate to good feelings. Just. Ass. Tons. Of. Energy. Woo!

I know y’all haven’t known me long. But surely you know me well enough by now to know that you’re not getting one quote. Nuh uh. You’re getting at least one and a half.

Quoth the Raven:

Somewhere, far, far away, there’s a shitty island. An island without a name. An island not worth giving a name. A shitty island with a shitty shape. On this shitty island grow palm trees that also have shitty shapes. And the palm trees produce coconuts that give off a shitty smell. Shitty monkeys live in the trees, and they love to eat these shitty-smelling coconuts, after which they shit the world’s foulest shit. The shit falls on the ground and builds up shitty mounds, making the shitty palm trees that grow on them even shittier. It’s an endless cycle.

~Haruki Murakami. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Those of you unfamiliar with Murakami’s work, please do not let that off-color passage deter you from entering his world. He is easily my favorite current author. All of the books I own by him so far are littered with notes and stickies and flagged passages and phrases. He speaks to my soul like…well like only Murakami can right now. His works are serious and surreal and deep and thought-provoking. And no. No. I cannot continue, because this is NOT the kind of half-ass, poorly thought out review I wanna write of his works. So. The point is. The passage I just put as my next quote? It’s in the middle of this super-serious book, and it leapt off of the page at me, and I laughed out loud. I laughed. I snorted. I moved on. And then I lost it again. Funny funny. Can you see it? The shitty monkeys on the shitty palm trees of shitty island?

WHY AREN’T YOU LAUGHING?!

Fine. You don’t wanna laugh at my funny? Cry, then!

Quoth the Depressed:

But even so, every now and then I would feel a violent stab of loneliness. The very water I drink, the very air I breathe, would feel like long, sharp needles. The pages of a book in my hands would take on the threatening metallic gleam of razor blades. I could hear the roots of loneliness creeping through me when the world was hushed at four o’clock in the morning.

~Haruki Murakami. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.

Another of my marked passages from the same book and author.

~

I’m having a strange day. Mentally. Moodily. Tummily. And now there’s this little bit of work that needs doing, and I find my restless boredom doesn’t quite extend that far. But I have to force it. I’ll try to write more later. I have so much to say to you people!

~Stephanie

3-Day Quote Challenge: Day One, aka Kat Rescues Us All from Another Depressing Post (not so fast, you haven’t seen my quote)

Kat over at Time No Matter has roped me into a 3-day quote challenge. And she didn’t even have to try hard! So far, I’m finding these sorts of things to be a fun community-building diversion from my usual humdrum. And it makes me feel welcome, and who doesn’t like to feel welcome? So thank you, Kat. And y’all please check out her blog – she’s on an inspiring journey.

Now. On to the quote challenge rule thingies.

Rules:

• Thank the blogger who nominated you
• Publish 3 quotes on 3 consecutive days on your blog. It can be your own, or from a book, movie or from anyone who inspires you.
• Nominate 3 more bloggers to carry on this endeavor

P.S. I’m about to break two out of three rules. A quote challenge, for a whopping three quotes total? Ever!? What if I wanna give you four, huh? Did you think about that, huh? No! You didn’t!

Nommies:

Look. Let’s be frank here. Okay, I’ll be Frank. You can be Cornelius. And Frank says, I know a lot of y’all hate shit like this. And some of you love it. I cannot begin to describe the absolute soul crushing anxiety these fucking nominations give me. I swear, you’d lock me up if you knew how much I fret over trying to pick THREE FUCKING PEOPLE out of the two hundred I’m following so far. And some of the ones I want to nominate, I know good and well hate this shit. And some of the ones I want to nominate, I keep nominating over and over! So. Look. Here’s what I’m gonna do.

I nominate EVERYONE. EVERYFUCKINGONEOFYOU. If you don’t wanna do it, no pressure. If you do, I won’t even ask you to tag me. Be cool if you did, but I won’t get my feelings hurt if you don’t! And and bonus idea! If you want, you can just share some of your favorite quotes with me here. Cuz I enjoy talking with y’all.

Maybe that’s a copout. Okay, it totally is a copout. Suck it. That’s how I’m doing it! Whew. (I’m still full of anxiety over it. I wish you knew how serious I am about that. Maybe I’m glad you don’t.)

Pre-Game Bonus:

This is the only quote that should be allowed to kick things like this off:

Will the Real Quote Please Stand Up:

There is a loneliness in this world so great
that you can see it in the slow movement of
the hands of a clock.

People so tired
mutilated
either by love or no love.

People just are not good to each other
one on one.

The rich are not good to the rich.
The poor are not good to the poor.

We are afraid.

Our educational system tells us
that we can all be
big-ass winners.

It hasn’t told us
about the gutters
or the suicides.

Or the terror of one person
aching in one place
alone

untouched
unspoken to

watering a plant.

~Charles Bukowski. Love is a Dog from Hell.

That’s my quote for today. Please feel free to add yours in the comments or on your own pages.