Awkward Beginnings Quotes

The reason for my discomfort was simple. Our story - however romantic I could make it sound in my head - sometimes sounded a little tawdry in the re-telling. There was no escaping the fact that I'd been living with the father of my child when we met; that I'd cheated on him, then left; that what James and I now shared was born out of the ruins of another relationship. ~ Catherine Sanderson

He laughed and was about to retort when she grabbed his collar and pulled him into her. She clamped her lips around his mouth and mashed her face into his. He took a step back in surprise and she went with him, stepping in a patch of wet floor. Her legs went out from under her and flailed as she fell, whacking him in the throat on the way down. She looked up at him as he gagged and coughed, and from across the corridor she could hear Tanith laughing hysterically. "I think I need practice," Valkyrie muttered. ~ Derek Landy

Somewhere along the journey of remembering who we really are, we may find ourselves in a very uncomfortable space, a void in which we realize that we haven't totally let go of our old beliefs, and on the other hand we have yet to fully plug into the new truths we have discovered. This awkward "place of mind" can bring on an internal crisis of uncertainty, instability, confusion, frustration, and a most unspeakable despair as the "dark night" sets in and makes its presence felt. ~ Nicholas Schmidt

I didn't know if I should hug him, and he didn't seem to know if he should hug me, so we just sort of stood there not touching, which to be honest is my preferred form of greeting. ~ John Green

What to go out with me tonight after work, Vaughan?"
... "You asking me out on a date, Lydia?"
"Yes," I said. "I am."
"Babe, I'd love to." His hand rose to the back of my neck, stroking, drawing me closer. Hot damn, did he have the moves. The man turned my mind to mush.
"Something you need to know," he said. "Before tonight."
"What's that?"
"I put out on the first date," he told me with a perfectly straight face. "That okay with you?"
"Oh, I'm counting on it" ... "I mean ... it would have been so awkward if you expected me to respect you for your mind or something. Yikes, how embarrassing. Between you and me, I'm really only interested in getting into your pants."
The corner of his mouth twitched.
"I'm sure you're a nice guy and all, but, priorities, you know?"
"I know." The man's smile would have made a nun think twice. I never stood a chance. ~ Kylie Scott

Now the situation could be resolved, and we could put this behind us -- both the awkward misunderstandings and the misguided attempts at self-preservation. Though both of those would probably happen in the future anyway. ~ Wataru Watari

I saw other people there. Old men sitting alone. Young girls with blue eye shadow and awkward jaws. Little kids who looked tired. Fathers in nice coats who looked even more tired. Kids working behind counters of the food places who looked like they hadn't had the will to live for hours. The machines kept opening and closing. The people kept giving money and getting their change. And it all felt very unsettlingly to me. ~ Stephen Chbosky

From the standpoint of observation, then, we must regard it as a highly probable hypothesis that the beginnings of the mental life date from as far back as the beginnings of life at large. ~ Wilhelm Wundt

When you are interviewing someone, never let your camera person turn off the camera. The second you turn off the camera, they'll say the magic thing that you'd been looking for the whole interview. People want to relax after the performance is done. Don't be afraid of awkward silence. That is your friend. ~ Marshall Curry

When I came to New York, I was really awkward. I went to military academy for high school, so I didn't have the socialization that most kids do. When I got here, I was five years behind everybody. Talking to women was weird for me. ~ Adam Rapp

Yes, life is full of awkward moments! For example, that time you keep dazing off while staring at the same person you found yourself staring at five minutes ago. *gulp* So glad staring is still not illegal. Or, at least I'm glad for my own benefit. ~ Mary Kate

I would like the refugee crisis to become a new beginning in the Turkish-European relationship. But it would be very problematic if, during this process, human rights were forgotten. Democracy needs to be the priority. ~ Elif Safak

His house was certainly peculiar, and since this was the first thing that Fenchurch and Arthur had encountered it would help to know what it was like.

It was like this:

It was inside out.

Actually inside out, to the extent that they had had to park on the carpet.

All along what one would normally call the outer wall, which was decorated in a tasteful interior-designed pink, were bookshelves, also a couple of those odd three-legged tables with semicircular tops which stand in such a way as to suggest that someone just dropped the wall straight through them, and pictures which were clearly designed to soothe.

Where it got really odd was the roof.

It folded back on itself like something that M. C. Escher, had he been given to hard nights on the town, which it is no part of this narrative's purpose to suggest was the case, though it is sometimes hard, looking at his pictures, particularly the one with all the awkward steps, not to wonder, might have dreamed up after having been on one, for the little chandeliers which should have been hanging inside were on the outside pointing up.

Confusing.

The sign above the front door said "Come Outside," and so, nervously, they had.

Inside, of course, was where the Outside was. Rough brickwork, nicely done pointing, guttering in good repair, a garden path, a couple of small trees, some rooms leading off.

And the inner walls stretched ~ Douglas Adams

I like you but you mightn't feel the same way about me, and I wouldn't blame you. To save us both from any awkward moments I've figured out an easy way to do this. Nod if you're even slightly interested in getting to know me. Write a ten page explanation if you're not. ~ Bill Condon

I've learned that what has a good beginning needs also a good ending.

Spoken by the hero, Adam Tremain ~ Day Taylor

Ballroom dancing was inherently social, but steps replaced words and beats ironed out pauses. The shy, the awkward, and the weird found a home where good rhythm or a barn of a memory vanquished their shyness, awkwardness, and weirdness. Some got good while others stayed middling. Everyone, though, had fun. ~ Erin Bomboy

It had been devilish awkward, as the young men say, to be found by Juliana in the dead of night examining the attachment of her bureau; and it had not been less so to have to believe for a good many hours after that it was highly probable I had killed her. ~ Henry James

Unity, I thought, implies the possibility of disunity. Beginnings imply and require endings. ~ Ann Leckie

The thing about dancing is that no matter how good it feels when you're doing it, it's always extremely awkward when it's over. - Owen Gentry ~ Colleen Hoover

It began with a telephone call from Isabella. She wanted to know where Christopher was, and I was put in the awkward position of having to tell her that I didn't know. To her this must have sounded incredible. I didn't tell her that Christopher and I had separated six months earlier, and that I hadn't spoken to her son in nearly a month. ~ Katie Kitamura

There will be no new arcadian age. There will always be new burdens, new problems, new failures, new beginnings. And the glory of man is to respond to his harsh fate with zest and ever-renewed effort. ~ Samuel Florman

The kitchen. La cucina, the true mother country, this warm cave of the good witch deep in the desolate land of loneliness, with pots of sweet potions bubbling over the fire, a cavern of magic herbs, rosemary and thyme and sage and oregano, balm of lotus that brought sanity to lunatics, peace to the troubled, joy to the joyless, this small twenty-by-twenty world, the altar a kitchen range, the magic circle a checkered tablecloth where the children fed, the old children, lured back to their beginnings, the taste of mother's milk still haunting their memories, fragrance in the nostrils, eyes brightening, the wicked world receding as the old mother witch sheltered her brood from the wolves outside. ~ John Fante

Awkward gestures, clumsy gestures, fist pumps. I just do whatever I feel like is right in the moment. If I need to be hyped, I'm hyped. If I need to talk to myself, I talk to myself. Whatever it takes to win, I'm going to do it. ~ Victoria Azarenka

I do come from fairly humble beginnings. ~ Tony Bates

Mystified by the change in their formerly awkward relationship, Christopher asked Bennett what had happened to alter it.
"I told her I was impotent from old war wounds," Bennett said. "That calmed her nerves considerably."
Taken aback, Christopher had brought himself to ask gingerly, "Are you?"
"Hell no," came Bennett's indignant reply. "I only said it because she was so skittish around me. And it worked."
Christopher had given him a sardonic glance. "Are you ever going to tell Audrey the truth?"
A mischievous smile had played at the corners of Bennett's lips. "I may let her cure me soon," he admitted. ~ Lisa Kleypas

Just as abruptly, he'd become a father. While preparing the book for publication, he'd been dating a woman named Sarah Coowe, an infectious-disease specialist at MGH. They were evenly matched in many ways: sharp-dressed, sharp-tongued, and devoted to their careers and personal freedoms to the exclusion of any serious interest in so-called romance. They spent ten months together. A few weeks after they broke up -- Sarah initiated the split -- she called to say that she was pregnant. "It's mine?" asked Affenlight. "He or she," replied Sarah, "is mostly mine."

They named the child Pella -- that was Affenlight's idea, though Sarah certainly had the final say. For those first couple of years, Affenlight conspired as often as he could to show up at Sarah and Pella's Kendall Square townhouse with expensive takeout and a new toy. He was fascinated with his daughter, with the sheer reality of her, a beautiful something where before there'd been nothing. He hated kissing her good-bye; and yet he relished, couldn't keep himself from relishing, the total quiet of his townhouse when he walked in, the scattered books and papers and lack of baby-proofing. ~ Chad Harbach

There – that was the awkward 'I think you're lovely and I do hope we can be friends but, oh, by the way, please don't get flirty because I'm not really in the vagina business' bit over and done with ~ FayJay

[I]t struck me how easy it is to bamboozle an uneducated audience if you have prepared beforehand a set of repartees with which to evade awkward questions."
...
"You can go on and on telling lies, and the most palpable lies at that, and even if they are not actually believed, there is no strong revulsion either. We are all drowning in filth. When I talk to anyone or read the writings of anyone who has an axe to grind, I feel that intellectual honesty and balanced judgment have simply disappeared from the face of the earth. Everyone's thought is forensic, everyone is simply putting a 'case' with deliberate suppression of his opponent's point of view, and, what is more, with complete insensitiveness to any sufferings except those of himself and his friends ... . But is there no one who has both firm opinions and a balanced outlook? Actually there are plenty, but they are powerless. All power is in the hands of paranoiacs. ~ George Orwell

A guy rubbed against me," I say. "But I think he was just trying to get by. He rubbed me, then said sorry. It was the 'sorry' that made me uncomfortable. The rub was kind of interesting, but when he apologized I felt like a creep because I actually liked it. ~ A.M. Homes

What's the word for when you're sitting at a table with someone you don't know all that well and they maybe just implied that you're gay and you are gay and you think they were trying to be inclusive or something but you kind of shut them down because they asked out your crush earlier and you really don't want to be having this conversation and now there's all this weird, unsaid stuff in the air that's making it hard to focus on your debate prep?

Is there a word for that? ~ Lauren Shippen

The Artificial's speech pattern was an idiosyncratic mix of awkward and colloquial. It was unexpectedly endearing. "I just have good instincts. Mostly I love being in space."

But you are not 'in' space. You are in your starship and your starship is in space. It is not so different than being on a planet.

"Oh, Valkyrie, you have no idea."

Tell me then. ~ G.S. Jennsen

From small beginnings in error great buildings by degrees are raised, and from one age to another are more and more strengthened by the general concurrence of the people; and as men obtain reputation by their profession of the truth, their virtues are mentioned as arguments in favor of general error; ~ Various

So did I mishear over the communicator, or did you send your girlfriend off on a super-sexy secret mission with her ex-boyfriend?'
'We're fighting a war here, Nine, it's not a joke,' John replies sternly. After a moment's awkward pause, a begrudging smile breaks on his face. 'Also, shut up. It's not super sexy. What does that even mean?'
'Wow, you really need my guidance,' Nine says. He throws his arm around John's shoulders and leads him towards the house. 'Come on. I'll explain what sexy is.'
'I know what it – ugh, why am I even discussing this with you?' John shoves Nine in frustration, but Nine just holds on tighter. 'Get off me, idiot.'
'Come on, Johnny, you need my affection now more than ever. ~ Pittacus Lore

It was a gorgeous calamity in scale, I thought. A lovely misfortune. Immediate and irreversible and very soon forgotten. We needed more troubles like that. Ones like burning supper or coming down with a head cold at an awkward time. I desperately wanted to pass through countless small, endurable problems with the girl sitting next to me. I didn't need much else. ~ Lyndsay Faye

[I]t becomes clearer and clearer that we do not live in a divided world. The harsh divisions of spirit and nature, mind and body, subject and object, controller and controlled, are seen more and more to be awkward conventions of language. These are misleading and clumsy terms for describing a world in which all events seem to be mutually interdependent[.] ~ Alan W. Watts

Enchantment and seduction were fine means of persuasion, but when time is short, an awkward but quick concussion could better serve a girl's purpose. ~ Christopher Moore

One must not be afraid of a little silence. Some find silence awkward or oppressive. But a relaxed approach to dialogue will include the welcoming of some silence. It is often a devastating question to ask oneself, but it is sometimes important to ask it - 'In saying what I have in mind will I really improve on the silence? ~ Robert K. Greenleaf

Presidents are always also storytellers, purveyors of useful national mythologies. And surprisingly enough, Richard Nixon, this awkward man who didn't even really like people, had not been so bad at this duty - at least in the first four years of his presidency. ~ Rick Perlstein

To new beginnings. To the pursuit of ... somethingness. ~ Cecelia Ahern

The present is filled with flotsam and irony and chaos and disorder in all arenas, political and sociological. I think we have to work in the present even if it's awkward, even if it's not necessarily good, even if we don't understand it ourselves. You only find out 10, maybe 20 years later what was going on. ~ Frank Gehry

But little Carlos's most important defense was not his good punch but rather the beginnings of a great education. ~ Gina Capaldi

In other circumstances, if Jamie hadn't been so miserable, Ryan would have laughed. Jamie rarely got so pissed that he lost the thread of the conversation. "Yes, you are." Cradling Jamie's face, he brushed his lips against Jamie's forehead. "Everything will be fine, you'll see." He kissed Jamie's temple.

Jamie shuddered. "Don't. Not now. I can't - not now."

Frowning, Ryan pulled back to look at his friend.

Jamie was staring at him oddly, his lips parted and curled in half a grimace, his eyes gleaming with desperation. "I - " he said before suddenly lunging forward and closing the distance between their mouths.

For a moment, Ryan's alcohol-fogged brain couldn't understand what was going on.

Jamie was kissing him.

Jamie was kissing him. Or at least trying to, his lips clumsy and awkward but desperate and needy - so needy it was weirding Ryan out. ~ Alessandra Hazard

This is not the time for political fun and games. This is the time for a new beginning. I ask you now to put aside any feelings of frustration or helplessness about our political institutions and join me in this dramatic but responsible plan to reduce the enormous burden of Federal taxation on you and your family. ~ Ronald Reagan

Don't be silly." I turned to my suitcase, pulling out my pajamas. "I'm just going to go change . . ." He coughed down at his own suitcase, open on a chair in the corner of the room. "Of course." I changed, washed my face, put my hair up, pulled my hair back down, put it up again. Moisturized. I brushed my teeth, used the loo, washed my hands, moisturized again. Brushed my teeth again. I stalled. And then, stepping out, I let him past me to do the same routine, realizing as he walked into the loo that he had only a pair of shorts in his hand. He slept shirtless. Fuck me sideways. However, when he finally came out of the restroom, Jensen was still wearing his T-shirt, to my enormous dismay. "I thought you slept shirtless." What. What did I just say? He looked up at me in surprise. "I mean, I usually do, but . . . ~ Christina Lauren

I'm not that good looking. That's why 'Gangnam Style' works. If someone handsome uses that phrase it's just awkward. But if someone like me uses it, it's funny. ~ Psy

The presence of another person - of any person whatsoever - makes me feel awkward, ~ Rabih Alameddine

The beginnings are gone, Laurel. But we can start with today and what you got around you. ~ Gloria Naylor

Stop it, girl. There's no way he's five-years-old. Or one hundred. He's probably like every other CEO on the planet: Late twenties, handsome in that geeky sort of way, and just as awkward as you. I breathe a sigh of relief, because I know I'm probably right. ~ Andrew Shaffer