Gunn Quotes

I think whatever is going on with my brain, I'm very, very - and I'm not saying this as a positive thing, it's just a fact - I'm very creative. I have a very strong imagination, and have since I was a little kid. That is where a lot of my world comes from. It's like I'm off somewhere else. And I can have a problem in life because of that, because I'm always off in some other world thinking about something else. It's constant. ~ James Gunn

In my typical way, I declined to respond, saying that I didn't want anyone to run to a store just because I endorsed a trend. Besides, a trend is good only if it works for you, your wardrobe, and your lifestyle. ~ Tim Gunn

You have been with me all along, even when it hurt like hell you have been with me, because I love you. And when you love someone they are with you forever. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

She holds within her the memory of this journey, drawn out for her like a constellation in the darkness, each element of the landscape connecting her along a line that is her past. Carter may want to come here now, but she's the one who belongs, on this road, under this piece of sky. ~ Kirsty Gunn

Place your truth on my hips. Don't tell me who you are. Show me with your sincerity, let me see the helplessness in your eyes, wrap your irreverence around me. I've been afraid. My freedom has been mistaken for frivolousness, my sexuality for carelessness. Double standards imposed with hypocritical fingers and incurious hearts. I've relinquished myself to the wrong ideologies. I'm tired of having to cover my vulnerability to protect others from feeling theirs.

Expose me, penetrate me with broad philosophies, let us collide recklessly with freedom. Steal my wild heart, but do not ask me to live under an umbrella when I like being soaked by the rain. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

As the actor, you can't be worried about the scene that you're going to playing two days from now. You think about what's going on, right now and in the moment. That's what you worry about. Everything is right then and there. In the end, all of the pieces come together, thanks to the editing and James Gunn. ~ Michael Rooker

As long as we avoid the creative, we are condemned to reaction. ~ Paula Gunn Allen

Not trusting him and him not being trustworthy are two different things. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Would I be more comfortable in a business meeting wearing my pajamas?
No! It would feel, honestly, very weird. I would think, Where's my IV? When do I take my next meds? ~ Tim Gunn

When I first started teaching at Berkeley in 1958, I could not announce that I was gay to anybody, though probably quite a few of my fellow teachers knew. ~ Thom Gunn

If Todd weren't so absolutely adorable, Christy would have slugged him. ~ Robin Jones Gunn

If I could predict the trends, they would already be there. ~ Tim Gunn

I don't know how to sit outside myself and test against a hypothetical self who stayed home. ~ Thom Gunn

Love should be easy. Life is hard. Relationships are complicated. But the love, that's the one thing we should be able to count on. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

One night when I was pregnant with Henry, I lay in bed thinking for some reason, about "Treasure Island." I realized that from the entire book there was only one sentence I remembered verbatim, something that Ben Gunn, who has been marooned for three years, says to Jim Hawkins: "Many's the long night I've dreamed of cheese -- toasted mostly." I repeated the last two words over and over again, like a mantra. "Toasted, mostly. Toasted mostly. ~ Anne Fadiman

Don't blame yourself. You believed what he told you, because you trusted him. You're a warm, open, trusting person. And you're trustworthy. Trustworthy people like us always get screwed, because we expect other people to be like us. Don't let his bad behavior make you question yourself. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

The fashion industry at large has been the worst public relations vehicle for larger women and petite women, they are both maligned and neglected. And I honestly do believe it's getting better. ~ Tim Gunn

I have a very Socratic approach - I pummel the designers with questions, so when I get them to step back from the work and look at it with me, they'll eventually see what I see, coming to it fresh and unencumbered. That's always very gratifying because they feel a responsibility and an ownership of a solution. ~ Tim Gunn

For the American Indian, the ability of all creatures to share in the process of ongoing creation makes all things sacred. ~ Paula Gunn Allen

It seems that when dreams come true they never turn out the same way you dreamed them. They twist and turn and disappoint, leaving you wanting so much more. I don't know which to blame: the dream itself or the reality that dissolves the dream ~ Robin Jones Gunn

Happiness is a frightening state of being. If we let ourselves be happy, then there is something that can always be taken from us. In one minute, one second, everything can change. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

We are the women of daylight; of clocks and steel foundries, of drugstores and streetlights, of superhighways that slice our days in two. Our dreams are pale memories of themselves, and nagging doubt is the false measure of our days. ~ Paula Gunn Allen

What a great and happy place the world was! But you had to be big and grown-up before you could do just what you liked. ~ Neil M. Gunn

When someone shares their distress or their inadequacies, the natural inclination is to comfort them. To mollify. When we do this we brush over their emotions, often because they make us uncomfortable. Most times, people don't want a blanket. They want someone who is willing to stand outside and shiver with them in the cold. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

I've worn a suit and tie for most of my life. And I believe (for me), it makes me more confident navigating the world. ~ Tim Gunn

There are 365 "fear nots" in the Bible. One for every day of the year. Today I will fear not. ~ Robin Jones Gunn

I want to be bold and courageous; I want to take ridiculous risks; I want to live every moment with appreciation and consciousness and I want to dance all the time - even when I am not dancing ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Nothing makes me happier than working with real people in the real world. ~ Tim Gunn

...truth is bigger than thoughts. It is unchangeable, whereas opinion and knowledge have many angles and variations. ~ K.A. Gunn

Sometimes the closer you are to the truth, the harder it is to see. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

I don't know if there is any one secret to successful writing, but one important step is to move beyond imitation and discover what you can write that no one else can - that is, find out who you are and write that in an appropriate narrative and style. ~ James Gunn

I'm not the kind of girl who spends hours getting ready. I don't blow dry my hair. And I hate make up. I'm not pretty. And I don't want to be. I am passionate and restless and wild. I'm exhausted by prudent ideologies. I'm not inferior because of my lack of convention. I'm as strong as I am broken. I'm tired of having my sexuality mistaken for an invitation. I will sweat and I will run. I will let the rain come down on me. I want to feel life as I am. I don't want to skate through having my immoderation controlled by weak judgements. By fear.

I don't want to be who I'm supposed to be, I want to be who I am. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

He loves her for all of the reasons you were afraid to. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

We can reach untainted experiential freedom, by living in the moment as it is - without contemplation. Here we find the possibility of freedom - of just being - living as our authentic self. We are our true nature. We are one and whole. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

But my manners also came from when I was in college and began participating in critiques. You have to speak with someone respectfully about their work and be honest and open, without hurting them. ~ Tim Gunn

I always like to think that I make movies that are like Nirvana songs. They have a slow verse and then they pop into high gear and then they go back into slow and then they pop into high gear again. ~ James Gunn

Fuck the passengers! ~ James Edwin Gunn

Just the way it never rains when you have an umbrella, you'll never run into people if you look fantastic. But go outside in pajamas, and you'll run into every ex you have. ~ Tim Gunn

People put on certain clothes for certain reasons, I assume, when their closet is filled with clothes. ~ Tim Gunn

We are the land. To the best of my understanding, that is the fundamental idea that permeates American Indian life ... ~ Paula Gunn Allen

I used to wonder if we were destined to fail from the start, two people who lived hard and loved fast. Afraid to slow down. But now I know that my fingers weren't long enough to reach your wounds, to caress the places that ached from the sharp words and careless actions of others. People had confused your gentleness for weakness. You carried everything heavy.

Had I known, I would have danced delicate language all around you. I would've told you that your internal brightness illuminated mine. And that I only saw the beauty in myself when I looked at my reflection in your eyes. If only I had known that behind that strong gaze was everything else. Everything you didn't want me to know. Your shine came from what you felt when you looked at me. And you feared that I would be yet another to use your light and leave you alone. In even more darkness.
But I wouldn't have.
I didn't know how to tell you, but I know that pain too. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Sweat dripped down his chest. She never thought she could envy a piece of fabric, until she saw the T-shirt kissing his skin the way she wanted to. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Every one of Dad's colleagues would eventually commit suicide, most by gunshot to the head, and every woman in their circle except for my mother would become a dysfunctional alcoholic. But in the fifties, they were all riding high. ~ Tim Gunn

"Gun Control" isn't about guns. It's about control. If guns are outlawed, how can we shoot the liberals? ~ Mike Gunn

For many years, Sierra had compared the Holy Spirit to the wind, as it said the the Bible, noting that it was always there, no matter how faint the breeze. The wind went where it wanted to go, and its path was easy to detect because it moved objects and people. But no one had ever seen the wind. ~ Robin Jones Gunn

I was reading the poems of Rochester. Rochester made himself out to be bisexual, but I think that was only to shock. Most of his poetry is sexual, even pornographic. ~ Thom Gunn

Sierra felt full of hope and confidence in God. She knew who she was. And she knew Whose she was.
Whatever mysterious plan God had for her life, it would be an interesting one. As Christy had said earlier, God writes a different story for each person. Sierra decided hers might not be a bestseller or even a thriller. It certainly wasn't a romance. But it was turning into a fine mystery. And she could live with that. ~ Robin Jones Gunn

Idealization of a group is a natural consequence of separation from the group; in other words, it is a by-product of alienation. ~ Paula Gunn Allen

Life is messy. No matter how hard we try to create order, something happens to cause the structure we created to falter. Maybe that's the only way for us to learn. If everything stayed neat and orderly, then we would never be forced to grow and change. We need something unexpected to help us make sense of where we are and to guide us to where we need to go. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Doing as many makeovers as I do, I've learned a few things about what makes women feel better about themselves. The starting point is usually getting a new haircut. I don't want to generalize, because every case is different, but I think it's best to err on the side of styling your hair shorter the older you get. In my opinion, it's generally not a good look for women over thirty to have hair way below their shoulders. ~ Tim Gunn

I had this wonderful career and thought I would retire as a teacher. ~ Tim Gunn

I love Groot so much I get teary eyed when I think of him sometimes. Essentially, all the Guardians start out the movie as bastards - except Groot. He's an innocent. He's a hundred percent deadly and a hundred percent sweet. He's caught up in Rocket's life, really. ~ James Gunn

I love the word 'fashion.' That's why I'm using it in the title of this book. Fashion is about change and about creating clothes within a historical context. To me, dismissing fashion as silly or unimportant seems like a denial of history and frequently a show of sexism
as if something that's traditionally a concern of women isn't valid as a field of academic inquiry. When the Parsons fashion department was founded in 1906, it was called 'costume design,' because fashion was then a verb: to fashion. But the word 'fashion' has evolved to mean something much more profound, and those who resist it seem to me to be on the wrong side of history. ~ Tim Gunn

The women I'm attracted to have to know their worth. That measurement can only be weighed from the inside, and when that's taken into account and she truly appreciates it? Everything on the outside of her becomes an asset. ~ Riley Murphy

In a universe whose size is beyond human imagining, where our world floats like a dust mote in the void of night, men have grown inconceivably lonely. We scan the time scale and the mechanisms of life itself for portents and signs of the invisible. As the only thinking mammals on the planet - perhaps the only thinking animals in the entire sidereal universe - the burden of consciousness has grown heavy upon us. We watch the stars, but the signs are uncertain. We uncover the bones of the past and seek for our origins. There is a path there, but it appears to wander. The vagaries of the road may have a meaning, however; it is thus we torture ourselves.... Loren Eiseley, 1946... ~ James Edwin Gunn

No one would ever find her here. Even from the high saddle there was no sign of the way she'd come, no path, no road, only the bent backs of the hills repeating themselves, over and over, on one side of the road all the way to the western mountains, on the other to the sea. ~ Kirsty Gunn

He who you knew, was once an author, but is not now, and yet he may try to be Told again, and in doing so, he will go to his demise. The Inhabitants of the earth whose names have not been written in the passages of the Book of Life since the creation of the valley will be astonished when they see him because he once tried to be Told, is clearly not, and yet will seek to be Told again. ~ K.A. Gunn

Let the enemy fall by their swords. Words not worth reading die their own death. But our Words will be Told! ~ K.A. Gunn

Medicine people are truly citizens of two worlds, and those who continue to walk the path of medicine power learn to keep their balance in both the ordinary and the non-ordinary worlds ... ~ Paula Gunn Allen

I wanted to push away the very thing I wanted. Have you ever had that feeling? Was it because you were so afraid that you wouldn't get it? Or because you were afraid you would, but deep down didn't feel you deserved it? ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Love makes people do crazy things. And not feeling loved can bring people to the edge of madness. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

She would not have another man push her aside like some appetizer, there to wet his whistle only to be left once the main dish arrived.

No more. She pushed her thumb into his throat a little harder. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

[T]he one indispensable ingredient of science fiction [is] a belief in a world being changed by man's intellect, a conviction that what was being written could really happen. ~ James Gunn

Between the empty spaces is a place called forever. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

I would say this to my students all the time, it's about 30% you as the teacher and 70% about them. They tend to think that their role is to be the baby bird in a nest and you're going to feed them? They're going to feed themselves, or they're going to starve. ~ Tim Gunn

Did you read the part that says, 'Your hair is like a flock of goats'? How romantic is that? Or that other line, 'Your neck is like the tower of David.' Oh, now, that sounds real attractive! If some guy tried those lines on me, I'm sure I'd fall instantly in love with him. ~ Robin Jones Gunn

It's funny whom we end up choosing to love and who ends up choosing to love us. It's rarely the people we think it should be. ~ Robin Jones Gunn

I would certainly rather the industry not go broke, but if that's what it takes for everyone to acquire some values and lose that sense of entitlement, maybe a little belt-tightening wouldn't be so tragic. ~ Tim Gunn

While I don't satisfy my curiosity about the way I work, I'm terribly curious about the way other poets work. But I would think that's true about many of us. ~ Thom Gunn

Now we get to the Karma thing: You make yourself so vulnerable by not tipping well or treating people in the service industry with respect. Not only is it wrong to treat another human being like that, but there's a practical consideration: They're standing between you and eating. Without waiters, nothing comes to your table and nothing goes away. Aren't you worried that they'll put rat poison in your food, or at least spit in it? pages 86-87 ~ Tim Gunn

I fell in love with the expression in his eyes when he looked at me. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Not everyone is going to love us. And that's OK. There's nothing like rejection to make a vulnerable person question their worth. But do not let your reflection in the mirror be distorted by what you imagined someone else saw. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

When I was an undergraduate I had very badly annotated editions of Shakespeare's sonnets, all of which left out the important fact that will has a sexual sense in Shakespeare's sonnets. ~ Thom Gunn

Why are you crying?'
'How can I possibly look good to you? I'm pregnant! I'm really, really pregnant!'
'Of course you are. Why are you crying?'
'Because I'm going to Hawai'i!'
'Yes, you're going to Hawai'i. Come on now, pull yourself together.'
I kept crying.
Darren looked frantic. He stepped back and fumbled for his roguish smirk. 'So, is this a hormone thing?'
'No, it's not a hormone thing! I'm old, Darren! I'm old and pregnant, and I'm going to Hawai'i. Can you understand how that makes me feel?'
He could not.
How could I possibly expect my husband to understand all the bizarre things that happen to a woman in spirit and flesh when a friendly alien takes over her body? He still couldn't figure out why Laurie and I wanted to fly all the way to Hawai'i just to spend a week lounging around the pool, comparing underarm flab, when we could stay home and have the same conversation over the phone for a lot less money. ~ Robin Jones Gunn

I always say I have a Socratic approach to most things that I do. I pummel people with questions, because I need to know what they're thinking, what they're trying to achieve, what they believe the final outcome is going to be. ~ Tim Gunn

Gunn would be an important figure-rewarding, delightful, accomplished, enduring-in the history of English-language poetry even were his life not as fascinating as it now seems; he would be an important figure in the history of gay writing and in the history of transatlantic literary relations even were his poetry not so good as it is. With his life as it was and his works as they are, he's an obvious candidate for a volume of retrospective and critical essays, and this one is first-rate. ~ Stephen Burt

When it comes to Project Runway, for me the most memorable look ever presented goes back to season one, episode one, when Austin Scarlett created a ravishing cocktail dress out of cornhusks. It was really amazing. ~ Tim Gunn

I can't reconcile who he was, the man who was so kind and loving and considerate, with who he is now. I know the truth is who I'm seeing now, but I keep hoping the former man will come back. It's like I love someone who doesn't even exist. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

But if you, as an independent filmmaker or a 'serious' filmmaker, think you put more love into your characters than the Russo Brothers do Captain America, or Joss Whedon does the Hulk, or I do a talking raccoon, you are simply mistaken. ~ James Gunn

Humor is widely used by Indians to deal with life. Indian gatherings are marked by laughter and jokes, many directed at the horrors of history, at the continuing impact of colonization, and at the biting knowledge that living as an exile in one's own land necessitates ... Certainly the time frame we presently inhabit has much that is shabby and tricky to offer; and much that needs to be treated with laughter and ironic humor. ~ Paula Gunn Allen

My advice to the 10 year old daughter is: fashion happens in a context. It's societal, it's cultural, it's historic, it's economic, and it's political. So all of her studies, everything that is happening in the world, all needs to be channeled through her in order to be a good designer. ~ Tim Gunn

Much that is natural, to the will must yield.
Men manufacture both machine and soul,
And use what they imperfectly control
To dare a future from the taken routes. ~ Thom Gunn

Fashion it's not just about learning how to draw pretty pictures, and how to sew, it's everything that makes up your life. ~ Tim Gunn

Whoever's designing for plus-size doesn't get it. The entire garment needs to be reconceived. You can't just take a size 8 and make it larger. ~ Tim Gunn

I wanted to keep him there to hold me up, to rely on, to remind me that there were places we found in other people that were safer than any walls could keep us. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

He kept asking me what was wrong that night and I kept responding, "Nothing."

But it's all the nothings that silently strangle us and our relationships, isn't it? ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

The work is at such a high level and is so well executed, it really is a matter of taste ... [Source: Project Runway - but consider, applied to the theme of book reviews, it seems apropos!] ~ Tim Gunn

Riley asked himself why he had ever considered space travel romantic. "Because you are a romantic," his pedia said. ~ James Edwin Gunn

You know this has really affected my ability to trust myself. No matter what happened in my life, I was always able to trust myself. My instincts. Two men in a row carrying on indiscretions makes me feel like I made up some story. Almost like a fiction, I
wrote in my mind that had a beginning, middle and end. It feels like I manufactured some ideal life that was a made-up invention that I needed to believe was the truth. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

When I first started to write, I was aware of being queer, but I didn't write about it. Queer poems would probably not have been accepted by the editors I sent them to. ~ Thom Gunn

These things were in the past now, many long years ago, though the memory remained as solid and present as his heartbeats. Time's passage had made the events seem almost crazed, hyper-real, stretched across a surreal dreamscape that felt more like a skjald's embellished saga than the intact past. Perhaps it had not happened like that. Perhaps the Lion had taken his Stormbirds to the Tyrant's fortress, and he himself had teleported in. Perhaps it had not been Ogvai there, but Gunn, or someone else. Had Bjorn been there too? It was a long time ago, so doubtful, but Bjorn seemed to always have been there, right from the start, just waiting for his time to come to maturity. ~ Chris Wraight

I can't imagine a more aesthetically offensive item of footwear than Crocs. That little strap! I shudder.
... I know Crocs are affordable. Well, so are Converse and lots of other brands that don't look like hooves. ~ Tim Gunn

When the rain came it came first as the scent of rain, the grey air stained darker behind the hills. Then when it came down to us it was like thread and needles, piercing the jellyish water with a trillion tiny pricks, the silver threads attaching water to sky. And there too was the sound of rain, drumming gently upon the canvas cover where it was stretched taut at the back of the boat. It was so warm. ~ Kirsty Gunn

If I think about most of America, and maybe I'm terribly wrong ... but I think most of America would say that they're not in favor of gay marriage. But there is certainly a large cohort, not a majority but a large number of people, who are articulate and vocal and they'd rally behind this. They're making their opinion known. ~ Tim Gunn

I suffer from chronic nostalgia. Looking back makes me dizzy, queasy, and I yearn for it, ache for it. I want it back; maybe the homesickness will leave then.

But it's not the way I remember it. I long for a past that I didn't have, for the same experiences with different emotions, without the pain, without the ambivalence, without the fear. My heart remembers two different lives and I long for the one I can only see now, in retrospect. ~ Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Ask them about their sex lives or their drinking habits or the times they beat up on Granny and they may dodge around a little but eventually they'll tell you all about it - they're dying to tell. Get to the money question, though, and they start acting like you just tore off all their clothes in public. In some way, money is the cover we use for the most intimate parts of ourselves. ~ Elizabeth Gunn

Everyone has a best feature, so find clothes and accessories to accentuate those, whether it's your shoulders or your long legs! ~ Tim Gunn

Healing the self means committing ourselves to a wholehearted willingness to be what and how we are-beings frail and fragile, strong and passionate, neurotic and balanced, diseased and whole, partial and complete, stingy and generous, twisted and straight, storm-tossed and quiescent, bound and free. ~ Paula Gunn Allen

It's so important to reach out to people you trust, and who can give you honest feedback, and keep those people close to you. You don't want to surround yourself with enablers. ~ Tim Gunn

The first thing I learned was the theme from Peter Gunn. ~ Pat Metheny