Old Man Quotes

I like to hope that there are more good people in the world than evil people' she said. 'I would like to hope that too', the old man said, 'but I don't. There are good people, however, and our duty in life is to be one of them, even though we will generally be outnumbered. ~ Janette Turner Hospital

Already it is twilight down in the Laredito. Bats fly forth from their roostings in courthouse and tower and circle the quarter. The air is full of the smell of burning charcoal. Children and dogs squat by the mud stoops and gamecocks flap and settle in the branches of the fruit trees. They go afoot, these comrades, down along a bare adobe wall. Band music carries dimly from the square. They pass a watercart in the street and they pass a hole in the wall where by the light of a small forgefire an old man beats out shapes of metal. They pass in a doorway a young girl whose beauty becomes the flowers about.

They arrive at last before a wooden door. It is hinged into a larger door or gate and all must step over the foot-high sill where a thousand boots have scuffled away the wood, where fools in their hundreds have tripped or fallen or tottered drunkenly into the street. They pass along a ramada in a courtyard by an old grape arbor where small fowl nod in the dusk among the gnarled and barren vines and they enter a cantina where the lamps are lit and they cross stooping under a low beam to a bar and belly up one two three.

There is an old disordered Mennonite in this place and he turns to study them. A thin man in a leather weskit, a black and straightbrim hat set square on his head, a thin rim of whiskers. The recruits order glasses of whiskey and drink them down and order more. There are monte games at tables by the wall and there are whores at another ~ Cormac McCarthy

You have tasted of death now," said the old man. "Is it good?"
"It is good," said Mossy. "It is better than life."
"No," said the old man: "it is only more life. ~ George MacDonald

I have characterized Nixon as a loner, a cold man with great self-confidence and a one-track mind centered on the advancement of Richard Nixon. ~ Barry Goldwater

Most people were heartless about turtles because a turtle's heart will beat for hours after it has been cut up and butchered. But the old man thought, I have such a heart too. ~ Ernest Hemingway,

I was sure the old man knew nothing about the beatitudes, ecstasies, dazzling reverberations of sexual encounters. Cut out the poetry was his message. Clinical sex, deprived of all the warmth of love - the orchestration of all the senses, touch, hearing, sight, palate; all the euphoric accompaniments, back-ground music, moods, atmosphere, variations - forced him to resort to literary aphrodisiacs. ~ Anais Nin

I am not going to become crazy in the ring, because I am already crazy. And I am not going to die in the ring. I am going to die in bed as an old man. ~ Roberto Duran

What's the matter?" said the old man. "Can't you make up your mind what kind you want?"
The kid laughed. "I want them all." He threw his hands out. "I'm learning everything!"
He opened one of the books. "Look ... geometry ... triangles ... ~ Jerry Spinelli

Leanoardo wrote that a painter should begin every canvas wit a wash of black, because all things in nature are dark except where exposed by the light. Most painters do the opposite, starting with a whitewash and adding the shadows last. But Paul, who knows Leonardo so well you'd thing the old man slept on the bottom bun, understands the value of starting with the shadows. The only things people can ever know about you are the ones you let them see. ~ Ian Caldwell

They say an old man is twice a child ~ William Shakespeare

Young men not ought to marry yet, and old men never ought to marry at all. ~ Diogenes

I'm sort of an old man, always tinkering in the backyard. Since I grew up playing outdoors, I still like to plant things, sit out on the deck, or go hiking. ~ Josh Duhamel

I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them have never happened. ~ Mark Twain

I didn't become an actor until I was an old man of 28 or 29. I declared to the world that I was an actor. Nobody heard me, but I did declare it. ~ Peter Falk

After the old man came up for air, he said, "C-O-P-D. Never even smoked a day in my life, you believe that? My lawyer thinks some chemical at the foundry did this to me but it's impossible to prove. I don't know what good a settlement would do me anyway. It's not like I can go to Disney World. If I see any money, I'm going to be irresponsible for the first time in my life and blow it all on hookers and coke. ~ Evan Ronan

Wonderful," he said. "Tell me. Which books in the Bible do you favor?"
"Oh, I favors 'em all," Pa said. "But I mostly like Hezekiel, Ahab, Trotter, and Pontiff the Emperor."
The Old Man frowned. "I don't recollect I have read those," he said. ~ James McBride

Connections were what kept people tied to the world. Without connections, there was nothing left to stop them from simply floating away.

Somtehing as simple as a stranger on the other end of the line willing to listen. Or a crotchety old man who believed he knew best.

Connections. ~ Eliza Maxwell

THE DAY

The day was a year at first
When children played in the garden;

The day shrank down to a month
When the boys played ball;

The day was a week thereafter
When young men walked in the garden;

the day was itself a day
when love grew tall

the day shrank down to an hour
when old man limped in the garden

The day will last forever
When it is nothing at all. ~ Theodore Spencer

The baron reminds me of someone, but I can't quite put my finger on who it is," Ramsey remarked.
"I swear my own father never talked to me the way Gillian's uncle just did."
"Your father died before you were old enough to know him."
"It was humiliating, damn it. He sure as certain wasn't what I expected. The way Gillian talked about him, I pictured a mild-mannered gentleman. She thinks he's ... gentle. Is the woman blind? How in God's name can she love such a crotchety old ... "
Ramsey's head snapped up, and he suddenly burst into laughter, breaking Brodick's train of thought. "It's you."
"What?"
"Morgan ... he reminds me of you. My God, Gillian married a man just like her uncle. Look at the baron and you'll see yourself in twenty years."
"Are you suggesting I'm going to become a belligerent, foul-tempered old man?"
"Hell, you're already belligerent and foul-tempered. No wonder she fell in love with you," he drawled ~ Julie Garwood

The old man asked again. "When I'm gone." His eyes blinked from behind his glasses. His neatly trimmed beard was gray, and he stood slightly stooped. Are you dying? I asked. "Not yet," he said, grinning. Then why - "Because I think you would ~ Mitch Albom

When a man died, there had to be blame. Jimmy Cross understood this. You could blame the war, You could blame the idiots who made the war. You could blame Kiowa for going to it. You could blame the rain. You could blame the river. You could blame the field, the mud, the climate. You could blame the enemy. You could blame the mortar rounds. You could blame people who were too lazy to read a newspaper, who were bored by the daily body counts, who switched channels at the mention of politics. You could blame whole nations. You could blame God. You could blame the munitions makers or Karl Marx or a trick of fate of an old man in Omaha who forgot to vote. ~ Tim O'Brien

Rumfoord had known that Constant would try to debase the picture by using it in commerce. Constant's father had done a similar thing when he found he could not buy Leonardo's "Mona Lisa" at any price. The old man had punished Mona Lisa by having her used in an advertising campaign for suppositories. It was the free-enterprise way of handling beauty that threatened to get the upper hand. ~ Kurt Vonnegut

Wenna followed us out. "You've done him some good, Clary, I have to say! He's got color in his cheeks, and he's stepping along as if he was sixty again," she told Goodwin as she walked us to the gate. "You'll come back?"
"Of course," Goodwin said. "But thank Cooper for his improved spirits. Once he'd insulted her a few times, he was in the pink. ~ Tamora Pierce

An old man in poor health, like my rival, could not be expected to be so impressively feeble as a young actor in the prime of life. You see, he really had paralysis, and working within this definite limitation, he couldn't be so jolly paralytic as I was. ~ Anonymous

The youngest one," she interrupted. "The youngest son, I mean. The one who is unmarried."
"I know who he is."
"Very well, then. What is wrong with him?" At that she cocked her head to the side and waited expectantly.
He thought for a moment. "Nothing."
"You - wait." She blinked. "Nothing?"
He shook his head, then shifted his weight a little; his good foot was beginning to fall asleep. "Nothing comes immediately to mind." It was true. She could do a good deal worse than Gregory Bridgerton.
"Really?" she asked suspiciously. "You find nothing at all objectionable about him."
Marcus pretended to think about this a bit longer. Clearly he was supposed to be playing a role here, probably that of the villain. Or if not that, then the grumpy old man. "I suppose he's a bit young," he said. ~ Julia Quinn

Immortality no longer interests the weary old man at all. ~ Milan Kundera

History
its what those bitter old men write. ~ Jackie Kennedy

Feel sorry for yourself.
Sure, your tiny steel-ribbed mother told you never to do that,
But who the hell is going to do it for you?
"Piangi, piangi," the old man in the opera tells Violetta.
"Cry, honey, cry." Do it right.
Do it yourself. ~ Lise Menn

Once, on ancient Earth, there was a human boy walking along a beach. There had just been a storm, and starfish had been scattered along the sands. The boy knew the fish would die, so he began to fling the fish to the sea. But every time he threw a starfish, another would wash ashore. "An old Earth man happened along and saw what the child was doing. He called out, 'Boy, what are you doing?' " 'Saving the starfish!' replied the boy. " 'But your attempts are useless, child! Every time you save one, another one returns, often the same one! You can't save them all, so why bother trying? Why does it matter, anyway?' called the old man. "The boy thought about this for a while, a starfish in his hand; he answered, "Well, it matters to this one." And then he flung the starfish into the welcoming sea. ~ Loren Eiseley

That folly of old age which is called dotage is peculiar to silly old men, not to age itself. ~ Marcus Tullius Cicero

They discovered only a small asteroid inhabited by a solitary old man who claimed repeatedly that nothing was true, though he was later discovered to be lying. ~ Douglas Adams

Magic!' cried an old man. 'Tis sorcery, and we are undone!' 'Not so,' I told him, 'Sorcery cannot harm good Christians.' 'But I am a miserable sinner,' he wailed. ~ Poul Anderson

It came to Morgan that Nicholas must have been a beaten boy, too, and that meant Grampa Earp was, as well. Which was no surprise, really, when Morg thought about that mean old man. How many sons were in that chain? Morgan wondered, and grief gave way to the pride he'd felt the day his brother Wyatt stood up to his first bully and put an end to a chain of vengeful, frightened, beaten boys. ~ Mary Doria Russell

Ah, sahib. I know you just come to comfort a old man left to live by hisself. Soomintra say I too old-fashion. And Leela, she always by you. Why you don't sit down, sahib? It ain't dirty. Is just how it does look.'
Ganesh didn't sit down. 'Ramlogan, I come to buy over your taxis. ~ V.S. Naipaul

There's a mystery in the thought of the re-creation of an old man as an old man, with all the defects and injuries of what is called long life faithfully preserved in him, and all their claims and all their tendencies honored, too … I have thought sometimes that the Lord must hold the whole of our lives in memory, so to speak. Of course He does. And 'memory' is the wrong word, no doubt. But the finger I broke sliding into second base when I was twenty-two years old is crookeder than ever, and I can interpret that fact as an intimate attention, taking [George] Herbert's view. ~ Marilynne Robinson

The naturalistic literature of this country has reached such a state that no family of characters is considered true to life whichdoes not include at least two hypochondriacs, one sadist, and one old man who spills food down the front of his vest. ~ Robert Benchley

Every blade will wither and fade,
As the old man dies again.
Seasons pass,
We're clinging to grass,
'Cause we've lost the sky again. ~ Newsboys

Youth always tries to fill the void, an old man learns to live with it. ~ Mark Z. Danielewski

Baptism was to put a line of demarcation between your past sins when you are buried with Him by Baptism-you are burying your past sins-eradicating them-putting a line in the sand saying that old man is dead and he is no longer alive any more and I rise up to walk in the newness of life. ~ T.D. Jakes

My father was and is a great journalist. Thirty years ago, I was studying broadcasting in college, and the problem was I wasn't nearly as good as my father. I wasn't as quick or as smart as my old man, and I realized it would be a long time before I was ever going to be, and I decided to do something else. ~ George Clooney

You call me castoff," Mahlia said, "Chinese throwaway, whatever." Amaya was trying to look away, but Mahlia had her pinned, kept her eye to eye. "My old man might have been peacekeeper, but my mom was pure Drowned Cities. You want to war like that, I'm all in." Mahlia lifted the scarred stump of her right hand, shoved it up in Amaya's face. "Maybe I cut you the way the Army of God cut me. See how you do with just a lucky left. How'd you like that? ~ Paolo Bacigalupi

For when an old man relives his life, he lives it only by dwelling upon his memories; and when wisdom in an old man has outgrown the immediate impressions of life, the past viewed from the quiet of memory is something different from the present in all its bustle. The ~ Soren Kierkegaard

There's too much risk in loving,'
the young boy said,
'no,'
said the old man,
'there's too much risk in not. ~ Atticus Poetry

I used to be a good party boy. I'm old. I'm an old man. You pay the consequences. I'm just fine with a couple of drinks, no more than that. ~ Javier Bardem

I definitely don't consider myself a kid anymore. I feel like an old man, an old 28-year-old. ~ Sergio Garcia

A child is not frightened at the thought of being patiently transmuted into an old man. ~ Antoine De Saint Exupery

I know that you and your girls have been told for years on end that you just don't pass up any opportunities when a man walks your way - he could be The One. But I'm here to tell you that this philosophy is just plain dumb. Women are smart - you all can tell when your friends are lying, you know when your kids are up to no good, co-workers can't get anything past you at
the job. You're quick to let each one of them know that you're not stupid, that you see them coming a mile away, and you're not going to let them play that game with you. But when it comes to your relationships with the opposite sex, all of that goes out the window; you relinquish your power and lose all control over the situation - cede it to any old man who looks at you twice. Just because he happened to look at you twice. ~ Steve Harvey

And that's the best thing about this crazy journey: I am forgetting that I'm an old man instead of the Alzheimer's reminding me by forgetting ~ Jonathan Dunne

That was ... oh, God, Joe. That was ... I honestly didn't know what the fuss was all about. God. We can do that again, right? Please tell me we can do that again!" Joe's lips curved up into a slow smile. "Give me fifteen minutes and a washcloth and we can probably do it again tonight. Good enough for you?" Casey smiled back, unbelievably sexy in the dark of the room. "Yeah, old man - I'll be impressed as hell if that's all it takes. But I wouldn't object." Joe pushed Casey's sweaty hair from his eyes. "I love you, kid. There's not much I wouldn't do to make you happy." Casey's grin turned serious. "I love you too, Joe. You know that, right?" "I do," Joe said softly. "I do. And I believe it with everything, or we wouldn't be here." The grin returned, but it was luminous and brighter this time. "Good. ~ Amy Lane

Dorothy wants to talk to you. Don't ask her to eat with us."
When Nora returned from the telephone she had a look in her eye. "Now what's up?" I asked.
"Nothing. Just 'how are you' and all that."
I said: "if you're lying to the old man, God'll punish you. ~ Dashiell Hammett

Because this week I've started in on a hundred reproductions of Rembrandt van Rijn, a hundred portraits of the old artist with the mushroom face, the face of a man pushed to the brink of eternity by art and drink, the door handle starting to turn, the final door pushed open from without by an unknown hand, and I'm beginning to have his puff-paste face, that peeling, piss-soaked wall of a face, I'm beginning to smile his half-moronic smile, to look at the world from the other side of human causes and events, and all my bales these days are framed with that portrait of Rembrandt van Rijn as an old man while I keep filling my drum with wastepaper and open books. ~ Bohumil Hrabal

What else? She is so beautiful. You don't get tired of looking at her. You never worry if she is smarter than you: You know she is. She is funny without ever being mean. I love her. I am so lucky to love her, Van Houten. You don't get to choose if you get hurt in this world, old man, but you do have some say in who hurts you. I like my choices. I hope she likes hers. ~ John Green

Honor and duty will ride upon my shoulders till the day I die, like the old man of the sea, who once picked up can never be put dow. ~ Simon R. Green

What's the secret to a perfect marriage?' The old man leaned forward and looked at me very seriously. 'Our marriage hasn't been perfect. No marriage is perfect. There were times when she gave up on us. There were even more times when I gave up on us. The secret to our longevity is that we never gave up at the same time. ~ Colleen Hoover

I was sitting in this small coffee shop a couple days ago and I saw this old man sitting at a table across from me. He looked so lonely, so sad. I was too, but it suddenly occurred to me that some people go through their whole lives never being loved or loving as deeply as I love you. There's always going to be the chance that I could lose you in this lifetime. There's nothing any of us can do about the possibility of loss. But in that moment, I decided that I was more interested in focusing on the great privilege I've been given in having you at all. Ch. 32 ~ Mia Sheridan

The old man sold beer after hours on weekends. And that was something that he probably did to top up his earnings as a truck driver. Mum was the traditional housewife. Loving, caring, sharing - always the keynotes of the family. ~ Lindsay Fox

After four tortured years, more than 400 over life-sized figures, I felt as old and as weary as Jeremiah. I was only 37, yet friends did not recognize the old man I had become. ~ Michelangelo

Old man, 40 years old against young hungry man from Great Britain! ~ Vitali Klitschko

All books can be indecent books
Though recent books are bolder,
For filth, I'm glad to say, is in
The mind of the beholder.
When correctly viewed,
Everything is lewd.
I could tell you things about Peter Pan
And the Wizard of Oz, there's a dirty old man ... ~ Tom Lehrer

The words I use too often are X-rated, something an old man like me shouldn't be talking about anyway. ~ George Clinton

By God, the old man could handle a spade.
Just like his old man. ~ Seamus Heaney

And Cracknut Whirrun?' asked Drofd.
'Straightforward. An old man up near Ustred taught me the trick of cracking a walnut in my fist. What you do is - '
Wonderful snorted. 'That ain't why they call you Cracknut.'
'Eh?'
'No,' said Yon. 'It ain't.'
'They call you Cracknut for the same reason they gave Cracknut Leef the name,' and Wonderful tapped at the side of her shaved head. 'Because it's widely assumed your nut's cracked.'
'They do?' Whirrun frowned. 'Oh, that's less complimentary, the fuckers. I'll have to have words next time I hear that. You've completely bloody spoiled it for me! ~ Joe Abercrombie

Then the voice - which identified itself as the prince of this world, the only being who really knows what happens on Earth - began to show him the people around him on the beach. The wonderful father who was busy packing things up and helping his children put on some warm clothes and who would love to have an affair with his secretary, but was terrified on his wife's response. His wife who would like to work and have her independence, but who was terrified of her husband's response. The children who behave themselves because they were terrified of being punished. The girl who was reading a book all on her own beneath the sunshade, pretending she didn't care, but inside was terrified of spending the rest of her life alone. The boy running around with a tennis racuqet , terrified of having to live up to his parents' expectations. The waiter serving tropical drinks to the rich customers and terrified that he could be sacket at any moment. The young girl who wanted to be a dance, but who was studying law instead because she was terrified of what the neighbours might say. The old man who didn't smoke or drink and said he felt much better for it, when in truth it was the terror of death what whispered in his ears like the wind. The married couple who ran by, splashing through the surf, with a smile on their face but with a terror in their hearts telling them that they would soon be old, boring and useless. The man with the suntan who swept up in his launch in front of everybody an ~ Paulo Coelho

It really so in your souls? Are you now henceforth dead to the world, and dead to sin, and quickened into the life of Christ? If you are so, then the text will bear to you a third and practical meaning, for it will not merely be true that your old man is condemned to die and a new nature is bestowed, but in your common actions you will try to show this by newness of actual conduct. Evils which tempted you at one time will be unable to beguile you now because you are dead to them: the charms of the painted face of the world will no longer attract your attention, for your eyes are blind to such deceitful beauties. You have obtained a new life which can only be satisfied by new delights, which can only be motivated by new purposes and constrained by new principles suitable to its own nature. This ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Wait, Alden. I really don't want to meet your friends dressed like this." "They're your friends too. And you look fantastic. I love the school uniform. You have great legs."
"Shut up!" I gasped. "I thought you were and old man!"
"Old soul. Young man. Big difference. It's okay, though; we're just friends, remember? ~ Mary Lindsey

After the wink, his head moved down and his eyes made a beeline to my chest. Ugh. The old man felt me up with his eyes. Men really are all just alike - no matter the age. He was a flirtatious old fossil. ~ Rose Pressey

Outside the gates of the finca, watching the passing rows of tin-roofed shacks which represented the residential section of San Francisco de Paula, I began to think about The Old Man and the Sea, and I realized it was Ernest's counterattack against those who had assaulted him for Across the River. It was an absolutely perfect counterattack and I envisioned a row of snickering carpies bearing the likenesses of Dwight Macdonald and Louis Kronenberger and E.B. White, who in the midst of cackling, "Through! Washed Up! Kaput!" suddenly grab their groins and keel over. It is a rather elementary military axiom that he who attacks must anticipate the counterattack, but the critics, poor boys, would never make General Staff. As Ernest once said, "One battle doesn't make a campaign but critics treat one book, good or bad, like a whole goddamn war. ~ A. E. Hotchner

In the flat above Coraline's, under the roof, was a crazy old man with a big mustache. He told Coraline that he was training a mouse circus. He wouldn't let anyone see it. ~ Neil Gaiman

Indeed," Fowler answered. He turned and looked at Tony critically. "I say, old man, but you're not much older than that German kid."
Yeah," Tony grinned. "But I'm from Texas and meaner than a junkyard bulldog. Makes a difference, you know. ~ Robert L. Wise

Howard, instead of trying to explain the hermit's existence in terms of hearth fires and trappers' shacks, preferred the blank space the old man actually seemed to inhabit; he liked to think of some fold in the woods, some seam that only the hermit could sense and slip into, where the ice and snow, where the frozen forest itself, would accept him and he would no longer need fire or wool blankets, but instead flourish wreathed in snow, spun in frost, with limbs like cold wood and blood like frigid sap. ~ Paul Harding

It is quite cruel that a poet cannot wander through his regions of enchantment without having a critic, forever, like the old man of the sea, upon his back. ~ Marianne Moore

Given one has before oneself a strong, healthy, youth rich in spirited blood and a powerless, weak, cachectic old man scarcely capable of breathing. If now the physician wishes to practise the rejuvenating art on the latter, he should make silver tubes which fit into each other: open then the artery of the healthy person and introduce one of the tubes into it and fasten it into the artery; thereupon he opens also the artery of the ill person ... ~ Andreas Libavius

'You're rather trusting, to send your guard away as you did.' Winthrop's eyes gleamed under the high sun. 'What would you do, I wonder, if I attacked you just now? After all, you have neither sword nor dirk to protect yourself with.'
'I suppose I'd have to settle for killing you with my bare hands.' Gareth shrugged. 'Dispatching an old man wouldn't be one of my more pleasurable kills, but we all do what we must.' ~ Sara Bell

Tell her I'm sorry I sold the diamond, eh?" Sammy said. "I broke my promise. When she disappeared in Alaska ... ah, so long ago, I finally used that diamond, moved to Texas as I always dreamed. I started my machine shop. Started my family! It was a good life, but Haze; was right. The diamond came with a curse. I never saw her again."
"Oh, Sammy," Hazel said. "No, a curse didn't keep me away. I wanted to come back. I died!"
The old man didn't seem to hear. He smiled down at the baby, and kissed him on the head. "I give you my blessing, Leo. First male great-grandchild! I have a feeling you are special, like Hazel was. You are more than a regular baby, eh? You will carry on for me. You will see her someday. Tell her hello for me. ~ Rick Riordan

My Lord ... what is Death like?" called the old man tremulously.
"When I have investigated it fully, I will let you know," came the faintest of modulations on the breeze.
"Yes," murmured the Loremaster. A thought struck him. "During daylight, please," he added. ~ Terry Pratchett

Watch the old man. Watch how the old man keeps the guys who aren't playing happy. ~ Mickey Mantle

At least us old men remember what a real bear market is like, and the young men haven't got a clue. ~ Jeremy Grantham

A thousand of old man are just able to dream, but a young man is able to change the world! ~ Sukarno

If you want a peaceful place to dwell Cold Mountain is guaranteed forever A light wind blows softly in the pines The sound is good when you are close One old man sits beneath the trees Reading Lao Tzu and Huang Ti, mumbling I could not find the world if I searched ten years I've forgotten the road by which I came ~ Hanshan

What's the point of sea horses? I asked.
The old man stood before them, mouth hung open, as if before his god. ~ David Vann

The Old Man at the Wheel
Measured against the immeasurable
universe, no word you have spoken
brought light. Brought
light to what, as a child, you thought
too dark to be survived. By exorcism
you survived. By submission, then making.
You let all the parts of that thing you would
cut out of you enter your poem because
enacting there all its parts allowed you
the illusion you could cut it from your soul.
Dilemmas of choice given what cannot
change alone roused you to words.
As you grip the things that were young when
you were young, they crumble in your hand.
Now you must drive west, which in November
means driving directly into the sun. ~ Frank Bidart

Big Yellow Taxi

They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hot spot

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone?
They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot

They took all the trees
Put 'em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see 'em

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone?
They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot

Hey farmer, farmer
Put away the DDT now
Give me spots on my apples
But leave me the birds and the bees, please

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone?
They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot

Late last night
I heard the screen door slam
And a big yellow taxi
Took away my old man

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone?
They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot

I said, "Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got till it's gone?
They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot"

They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot
They paved paradise
Put up a parking lot ~ Joni Mitchell

It is not the young man who should be considered fortunate but the old man who has lived well, because the young man in his prime wanders much by chance, vacillating in his beliefs, while the old man has docked in the harbor, having safeguarded his true happiness. ~ Epicurus

Look at me," he said, glancing
down at his legs. "A wretched old man in a red monkey suit. A convicted murderer about
to be gassed like an animal. And look at you. A fine young man with a beautiful
education and a bright future. Where in the world did I go wrong? What happened to me?
I've spent my
life hating people, and look what I have to show for it. You, you don't hate anybody. And
look where you're headed. We have the same blood. Why am I here? ~ John Grisham

Day snorted at him and rolled out of bed, groaning like an old man and God had to hold in his laugh at Day's wide-legged walk to the bathroom. He heard Day cleaning himself up and he thought to himself while he waited. He has a right to know. Day got back into bed and fully climbed on top of him, laying his head down on his chest. God laughed. "Uhh, sweetheart. You going to sleep like this?" "Yep. I've imagined sleeping like this for years," Day said settling in comfortably. God kissed Day's forehead and wrapped his arms around him, trying to calm his mind. Please don't have a nightmare. Not tonight. Just let this night be perfect. ~ A.E. Via

Ronan's phone buzzed with a text: Gansey.
Reached out to a few peers, it said, as if he were sixty instead of the same age as Ronan. Image you sent confirmed logo for Boudicca. All-lady group involved in the protection and organization of women in business. Henry says his mother thinks they're pretty powerful.
Another text came in. Boudicca is actually a very interesting historical figure in her won right.
Another: She was a warrior queen of the Celts around 60 CE and she fought against the Romans
Another: Blue wants you to know Boudicca is
Another: Sorry sent too soon quote is 'Boudicca is the original goth. Ronan Lynch wishes he was that badass'
Another: Is badass one word or two
Ronan's phone displayed ellipses to show that Gansey was about to shoot off another text.
Ronan texted back hurriedly, If you have to ask you aren't one. Thanks old man. I'll wiki it. ~ Maggie Stiefvater

Misery comes to miser; joy comes to wiser. (A Very Hot Cup of Tea, Empathy)
Juvenile invites, youth tries, adult applies, and the old man dies. (A Straw Man, Empathy)
In everyone, there lives a superhero. (The Medicine Man, Empathy)
Faith is the strongest word in any dictionary. (The Wisdom Beard, Empathy)
I've entered into your feelings; it's your turn now. (Empathy) ~ D.R. Mirror

Men are very confident people. Even a sixty-year-old man with no arms thinks he could play in the Super Bowl if he had to. ~ Rita Rudner

since the Depression, we bankers have had the leisure and . . . solitude, you might say, to think about the future. The Civil War left us with a federal government. The Great War made us a creditor nation. As bankers, we must anticipate what changes this war will thrust upon us."
[…] The old man leaned forward and took a long breath. "I see the rise of this country to a height no country has occupied, ever," he said quietly. "Not the Romans. Not the Carolingians. Not Genghis Khan or the Tatars or Napoleon's France. Hah! You're all looking at me like I've one foot in the funny farm. How is that possible? you ask. Because our dominance won't arise from subjugating peoples. We'll emerge from this war victorious and unscathed, and become bankers to the world. We'll export our dreams, our language, our culture, our way of life. And it will prove irresistible. ~ Jennifer Egan

Strength of this affection. And it is not hard to understand. The baby represented everything sacred to his father's heart: the promises of God, the covenants, the hopes of the years and the long messianic dream. As he watched him grow from babyhood to young manhood the heart of the old man was knit closer and closer with the life of his son, till at last the relationship bordered upon the perilous. It was then that God stepped in to save both father and son from the consequences of an uncleansed love. "Take now thy son," said God to Abraham, "thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains which I will ~ A.W. Tozer

It quite often happens that the old man is subject to the delusion of a great moral renewal and rebirth, and from this experience he passes judgments on the work and course of his life, as if he had only now become clear-sighted; and yet the inspiration behind this feeling of well-being and these confident judgements is not wisdom, but weariness . ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Our representative democracy is not working because the Congress that is supposed to represent the voters does not respond to their needs. I believe the chief reason for this is that it is ruled by a small group of old men. ~ Shirley Chisholm

I, an old man, have written this fire report. Among other things, it was important to me, as an exercise for old age, to enlarge my knowledge and spirit so I could accompany young men whose lives I might have lived on their way to death. I have climbed where they climbed, and in my time I have fought fire and inquired into its nature. In addition, I have lived to get a better understanding of myself and those close to me, many of them now dead. Perhaps it is not odd, at the end of this tragedy, where nothing much was left of the elite who came from the sky, but courage struggling for oxygen, that I have often found myself thinking of my wife on her brave and lonely way to death. ~ Norman Maclean

The old man began to sing. His voice was very lovely and obviously a part of something that the world had disposed of in its haste, evidence of a grander, kinder past. ~ Jesse Ball

Every man is dangerous," said the old man without moving, "who cares only for one thing. ~ G.K. Chesterton

A wise old man taught me that diplomacy is the velvet glove that cloaks the fist of power. Persuasion, not force, works best and lasts longest. ~ Robin Hobb

In my aircar," said the old man, motioning Arthur to get into the craft which had settled silently next to them. "We are going deep into the bowels of the planet where even now our race is being revived from its five-million-year slumber. ~ Douglas Adams

He approached the great glass barrier dividing the room, and the speaker at the end of the table. "Cyclops?" he whispered, stepping closer, clearing his tight throat, "Cyclops, it's me, Gordon."
The glow in the pearly lens was subdued. But the row of little lights still flashed--a complex pattern that repeated over and over like an urgent message from a distant ship in some lost code--ever, hypnotically, the same.
Gordon felt a frantic dread rise within him, as when, during his boyhood, he had encountered his grandfather lying perfectly still on the porch swing, and feared to find that the beloved old man had died.
The pattern of lights repeated, over and over.
Gordon wondered. How many people would recall, after the hell of the last seventeen years, that the parity displays of a great supercomputer never repeated themselves? Gordon remembered a cyberneticist friend telling him the patterns of light were like snowflakes, none ever the same as any other.
"Cyclops," he said evenly, "Answer me! I demand you answer--in the name of decency! In the name of the United St--"
He stopped. He couldn't bring himself to meet this lie with another. Here, the only living mind he would fool would be himself.
The room was warmer than it had seemed during his interview. He looked for, and found, the little vents through which cool air could be directed at a visitor seated in the guest chair, giving an impression of great cold just beyond the glass wall.
~ David Brin

Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter. ~ T. S. Eliot

To be young and not to know how, is bearable; to be old and not have the strength, is too great a weight to carry. And what's is so painful you can't sense your powers leaving you. It's hard for an old man to ensure such blows! ~ Ivan Turgenev