Scratching Quotes

He was beautiful.
Whatever else he was, Sage was by far the most magnetic man I had ever seen. I had felt it in my dreams, and it was even more true in real life. I welcomed the chance to study him without his knowledge.
He glanced up, and I quickly closed my eyes, feigning sleep. Had he seen me? The scratching stopped. He was looking at me, I knew it. I held my breath and willed my eyes not to pop open and see if he was staring.
Finally the scratching started up again. I forced myself to slowly count to ten before I opened my eyelids the tiniest bit and peeked through my lashes.
Good-he wasn't looking at me.
I opened my eyes a little wider. What was he doing? Moving only my eyes, I glanced down at the dirt floor in front of him…
…and saw a picture of me, fast asleep.
It was incredible. I could see his tools laid out beside the picture: rocks in several sizes and shapes, a couple of twigs…the most rudimentary materials, and yet what he was etching into the floor wouldn't look out of place on an art gallery wall. It was beautiful…far more beautiful than I thought I actually looked in my sleep. Is that how he saw me?
Sage lifted his head again, and I shut my eyes. I imagined him studying me, taking careful note of my features and filtering them through his own senses. My heartbeat quickened, and it took all my willpower to remain still.
"You can keep pretending to be asleep if you'd like, but I don't see a career for you as an actres ~ Hilary Duff

Vigorous public ball scratching is common in the combat-arms side of the Marine Corps, even among high-level officers in the midst of briefings. ~ Evan Wright

What y'all ladies got to share? Hmmm, what you bitches got?"

Aunt Georgia sighed and squinted at the boy. She said, "The Lord loves a cheerful giver, but I'm just not in the mood."

The thug moved his hand from his crotch to his scalp, still scratching. "What in the hell's that supposed to mean?" Mrs. Cleveland raised and pumped her walking stick, which, it turned out, was a double-barreled shotgun.

"It means take one more step," she said, "and I'll blast you to hell, you ignorant-ass bastard. ~ Jabari Asim

It was a real honor to be able to work with someone like that that I've been watching since I was a kid. I mean, to play his brother left some people scratching their heads but something about it really worked. ~ Jared Leto

I clenched my teeth and fists to stop them biting and scratching these clever men who want no care for the helpless sick small, who use religions and politics to stay comfortably superior to all that pain: who make religions and politics, excuses to spread misery with fire and sword and how could I stop all this? I did not know what to do. ~ Alasdair Gray

I'm terribly bad at lying in real life. I flush, look away, do the scratching of the nose, or whatever. ~ Greg Wise

I feel like actors, having spent a lot of time on movie sets, tend to make decent directors, because they've been there, they know what they're doing, they've seen it done right, they've seen it done wrong, and they feel comfortable. There's not a lot of chin-scratching and wondering what your next move is. ~ C. Thomas Howell

My neediness is not a hole to be filled but something beneath the skin scratching to get out. ~ Jonathan Evison

The gospel of Jesus Christ solves the innate problem we have of "glory greed." We are, every one of us from birth, incompetent thieves of the glory that belongs only to God. We know in our insidest insides that we fall short of his glory, and so we are constantly clawing and scratching to make up that difference in some way. This is how all sin is fundamentally idolatry and how all accumulations of worldly treasures - be they material goods or religious merit - are fundamentally acts of self-worship. Then in the gospel of Christ, God forgives our petty theft, sets us free from the bondage of our idols, and unites us Spiritually, irrevocably, and satisfyingly to himself. Now the glory we tried to steal is shared with us freely, and it is real glory this time, not these pathetic knockoffs we think will do the trick. ~ Jared C. Wilson

These human eyes seemed weak to me at first," said Eskar, still staring away from me, scratching her short black hair. "They detect fewer colors and have terrible resolution, but they see things dragon eyes cannot. They can see beyond surfaces. I don't understand how that's possible, but it happened incrementally as I traveled with Orma: I began to see the inside of him. His questioning and gentle nature. His conviction. I'd glimpse it in something as incongruous as his hand holding a teacup, or his eyes when he spoke of you. ~ Rachel Hartman

Unless you are here: this garden refuses to exist.
Pink dragonflies fall from the air
and become scorpions scratching blood out of rocks.
The rainbows that dangle upon this mist: shatter.
Like the smile of a child separated
from his mother's milk for the very first time.
from poem Blood and Blossoms ~ Aberjhani

There was something soothing about the crackle of paper, the smell of ink, and the soft scratching of nibs and brushes. ~ Leigh Bardugo

While Mr Loveday aired my lady's sheets, I set to scratching up a supper. With not even time to change from my own damp clothes I had in one-half hour some welcoming tea steaming and hot brandy to mix a punch. Our bill of fare was the remnants of Mrs Garland's Yorkshire Pie, still sound and savory, fried bacon, and a hillock of roasted rabbits that disappeared as quickly as I made them. The last of the seed cake was eaten too, with a douse of brandy sprinkled over it to warm us.
'She will not eat those beggarly scraps,' said Jesmire, the spiteful old cat, when I took a tray of food to my lady's door. Yet I did see a slice of brandied cake disappear. I knew my mistress well enough by then, and she was a slave to her sugar tooth. ~ Martine Bailey

The man bobbed toylike in front of him, meanwhile digging into his pocket as if scratching at a familiar micro-organism that possessed parasitic proclivities that had survived the test of time. ~ Philip K. Dick

My involvement with the Black Swan is usually more hands off. But today I must play babysitter, so I get to be this." He waved his hands at his fur before going back to scratching, and Sophie got a feeling she wasn't going to be a fan of Coiffe. ~ Shannon Messenger

I've never heard a writer feel that way about a device with a screen. Oh sure, they're functional, practical. We would be lost without them. But just as we need to feel our feet on the earth, smell and taste the world around us, the pen scratching against the page, sensory and slow, is the difference between looking at a high-definition picture of a flower and holding that very same flower in your palm, feeling the brush of its petals, the color of its stamen rubbing off on your fingers. ~ Dani Shapiro

Why, you may ask, take on this unpleasant, frightening subject? Why stare into the sun? Why not follow the advice of the venerable dean of American psychiatry, Adolph Meyer, who, a century ago, cautioned psychiatrists, 'Don't scratch where it doesn't itch'? Why grapple with the most terrible, the darkest and most unchangeable aspect of life? ... Death, however, DOES itch. It itches all the time; it is always with us, scratching at some inner door, whirring softly, barely audibly, just under the membrane of consciousness. ~ Irvin D. Yalom

Five thousand dollars? For a kiss?"

"That's what I said."

"With tongue?"

"It's not really a kiss without it.
Just say yes, pet. You obviously need the money."

I gasp before I can stop myself. I didn't think five words from a stranger could hurt so much. What a dick.

"For fuck's sake, Nicholas," Simon says.

But he just looks at me, waiting, those arrogant green eyes alight with anticipation. So I give him what he's waiting for.

"Hands under the table," I order.

He smiles wider, puts his flask in his pocket, and does what he's told.

"Close your eyes."

"I like a woman who's not afraid to take charge."

"No more talking." He's said more than enough.

I lean in, keeping my eyes open the whole time, memorizing every angle of that face, feeling his warm breath against my cheek. This close, I can see the shadow of stubble on his chin and for just a second, I let myself wonder what it would feel like scratching against my stomach, my thighs - everywhere.

Then in one move, I pick up his plate - and smash the apple pie in his stupid, handsome face.

"Kiss this, asshole. ~ Emma Chase

Back at the Chateau Windsor there was a rat-like scratching at the door of my room. Vinod, the youngest servant, came in with a soda water. He placed it next to the bag of toffees. Then he watched me read. I was used to being observed reading. Sometimes the room would fill like a railway station at rush hour and I would be expected to cure widespread boredom. ~ Tahir Shah

You shall see rude and sturdy, experienced and wise men, keeping their castles, or teaming up their summer's wood, or chopping alone in the woods, men fuller of talk and rare adventure in the sun and wind and rain, than a chestnut is of meat; who were out not only in '75 and 1812, but have been out every day of their lives; greater men than Homer, or Chaucer, or Shakespeare, only they never got time to say so; they never took to the way of writing. Look at their fields, and imagine what they might write, if ever they should put pen to paper. Or what have they not written on the face of the earth already, clearing, and burning, and scratching, and harrowing, and plowing, and subsoiling, in and in, and out and out, and over and over, again and again, erasing what they had already written for want of parchment. ~ Henry David Thoreau

I can see it now: me holding a map, scratching my head, trying to figure out how I ended up on Venus. ~ Andy Weir

it occurred to him that kids were better at almost dying, and they were also better at incorporating the inexplicable into their lives. They believed implicitly in the invisible world. Miracles both bright and dark were to be taken into consideration, oh yes, most certainly, but they by no means stopped the world. A sudden upheaval of beauty or terror at ten did not preclude an extra cheesedog or two for lunch at noon.

"But when you grew up, all that changed. You no longer lay awake in your bed, sure something was crouching in the closet or scratching at the window ... but when something did happen, something beyond rational explanation, the circuits overloaded. The axons and dendrites got hot. You started to jitter and jive, you started to shake rattle and roll, your imagination started to hop and bop and do the funky chicken all over your nerves. You couldn't just incorporate what had happened into your life experience. It didn't digest. Your mind kept coming back to it, pawing it lightly like a kitten with a ball of string ... until eventually, of course, you either went crazy or got to a place where it was impossible for you to function. ~ Stephen King

He couldn't look back at the children. He couldn't think of it. All he could do was watch the eyes of his wife.
He pulled her to him, her body soft, her skin warm. She was life, she was his. He took her lips and tasted his freedom once more. The subtle tenderness. The hope hidden in joined breath. He took it into himself. Soaking in the peace that came with it.
And even as the rustling began he felt still, he felt calm. Scratching and scrapping within the stones, and the rustle of wings. But all Eli knew was the nature of love. ~ Rachel A. Marks

With digital, you do have the advantage of having an absolutely rock steady image because there's no projector gate, no perforations, no film weaving through a machine. And there's no dust and no scratching. ~ Greg MacGillivray

These headsets could pick up a spider scratching in Madagascar." "And is there a spider scratching in Madagascar?" "Well ... I don't know. They can't really - ~ Eoin Colfer

I enjoy scratching itches on my body with my beard stubble. The worst though is when my lower back itches. ~ Jarod Kintz

Sex is ... scratching an itch Everything else is something we project on a very simple act. It's the psychology, not the biology, that's complicated. ~ Joy Browne

But never again use another person's body or emotions as a scratching post for your own unfulfilling yearnings. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

But I am I now; and so many other millions are so irretrievably their own special variety of 'I' that I can hardly bear to think of it. I: how firm a letter; how reassuring the three strokes: one vertical, proud and assertive, and then the two short horizontal lines in quick, smug succession. The pen scratching on the paper ... I ... I ... I ... I ... I ... I. ~ Sylvia Plath

She'd been taught that pants were inappropriate for girls because they were immodest [ ... ] If women's pants were suggestive, men's were equally so, and they revealed a great deal more of what was underneath them. There was almost always a bulge
you couldn't help but notice it
and if the pants were tight, you could see practically everything. And the way men were always drawing attention to it! Touching and scratching themselves with total unselfconsciousness, as if they were alone and not in public. She'd even seen Aidan do it a few times, absent-mindedly. And yet no one accused men of being improper or of encouraging sin by reminding women of what hung between their legs. She looked at herself in the mirror, irritated suddenly by the double standard. This was how her body was made. The fact that it was well made and encased in a pair of blue jeans didn't mean she was inviting anything. ~ Hillary Jordan

Here are the basic rules of LNTC, as I understood it:

Leave no evidence that you ever left the comfort of your bed to struggle through the woods with the sole intention of eating starch and beans and lying on your back on a rocky and downward-sloping campsite while you stare at the ceiling of your tent and listen to the sounds of a variety of carnivores as they rustle around outside. Leave no evidence that you are scared witless, that every movement terrifies you, even the most quiet scratching that you will realize in the morning must have been chipmunks. Leave no evidence that you are afraid you didn't dig your glory hole deep enough and that you used twice as much toilet paper as everyone else. Leave as little evidence as possible to indicate that you are the most incompetent camper to ever set foot on the trail.

Needless to say, it was my first time camping. ~ Erin Saldin

MOMA's values were blown through the American education system, from high school upwards-and downwards, too, greatly raising the status of "creativity" and "self-expression" in kindergarten. By the 1970s, the historical study of modern art had expanded to the point where students were scratching for unexploited thesis subjects. By the mid-eighties, twenty-one-year-old art-history majors would be writing papers on the twenty-six-year-old graffitists. ~ Robert Hughes

Some people aren't touchy-feely, but I grew up in a family where you'd walk into the family room and there'd be five people on the couch with an arm here, an arm there, everyone scratching and taking turns. ~ Chris O'Donnell

Even over the rumble of the quakes, I thought I heard Jack rasp, "Bebe?" Then louder: "Doan you do this!"
I gasped out, "T-take care of him, Jack-" Death yanked me to him, sweeping me up in his arms. I fought him with any strength I had left, hyperventilating, dulling my claws on his armor, not even scratching it. Death just laughed.
"Evie! EVIE!" Jack's bellows grew fainter as the light brightened. "I'm comin' for you! You know I will! ~ Kresley Cole

She let him finish, scratching his head with the tips of her fingers, and without his having revealed that he was weeping from love, she recognized immediately the oldest sobs in the history of man. ~ Gabriel Garcia Marquez

When the last autumn of Dickens's life was over, he continued to work through his final winter and into spring. This is how all of us writers give away the days and years and decades of our lives in exchange for stacks of paper with scratches and squiggles on them. And when Death calls, how many of us would trade all those pages, all that squandered lifetime-worth of painfully achieved scratches and squiggles, for just one more day, one more fully lived and experienced day? And what price would we writers pay for that one extra day spent with those we ignored while we were locked away scratching and squiggling in our arrogant years of solipsistic isolation?
Would we trade all those pages for a single hour? Or all of our books for one real minute? ~ Dan Simmons

I think I'm going to skip all of my classes today because I need a "me" day. The problem with "me" days is that I need them four times a week. The problem with me is that I'm very smart and very capable (or so I've been told) but my laziness hinders me. Laziness. They forgot to add procrastination, self-destruction, and the inability to leave my bed to the list. The problem with me is that I've dealt with this before but have no idea what to do next. I should email my past teachers and ask them what I did after I sent them messages excusing my week-long absences from class due to "personal reasons." I should stop scratching my hand in case my mom asks me if I'm okay again. I am okay. I am doing fine. But I have an itch that I cannot place, an itch that changes locations when my fingers find it. The problem with me is that I will focus on it completely until it goes away. The problem with this feeling is that it never goes away. It has always been one large itch that I cannot place. ~ Lora Mathis

Perhaps it's only the vehicle that won't start, but it feels like it's my life that won't start. Yes, this Yugo with the passenger-side seat metal coming through the torn seat fabric, scratching against the back of my thigh, this Cold War relic that won't respond to Nick's turn of the ignition key is like the fucking metaphor for my sorry-ass life: STALLED. ~ Rachel Cohn

If it isn't literally true that my wanting is causally responsible for my reaching, and my itching is causally responsible for my scratching, and my believing is causally responsible for my saying ... If none of that is literally true, then practically everything I believe about anything is false and it's the end of the world. ~ Jerry Fodor

They scribble on notepads,
the sound of their pens
scratching the judgemental air. ~ Emma Cameron

When they got back inside the safety of his home, Herobrine headed straight to Wolfie's favourite room, the kitchen. "You hungry boy?" Herobrine asked, scratching Wolfie behind the ear. "OK, let's see what we have tonight." Searching through his food stock Herobrine turned back to his dog with disappointment. "Sorry, boy its pork again. I was sure we had some fish or meat back there. Maybe tomorrow we can go out hunting and find something different to eat. What ~ Barry J. McDonald

The police arrived and went to question the driver of the truck, who was still sitting in his cab, scratching his head. The truck looked as if nothing had happened to it. ... The police were giving the driver a hard time, though. They too had worked out that the man sitting dazed and wounded on the grass was Salman Rushdie, and so they wanted to know, what was the driver's religion? The driver was bewildered. "What's my religion got to do with anything?" Well, was he a Muzlim? An Islammic? Was he Eye-ray-nian? Is that why he had tried to kill Mr. Rushdie? Maybe one of the Ayatoller's fellers? Was he carrying out the whatever it was called, the fatso? The poor driver shook his confused head. He didn't know who the guy was he had hit. He had just been driving this truck and didn't know about any fatso. In the end the police believed him and sent him on his way. ~ Salman Rushdie

It was one of those Hobart spring nights, cold as charity, snow coming down hard on the mountain, the harbour a lather, sleet slapping and scratching at windows and tin roofs like a wild drunk who's been locked out. ~ Richard Flanagan

Then, idly scratching his nose, he walks to the bookcase in the living room and stoops before a set of drab brown Victorian volumes gathering dust on the second shelf from the bottom.

How amusing, he thinks, as he withdraws one of them-amusing that a key to dark and ancient rites should survive in such innocuous-looking form.

A young fool like Freirs would probably refuse to believe it. Like the rest of his doomed kind, he'd probably expect such lore to be found only in ancient leather-bound tomes with gothic lettering and portentously sinister titles. He'd search for it in mysterious old trunks and private vaults, in the "restricted" sections of libraries, in intricately carved wood chests with secret compartments.

But there are no real secrets, the Old One knows. Secrets are ultimately too hard to conceal. The keys to the rites that will transform the world are neither hidden nor rare nor expensive. They are available to anyone. You can find them on the paperback racks or in any second-hand bookshop. ~ T.E.D. Klein

If you want to marry me, here's what you'll have to do:
You must learn how to make a perfect chicken-dumpling stew.
And you must sew my holey socks,
And soothe my troubled mind,
And develop the knack for scratching my back,
And keep my shoes spotlessly shined.
And while I rest you must rake up the leaves,
And when it is hailing and snowing
You must shovel the walk ... and be still when I talk,
And-hey-where are you going? ~ Shel Silverstein

When I first did the book on gasoline stations, people would look at it and say, Are you kidding or what? Why are you doing this? In a sense, that's what I was after: I was after the head-scratching. ~ Edward Ruscha

And that is when I know ... that is when I understand that it's better to feel the ache inside me like demons scratching at my heart than it is to feel numb the way a dead body feels when you touch it. It's better to wait for the beautiful things ... to stare at them for as long as they last..to hold on as tight as you can before they disappear. And it might hurt so bad inside ... but it's better to wait for the next beautiful thing than never look for any again. ~ Brian James

I have also noted, over the course of our friendship, that his hearing is curiously erratic. He can hear a lizard-bird scratching itself half a mile away, but occasionally seems unable to hear the politest of requests no matter how loudly I shout them at him. ~ Robert Asprin

As we crossed the Malakand Pass I saw a young girl selling oranges. She was scratching marks on a scrap of paper with a nail to account for the oranges she had sold as she could not read or write. I took a photo of her and vowed I would do everything in my power to help educate girls just like her. This was the war I was going to fight. ~ Malala Yousafzai

She had something Adam didn't. Curiosity. First step to growth
and if it wasn't for Eve's Adam would still be sitting by the side of the pool picking his nose and scratching his scalp, bamboozled by his own reflection. Off in her part of Eden, Eve hadn't bothered naming the animals. On the other hand she'd discovered how to milk some of them and how best to eat the eggs of others. She'd decided she wasn't overly keen on torrential rain and had built a shelter from bamboo and banana leaves, into which she'd retire when the heavens opened, having set out coconut shells to catch the rainwater with a view to saving herself the schlep down to the spring every time she wanted a drink. The only thing you won't be surprised to hear about is that she'd already domesticated a cat and called it Misty. ~ Glen Duncan

Blade Runner is a rare science fiction movie so full of material that pages can be written about it without scratching the surface. A review like this can provide little more than an overview. A detailed exploration of the movie, its style, and its mysteries requires dedication that only someone immersed in Blade Runner lore can provide. ~ James Berardinelli

Vargo climbed in, twisted and turned a few times to get comfortable on the pillow, then pulled the lid down and latched it.
As the eye of narrative drew back from the coffin on its stand, two things happened. One happened comparatively slowly, and this was Vargo's realization that he never recalled the coffin having a pillow before.
The other was Greebo deciding that he was as mad as hell and wasn't going to take it any more. He'd been shaken around in the wheely thing and then sat on by Nanny, and he was angry about that because he knew, in a dim, animal way, that scratching Nanny might be the single most stupid thing he could do in the whole world, since no one else was prepared to feed him. This hadn't helped his temper.
Then he'd encountered a dog, which had tried to lick him. He'd scratched and bitten it a few times, but this had had no effect apart from encouraging it to try to be more friendly.
He'd finally found a comfy resting place and had curled up into a ball, and now someone was using him as a cushion-
There wasn't a great deal of noise. The coffin rocked a few times, and then pivoted around. ~ Terry Pratchett

The road to self-deception is narrow to begin with, but there's always someone ready to broaden it out, for as the proverb says, self-deception is like eating or scratching, it's all a matter of beginning. ~ Jose Saramago

Back in my room, I woke to a strange scratching coming from the air-conditioning vent. It began with hesitance, a creature feeling its way around a new environment. After a few minutes, the scratching gained a rhythm - shka shka shkashka shka shka - the rhythm of work that some small rodent figured would bring it to freedom. Consistency. Work without interruption, work with intensity. Surely, working at a steady pace, without breaks, the creature could reach its goal. I listened to my companion, refusing to take away its dignity by opening the vent. It took twenty minutes for the rhythm to reach its climax - shkakakakashkakakakashkakakaka, now with true desperation, as the rodent beat at the world to convince it of its worth, not a plea but a demand: Hear me! Let me out! I am here! I decided it was time for relief for the both of us, and when I stood up I saw a small brown nose peeking through the bars, two black eyes fixed on mine. I unscrewed the cover with a coin. When I opened it, a small tail was peeking from a dark corner deep in the shaft. It was hiding from me. It would not be rescued. I tried to reach the tail without any luck. I sat on my bed with the vent uncovered for an hour, waiting for my new fried to come out. It didn't. I put the cover back on, and while I was fastening the last screw, the nose appeared again, followed by the laborious scratching. Work will save me. Diligent, patient, never-ending. It must.
I put a coat on and walked outside. ~ Jaroslav Kalfar

We're all pretty proud of it, and we're also standing around, scratching our heads and going, "Wow, this is really good." With the caliber of actors that we have, you really can't got wrong. Not only is it fun, but it's good. It's been really, really great, in that aspect. I totally get what they're doing. ~ Angie Harmon

There were nine children in my father's family and eight in my mother's. My grandparents did the best with what they had. After the Depression, they were scratching out a living and working hard. They kept the family going. ~ Cheryl Ladd

The thing about love is one can never define it exactly. And as much of a mystery as that is and as familiar it is when we acknowledge it, words just aren't enough. So we find ourselves scratching the walls while our hair is falling out. Then we can't live without it. We become addicts. ~ Kevin Fuller

How are the Indians on cats?"
"I never saw one. Plenty of dogs, though."
"They eat the dogs, don't they?"
"That's the Shoshones," I said. "A dog or coyote is sacred to a Comanche. You would be cursed."
"But they do eat human beings occasionally?"
"That's the Tonkawas," I said.
"Never the Comanches."
"A Comanche who ate a man would be killed by the tribe immediately, because supposedly it becomes an addiction."
"Interesting," he said. He was scratching his chin. "And this Sun Dance they all talk about?"
"That's the Kiowas," I said. "We never did that. ~ Philipp Meyer

Fee fi foe fum, she's scratching on my back. Oh, here she comes. ~ Eazy-E

This is how sad my life is: I got a scar from scratching my chicken pox too much. That's my big scar story. I really have no major scars. ~ Lewis Black

I'd seen glimpses of a different me. It was a different me because in those increments of time I thought I actually became a winner.
The truth, however, is painful.
It was a truth that told me with a scratching internal brutality that I was me, and that winning wan't natural for me. It had to be fought for, in the echoes and trodden footprints of my mind. In a way, I had to scavenge for moments of alrightness. ~ Markus Zusak

In coming here, I was digging at the foundations of something larger and deeper, scratching tiny lines in a wall I dare not breach. There was a monster behind that wall, and I had built it strong to keep the monster at bay; now it stirred and stretched, restless in its dreaming. There was a new monster in town, it seemed - would its presence awaken the one I kept hidden? ~ Dan Wells

Keeping this journal causes tension as much as it calms it. The writing busies my hands and occupies my mind, but there's something about the pen scratching against the thick textured paper that makes my words take on an uncomfortable weight. Online, words flow almost as quickly as thoughts without revision or purpose, the way they do when you're alone or with someone who's fallen in love with you. ~ Wayne Gladstone

It seems to me just as imbecile, just as infernal, to have to go to the office on Monday," said Jonathan, "as it always has done and always will do. To spend all the best years of one's life sitting on a stool from nine to five, scratching in somebody's ledger! It's a queer use to make of one's . . . one and only life, isn't it? Or do I fondly dream?" He rolled over on the grass and looked up at Linda. "Tell me, what is the difference between my life and that of an ordinary prisoner? ~ Katherine Mansfield

No plan,' I sighed. The paper bird had flown away without my noticing, and I wondered briefly where it had gone. 'I need faith, Light, and friendship, apparently.'
Pixie dust. Don't forget that. It's very important.
'Shut up,' I said, scratching him behind the ear. ~ Mirriam Neal

Looking at Great-Great Grandpa Baldwin's photograph, I think to myself: You've finally done it. It took four generations, but you've finally goddamned done it. Gotten that war against reason and uppity secularists you always wanted. Gotten even for the Scopes trial, which they say was one of many burrs under your saddle until your last breath. Well, rejoice, old man, because your tribes have gathered around America's oldest magical hairball of ignorance and superstition, Christian fundamentalism, and their numbers have enabled them to suck so much oxygen out of the political atmosphere that they are now acknowledged as a mainstream force in politics. Episcopalians, Jews, and affluent suburban Methodists and Catholics, they are all now scratching their heads, sweating, and swearing loudly that this pack of lower-class zealots cannot possibly represent the mainstream--not the mainstream they learned about in their fancy sociology classes or were so comfortably reassured about by media commentators who were people like themselves. Goodnight, Grandpa Baldwin. I'll toast you from hell. ~ Joe Bageant

He carries on his frail shoulders a weird burden of fear; he is cast in the role of the corpse-eater, the body-snatcher who invades the last privacies of the dead. He is white as leprosy, with scrabbling fingernails, and nothing deters him. If you stuff a corpse with garlic, why, he only slavers at the treat: cadavre provençale. He will use the holy cross as a scratching post and crouch above the font to thirstily lap up holy water. ~ Angela Carter

If I had questioned Harris further - "What do you mean when you say sex doesn't have to mean anything? Do people engage in it for no reason at all? Does it just happen, like a gurgle in the stomach, a can rattling down the street, or a screen door blowing shut in the breeze?" - perhaps he would have conceded that sex does have trivial meanings: a little pleasure, a little fun, a little relief from boredom and desire. This wouldn't be much of a concession. Sex would mean something, but only in the way that eating a peanut means something, chewing on an ice cube means something, scratching an itch means something. There would be no more call to rhapsodize about the touch of a man and a woman than to compose sonnets about the communion of a picnicker with his mayonnaise. ~ J. Budziszewski

The cat Horus shot out from under the table and headed for the door, his ears flattened and his tail straight out. There he encountered Abdullah, who had been waiting for us on the verandah and who had, I supposed, been alarmed by Emerson's shouts and hurried to discover what disaster had prompted them. The cat got entangled in Abdullah's skirts and a brief interval of staggering (by Abdullah), scratching (by Horus) and swearing (by both parties) ensued before Horus freed himself and departed. ~ Elizabeth Peters

These ears aren't to be trusted.
The keening in the night, didn't you hear?
Once I believed all the stories didn't have endings,
but I realized the endings were invented, like zero,
had yet to be imagined.
The months come around again,
and we are in the same place;
full moons, cherries in bloom,
the same deer, the same frogs,
the same helpless scratching at the dirt.
You leave poems I can't read
behind on the sheets,
I try to teach you songs made of twigs and frost.
you may be imprisoned in an underwater palace;
I'll come riding to the rescue in disguise.
Leave the magic tricks to me and to the teakettle.
I've inhaled the spells of willow trees,
spat them out as blankets of white crane feathers.
Sleep easy, from behind the closet door
I'll invent our fortunes, spin them from my own skin.

(from, The Fox-Wife's Invitation) ~ Jeannine Hall Gailey

A Russian peasant scratching the back of his head means many different things. ~ Nikolai Gogol

Mmm," Bree licked the ice cream scoop and tossed it into the sink. "Let's just say that for the sake of the baby, Alessandro and I have reached a sort of…an...agreement, I guess."
"Does that mean I can't punch him anymore? 'Cause that was fun."
"Yes. It does. Sorry."
"So are you two…"
"No. Hell no. Not after him using Rebecca Malford as a scratching post," Bree grumbled, her stomach clenching tight at that little reminder.
"He's what? Alessandro and that...viper?"
"That's right." Bree clenched her teeth.
"Rebecca and Alessandro? Oh my God. Mental bleach! I need mental bleach!" Meggie rubbed her temples.
"Yeah, keep doing that for another week and you might be where I am right about
now."
"Oh, he's a smooth one, that's for sure," Meggie said with a sudden smile.
"What's with that look?"
"You're so jealous,"
Bree snorted, turning away from her and taking a seat opposite of Will. "That's ridiculous."
"And so true. ~ E. Jamie

I will conclude this work with stating in what light religion appears to me.
If we suppose a large family of children, who, on any particular day, or particular circumstance, made it a custom to present to their parents some token of their affection and gratitude, each of them would make a different offering, and most probably in a different manner. Some would pay their congratulations in themes of verse and prose, by some little devices, as their genius dictated, or according to what they thought would please; and, perhaps, the least of all, not able to do any of those things, would ramble into the garden, or the field, and gather what it thought the prettiest flower it could find, though, perhaps, it might be but a simple weed. The parent would be more gratified by such a variety, than if the whole of them had acted on a concerted plan, and each had made exactly the same offering. This would have the cold appearance of contrivance, or the harsh one of control. But of all unwelcome things, nothing could more afflict the parent than to know, that the whole of them had afterwards gotten together by the ears, boys and girls, fighting, scratching, reviling, and abusing each other about which was the best or the worst present.
Why may we not suppose, that the great Father of all is pleased with variety of devotion; and that the greatest offence we can act, is that by which we seek to torment and render each other miserable? For my own part, I am fully satisfied that wha ~ Thomas Paine

Ever since she'd come home from school three years ago, she'd been burrowing under his skin, itching like a host of chigger bites. He kept telling himself not to scratch, but invariably he did anyway, fool that he was. And here he was scratching again, thinking about her when he should be focused on the work at hand. He ~ Karen Witemeyer

He loved the scratching of pencil against paper when he was focused: it meant something was happening. ~ John Green

my poems are only bits of scratching
on the floor of a
cage. ~ Charles Bukowski

I don't think I believe in ghosts, per se. But, my nearest experience was when I went on a weekend away and was in a bar in England, years ago, with an ex-girlfriend. I heard this scratching. I was about to go to bed and I was thinking, 'It's an old ghost.' I could hear this noise, but I couldn't work out where it was coming from. ~ Theo James

She brought out the first-aid kit - ever-efficient Summerset - and sat to tend the wounds. "Jesus, I really went at you. That's bad enough, but scratching and biting like a girl. It's mortifying."
"You got a couple of punches in, if it makes you feel better."
"I'm a crappy person, because it does a little."
"Rang my bell once."
"And still a little more." She looked up at him. "Do you ever wonder who the hell we are, that somehow we'll be okay that I bloodied you?"
"We're exactly who we're supposed to be."
"I don't know what I'd do if you weren't who you're supposed to be with me. I just don't know."
"I wouldn't be, without you. ~ J.D. Robb

In the common room, they found Emer dozing in her chair, Lila scratching at the door, and Mine stirring a large pot and peering at its contents with an anxious, irritated expression. With a groan, the Archmage strode across the room and flung open the windows.
"It just needs more basil," Mine assured him. "No, it does not," Bram declared. "It needs less garlic. Didn't I tell you to follow a recipe?"
"I did follow a recipe!" Shouted Mine, defiantly flinging the rest of the basil into the pot.
"Show it to me, then."
"I threw it in the fire!"
"What have I told you about lying, child?"
"To get better at it! ~ Henry H. Neff

There is a tendency for people affected by this epidemic to police each other or prescribe what the most important gestures would be for dealing with this experience of loss. I resent that. At the same time, I worry that friends will slowly become professional pallbearers, waiting for each death of their lovers, friends, and neighbors, and polishing their funeral speeches; perfecting their rituals of death rather than a relatively simple ritual of life such as screaming in the streets. I worry because of the urgency of the situations, because of seeing death coming in from the edges of abstraction where those with the luxury of time have cast it. I imagine what it would be like if friends had a demonstration each time a lover or a friend or a stranger died of AIDS. I imagine what it would be like if, each time a lover, friend or stranger died of this disease, their friends, lovers or neighbors would take the dead body and drive with it in a car a hundred miles an hour to washington d.c. and blast through the gates of the white house and come to a screeching halt before the entrance and dump their lifeless form on the front steps. It would be comforting to see those friends, neighbors, lovers and strangers mark time and place and history in such a public way.

But, bottom line, this is my own feelings of urgency and need; bottom line, emotionally, even a tiny charcoal scratching done as a gesture to mark a person's response to this epidemic means whole worlds to me i ~ David Wojnarowicz

How I hate this world. I would like to tear it apart with my own two hands if I could. I would like to dismantle the universe star by star, like a treeful of rotten fruit. Nor do I believe in progress. A vermin-eaten saint scratching his filth for heaven is better off than you damned in clean linen. Progress doubles our tenure in a vale of tears. Man is a mistake, to be corrected only by his abolition, which he gives promise of seeing to himself. Oh, let him pass, and leave the earth to the flowers that carpet the earth wherever he explodes his triumphs. Man is inconsolable, thanks to that eternal "Why?" when there is no Why, that question mark twisted like a fishhook in the human heart. "Let there be light," we cry, and only the dawn breaks. ~ Peter De Vries

She can feel it scratching at her, her anger, wedged in the space where the two halves of her rib cage meet. ~ Kristen Roupenian

The scratching came from the attic. At night, when Rory turned out the light I would lie awake and wait for it to skit, skit, skit lightly across the floorboards above our heads and down behind the water pipes. ~ Kate Chisman

He was leaning back on his bench, scratching his chin thoughtfully. "Why would Charkov sleep with you?" "Gee, I don't know," I said, glowering. "Maybe because he's got good taste? ~ Rachel Bach

I hate it here... ...Everyday is actually three days, a freezing morning, a blistering day, and a cool night. You need a lot of clothes. And every day is the same day, which is why it's important to hang a calendar. I see why people move here and wake up one day scratching their heads, wondering when they turned forty or what year it is. ~ Caroline Kepnes

I wish I were there to watch the operations and changes; but alas! I am in Kansas scratching for a living. ~ Robert L. O'Connell

[Gold] gets dug out of the ground in Africa, or someplace. Then we melt it down, dig another hole, bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it. It has no utility. Anyone watching from Mars would be scratching their head. ~ Warren Buffett

I like to be somewhere at least where you can see a few girls around once in a while, even if they're only scratching their arms or blowing their noses or even just giggling or something. ~ J.D. Salinger

Say my name with hints of longing and hunger. I'd like to hear the desire in your voice scraping against the walls, messing up the sheets of my bed, scratching on my skin. Caress every single letter of me like you're making love to me. I want to be owned by you. ~ Nessie Q.

The only writer who gives me unfeigned pleasure is P.G. Wodehouse. And even him I find a bit heavy. He takes a lot out of me. Scratching my hair, with soft whistles, with lips aquiver, I frown over Sunset at Blandings. ~ Martin Amis

I'm not supposed to know what's going on. But I can tell you this, I won't be standing around scratching my head like Coach Johnson in that Denorex commercial. ~ John Avery

They laid up in the shade of a rock shelf until past noon, scratching out a place in the gray lava dust to sleep, and they set forth in the afternoon down the valley following the war trail and they were very small and they moved very slowly in the immensity of that landscape.
Come evening they hove toward the rimrock again and Sproule pointed out a dark stain on the face of the barren cliff. It looked like the black from old fires. The kid shielded his eyes. The scalloped canyon walls rippled in the heat like drapery folds. ~ Cormac McCarthy

My scratching I don't really think communicates to intelligent life forms. Anyone with more than one brain cell would think Kid Koala music is completely retarded. ~ Eric San

Evening, lads." The redhead curled her fingers around the back of Sullivan's neck and pulled his head in for a quick kiss. "Hey, baby, I missed you." It took a few head-scratching seconds to realize that he was looking at Isabel Roma. ~ Elle Kennedy

Scratching is one of nature's sweetest gratifications, and the one nearest at hand. ~ Michel De Montaigne

Reality doesn't wait for you to be ready for it. It doesn't go away when you tell it to. It's like a persistent mosquito, determined to suck your blood and leave you with a bumpy itch that you can't stop scratching. ~ Holly Bourne

Life is a lone wolf, scratching out a living with teeth and claws and a heart of stone. ~ Dan Wells

What if something were to happen? What if something suddenly started throbbing? Then they would notice it was there and they'd think their hearts were going to burst. Then what good would their dykes, bulwarks, power houses, furnaces and pile drivers be to them? It can happen any time, perhaps right now: the omens are present. For example, the father of a family might go out for a walk, and, across the street, he'll see something like a red rag, blown towards him by the wind. And when the rag has gotten close to him he'll see that it is a side of rotten meat, grimy with dust, dragging itself along by crawling, skipping, a piece of writhing flesh rolling in the gutter, spasmodically shooting out spurts of blood. Or a mother might look at her child's cheek and ask him: "What's that, a pimple?" and see the flesh puff out a little, split, open, and at the bottom of the split an eye, a laughing eye might appear. Or they might feel things gently brushing against their bodies, like the caresses of reeds to swimmers in a river. And they will realize that their clothing has become living things. And someone else might feel something scratching in his mouth. He goes to the mirror, opens his mouth: and his tongue is an enormous, live centipede, rubbing its legs together and scraping his palate. He'd like to spit it out, but the centipede is a part of him and he will have to tear it out with his own hands. And a crowd of things will appear for which people will have to find new names, st ~ Jean-Paul Sartre

I was scarcely aware of the angry hands scratching and pulling at me from all directions. Instead, I closed my eyes and wished silently for death to free me. ~ Kien Nguyen

Idolatry isn't just one of many sins; rather it's the one great sin that all others come from. So if you start scratching at whatever struggle you're dealing with, eventually you'll find that underneath it is a false god. Until that god is dethroned, and the Lord God takes his rightful place, you will not have victory. Idolatry isn't an issue; it is the issue. All roads lead to the dusty, overlooked concept of false gods. Deal with life on the glossy outer layers, and you might never see it; scratch a little beneath the surface, and you begin to see that it's always there, under some other coat of paint. There are a hundred million different symptoms, but the issue is always idolatry. ~ Kyle Idleman