Two Rivers Quotes

You stand up straw men," Nynaeve said. "We have a saying in the Two Rivers. 'Whether the bear beats the wolf or the wolf beats the bear, the rabbit always loses.' Take your contest somewhere else and leave Emond's Field folk out of it. ~ Robert Jordan

In Koln, a town of monks and bones,
And pavement fang'd with murderous stones,
And rags and hags, and hideous wenches,
I counted two-and-seventy stenches,
All well defined, and several stinks!
Ye nymphs that reign o'er sewers and sinks,
The River Rhine, it is well known,
Doth wash your city of Cologne;
But tell me, nymphs! what power divine
Shall henceforth whash the river Rhine. ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Until yesterday Mosca had been trapped between two rivers, desperate to get out before winter arrived. Toll had looked like her only means of escape. Now, however, she wondered if she had traded one prison for another, a smaller prison with high walls. If she was not out of it before her allotted time as a visitor ended, then the mysterious night town with its twilight cacophony would claim her. ~ Frances Hardinge

He's following me... He needs to have a secret but he can´t help telling the heat is going out of me. The heart is going out of me, and though she cannot remember she cannot forget. Clutching a fistful of sand. What ties me to you is guilt. I crossed two rivers and wept by one I am the beast at the end of the rope Happy and free. ~ Sarah Kane

Most of the world's major waterways have been diverted or dammed or otherwise manipulated - in the United States, only two per cent of rivers run unimpeded - and people now use half the world's readily accessible freshwater runoff. ~ Elizabeth Kolbert

In Einstein's equation, time is a river. It speeds up, meanders, and slows down. The new wrinkle is that it can have whirlpools and fork into two rivers. So, if the river of time can be bent into a pretzel, create whirlpools and fork into two rivers, then time travel cannot be ruled out. ~ Michio Kaku

The river Guadalquivir
Flows between oranges and olives
The two rivers of Granada
Descend from the snow to the wheat

Oh my love!
Who went and never returned

The river Guadalquivir
Has beards of maroon
The two rivers of Granada
One a cry the other blood

Oh my love!
Who vanished into thin air ~ Federico Garcia Lorca

I remembered the story Evan the cobbler had told me, about the two headstreams of Dwy Fawr and Dwy Fach which are said to flow right through the lake, far down in its dark depths, never mingling their waters with its own. The two rivers, according to Evan, said Austerlitz, were called after the only human beings not drowned but saved from the biblical deluge in the distant past. ~ W.G. Sebald

Two ways the rivers Leap down to different seas, and as they roll Grow deep and still, and their majestic presence Becomes a benefaction to the towns They visit, wandering silently among them, Like patriarchs old among their shining tents. ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I smell fennel," Launcelot said. "That reminds me, I should tell you I have discovered a specific for maims. You take salt, good-quality river mud, and bee urine, and slather it on the maim and hold it there for two days. Works like a charm. Gathering the bee urine is a bit of a bore. ~ Donald Barthelme

It seems a simple task. We all know what water looks like, feels like in our mouth. Water is ubiquitous. Describing a cup of water feels a little like doing a still life painting. As a child I used to wonder: Why do people spend so much time painting bowls of fruit, when they could be painting dragons? Why learn to describe a cup of water, when the story is about cool magic and (well) dragons?

It's a thing I had trouble with as a teenage writer - I'd try to rush through the "boring" parts to get to the interesting parts, instead of learning how to make the boring parts into the interesting parts. And a cup of water is vital to this. Robert Jordan showed me that a cup of water can be a cultural dividing line–the difference between someone who grew up between two rivers, and someone who'd never seen a river before a few weeks ago.

A cup of water can be an offhand show of wealth, in the shape of an ornamented cup. It can be a mark of traveling hard, with nothing better to drink. It can be a symbol of better times, when you had something clean and pure. A cup of water isn't just a cup of water, it's a means of expressing character. Because stories aren't about cups of water, or even magic and dragons. They're about the people painted, illuminated, and changed by magic and dragons. ~ Brandon Sanderson

My mother, stuck in Two Rivers with a head full of unfulfilled dreams, escaped every chance she got via the Two Rivers Free Library - her library card both a passport and necessary currency for her travels. ~ T. Greenwood

But there are still many who continue to marvel at the wisdom of God in so planning the universe that big rivers run by great towns, and that death comes at the end of life instead of in the middle of it. Divest pleas ... of their semi-philosophic jargon, reduce his illustrations to homely similes, and he is marvelling at the wisdom of God who so planned things that the two extremities of a piece of wood should come at the ends instead of in the middle. ~ Chapman Cohen

Perrin told me about his people before I ever came here," she said. He was not a man to brag, but things had a way of coming out. "When hail flattens your crops, when the winter kills half your sheep, you buckle down and keep going. When Trollocs devastated the Two Rivers, you fought back, and when you were done with them, you set about rebuilding without missing a step." She would not have believed that without seeing for herself, not of southerners. These people would have done very well in Saldaea, where Trolloc raids were a matter of course, in the northern parts at least. "I cannot tell you the weather will be what it should tomorrow. I can tell you that Perrin and I will do what needs to be done, whatever can be done. And I don't need to tell you that you will take what each day brings, whatever it is, and be ready to face the next. That is the kind of people the Two Rivers breeds. That is who you are. ~ Robert Jordan

Duty is heavier than a mountain, Dai Shan.'
That time, Lan did flinch. How long had it been since someone had been able to do that to him with mere words? He remembered teaching that same concept to a youth out of the Two Rivers. A sheepherder, innocent of the world, fearful of the fate laid out before him by the Pattern. ~ Robert Jordan

This is the Death's-head Moth," he said. "That's nightshade she's sitting on - we're hoping she'll lay." The moth was wonderful and terrible to see, its large brown-black wings tented like a cloak, and on its wide furry back, the signature device that has struck fear in men for as long as men have come upon it suddenly in their happy gardens. The domed skull, a skull that is both skull and face, watching from its dark eyes, the cheekbones, the zygomatic arch traced exquisitely beside the eyes. "Acherontia styx," Pilcher said. "It's named for two rivers in Hell. Your man, he drops the bodies in a river every time - did I read that?" "Yes," Starling said. "Is it rare?" "In this part of the world it is. There aren't any at all in nature. ~ Thomas Harris

There's an old saying in the Two Rivers" Rand said dryly. "'The louder a man tells you he's honest, the harder you must hold on to your purse.'" Another said, "The fox often offers to give the duck its pond. ~ Robert Jordan

Several times Tam paused to engage one man or another in brief conversation. Since he and Rand had not been off the farm for weeks, everyone wanted to catch up on how things were out that way. Few Westwood men had been in. Tam spoke of damage from winter storms, each one worse than the one before, and stillborn lambs, of brown fields where crops should be sprouting and pastures greening, of ravens flocking in where songbirds had come in years before. Grim talk, with preparations for Bel Tine going on all around them, and much shaking of heads. It was the same on all sides. Most of the men rolled their shoulders and said, "Well, we'll survive, the Light willing." Some grinned and added, "And if the Light doesn't will, we'll still survive." That was the way of most Two Rivers people. People who had to watch the hail beat their crops or the wolves take their lambs, and start over, no matter how many years it happened, did not give up easily. Most of those who did were long since gone. ~ Robert Jordan

Like most Two Rivers folk, Rand had a strong stubborn streak. Outsiders sometimes said it was the prime trait of people in the Two Rivers, that they could give mules lessons and teach stones. ~ Robert Jordan

A woman's body is a dark and monstrous mystery; between her supple thighs a heavy whirlpool swirls, two rivers crash, and woe to him who slips and falls! ~ Nikos Kazantzakis

He was a soldier. He was a shepherd. He was a beggar, and a king. He was a farmer, gleeman, sailor, carpenter. He was born, lived, and died Aiel. He died mad, he died rotting, he died of sickness, accident, age. He was executed, and multitudes cheered his death. He proclaimed himself the Dragon Reborn and flung his banner across the sky; he ran from the Power and hid; he lived and died never knowing. He held off the madness and the sickness for years; he succumbed between two winters. Sometimes Moiraine came and took him away from the Two Rivers, alone or with those of his friends who had survived Winternight; sometimes she did not. Sometimes other Aes Sedai came for him. Sometimes Red Ajah. Egwene married him; Egwene, stern-faced in stole of Amyrlin Seat, led Aes Sedai who gentled him; Egwene, with tears in her eyes, plunged a dagger into his heart, and he thanked her as he died. He loved other women, married other women. Elayne, and Min, and a fair-haired farmer's daughter met on the road to Caemlyn, and women he had never seen before he lived those lives. A hundred lives. More. So many he could not count them. And at the end of every life, as he lay dying, as he drew his final breath, a voice whispered in his ear. I have won again, Lews Therin. Flicker. ~ Robert Jordan

Sweetbuns?" "Tradition among us Two Rivers folk." "Never heard of that tradition." "It's very obscure." "Ah, I see. And what did you do to those buns?" "Sprinklewort," Mat said. "It'll turn her mouth blue for a week, maybe two. And she won't share the sweetbuns with anyone, except maybe her Warders. Joline is addicted to the things. She must have eaten seven or eight bags' worth since we got to Caemlyn." "Nice," Thom said, knuckling his mustache. "Childish, though." "I'm trying to get back to my basic roots," Mat said. "You know, recapture some of my lost youth. ~ Robert Jordan

The Mississippi River carries the mud of thirty states and two provinces 2,000 miles south to the delta and deposits 500 million tons of it there every year. The business of the Mississippi, which it will accomplish in time, is methodically to transport all of Illinois to the Gulf of Mexico. ~ Charles Kuralt

I am the place where two rivers meet, silted with upheaval and loss. ~ Lori Benton

The old women in black at early Mass in winter
are a problem for him. He could tell by their eyes
they have seen Christ. They make the kernel
of his being and the clarity around it
seem meager, as though he needs girders
to hold up his unusable soul. But he chooses
against the Lord. He will not abandon his life.
Not his childhood, not the ninety-two bridges
across the two rivers of his youth. Nor the mills
along the banks where he became a young man
as he worked. The mills are eaten away, and eaten
again by the sun and its rusting. He needs them
even though they are gone, to measure against.
The silver is worn down to the brass underneath
and is the better for it. He will gauge
by the smell of concrete sidewalks after night rain.
He is like an old ferry dragged on to the shore,
a home in its smashed grandeur, with the giant beams
and joists. Like a wooden ocean out of control.
A beached heart. A cauldron of cooling melt. ~ Jack Gilbert

The old blood is indeed still strong in the Two Rivers. ~ Robert Jordan

I think when two people really love each other ... way down deep ... like where the souls sleep and dreams happen, where pain can't live 'cause there's nothing for it to feed on ... then a wedding is a bleeding together of those two souls. Like two rivers running together. All that water becoming the same water. Mine did that. ~ Charles Martin

His thoughts were wheeling and dipping like the gulls over the estuary, groping for an explanation, feeling at last he was making sense of what lie behind Walden's death... ~ Ann Cleeves

Lost

In black as solid as a mire
In a land no one would die for
In a time I was lost
To anyone who ever loved me
The world set itself on fire
And the sky collapsed above me

In a place no one could call home
In a place I breathed and slept
In a battle no one understood
That continued all the same
I sat defenseless and alone
With the insignificance of my name

In the midst of the Lord's birth
On a night meant to be peaceful
In a country of the Prophet
Where women don't live free
I spoke to God from the shaking Earth
And prayed my mother would forgive me

In a city without power
In a desert torn by religion
In a bank between two rivers
We added up the decade's cost
And glorified the final hour
Of a war that everyone had lost

In the dust of helplessness
In a concrete bunker
In a fate I chose myself
I waited without remorse
To fight again as recompense
For wasted lives and discourse

-an original poem about an attack on our base in Iraq during the Arab Spring ~ Dianna Skowera

His (Washington's) apparent paralysis was the result of balancing two imperatives: his reputation against the survival of the Continental Army. ~ Joseph J. Ellis

He showed the fineness of his nature by being kinder to me after that misunderstanding than before. Nay, the very incident which, by my theory, must in some degree estrange me and him, changed, indeed, somewhat our relations; but not in the sense I painfully anticipated. An invisible, but a cold something, very slight, very transparent, but very chill: a sort of screen of ice had hitherto, all through our two lives, glazed the medium through which we exchanged intercourse. Those few warm words, though only warm with anger, breathed on that frail frost-work of reserve; about this time, it gave note of dissolution. I think from that day, so long as we continued friends, he never in discourse stood on topics of ceremony with me. ~ Charlotte Bronte

The moment of meeting, and that of parting are the two greatest epochs of life as sayeth the great book of Zend. ~ Voltaire

In Brussels, you are able to have a lot of appointments in a day. In Paris, you can have one, two, maybe three, but you spend all your time on the road, in the car or in the suburbs. In Brussels, everything is easy. It's not a very big city, and the people are very quiet and warm. ~ Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt

To struggle" was the verb most commonly associated with homosexuality within the ex-gay subculture. To accept the gay label was to associate with a lifestyle God didn't ordain and couldn't bless, yet to adopt the label straight seemed pretentious and disingenuous. We felt that the word struggle communicated the truth of it all. I was, and we were, struggling between two worlds. Trying not to be gay was one big excruciating struggle, because it is impossible. Trying to be straight is equally impossible. Such attempts are pretty much always motivated by shame and fear, unfortunately sending too many gay Christians into dangerous and secretive lives that most openly gay people would never lead. ~ Leslie Chambers

I was crying for joy, my Sassenach,' he said softly. He reached out slowly and took my face between his hands. And thanking God that I have two hands. That I have two hands to hold you with. To serve you with, to love you with. Thanking God that I am a whole man still, because of you. ~ Diana Gabaldon

It has been a great source of sadness to me to see two schools of thought within the evangelical church over many decades. Those who come glorying in manifestations of power sometimes seem dismissive of those whom they regard as "cold theologians." I once heard a man speaking at a large conference say that theology was the enemy of the church and if only we could abandon doctrinal perspectives, the church would be a happier place. What tragic nonsense! We also see and hear those who love theological insight and savour the doctrines of Scripture expressing equally dismissive remarks about Christians who are enjoying God's power, as though they were mere children preoccupied with experience. How I long for a recovery of true biblical Christianity where the apostle Paul, who wrote the book of Romans, also raised the dead! It seems that profound theology and great signs and wonders happily cohabited in Paul's life and ministry. ~ Terry Virgo

i only ever thought
there were two kinds of loves:
the kind you would kill for and
the kind you would die for.
but you, my darling,
you were the kind of love
i would live for. ~ Nathaniel Orion

Our hearts fill with terror at the thought of harm coming to our loved ones, don't they? You cannot have love without fear. The two coexist. ~ Marie Lu

Britain won its wars on the playing fields of Eton. America developed its mettle at the muddy gaps of the Cumberlands, in the swift rapids of its rivers, on the limitless reaches of its western plains, in the silent vastness of primeval forests, and in the blizzard-ridden passes of the Rockies and Coast ranges. ~ Harvey Broome

I believe the essence of translation lies in taking what is unsaid in a work from one language to another. Words have memories, a history of their own. There are no two words with exactly the same meaning. To recreate the unspoken in another language, one needs to understand what went into making the original; then one must dismantle it and rebuild it in the other language. ~ Vivek Shanbhag

There are four people in my life, not counting my reps who know everything, two of whom are my parents, that know everything, so that when I feel like I need to let it out, I can talk to any of those four people. ~ Natalie Zea

I see you are in a dilemma, and one of a peculiar and difficult nature. Two paths lie before you; you conscientiously wish to choose the right one, even though it be the most steep, straight, and rugged; but you do not know which is the right one; you cannot decide whether duty and religion command you to go out into the cold and friendless world, and there to earn your living by governess drudgery, or whether they enjoin your continued stay with your aged mother, neglecting, for the present, every prospect of independency for yourself, and putting up with the daily inconvenience, sometimes even with privations. I can well imagine, that it is next to impossible for you to decide for yourself in this matter, so I will decide it for you.

At least, I will tell you what is my earnest conviction on the subject; I will show you candidly how the question strikes me. The right path is that which necessitates the greatest sacrifice of self-interest -- which implies the greatest good to others; and this path, steadily followed, will lead, I believe, in time, to prosperity and to happiness; though it may seem, at the outset, to tend quite in a contrary direction. Your mother is both old and infirm; old and infirm people have but few resources of happiness -- fewer almost than the comparatively young and healthy can conceive; to deprive them of one of these is cruel. If your mother is more composed when you are with her, stay with her. If she would be unhappy in case you left ~ Charlotte Bronte

At one point I had to shove as much food in my body as possible to pack on calories. My trainer wanted me to do six meals a day and not go two hours without eating. If I would cheat on eating one day, I could tell - I'd drop a few pounds. ~ Taylor Lautner

I'll even give you two moments, seeing as how I'm feeling generous." "Thank you ever so much. I'll contact the Vatican straight away to extoll your virtues and petition for sainthood. ~ Ben Reeder

...when all the openings were closed, then the worlds would all be restored to their proper relations with one another, Lyra's Oxford and Will's would lie over each other again, like transparent images on two sheets of film being moved closer and closer until they merged–although they would never truly touch. ~ Philip Pullman

Being a blues singer is like being black two times. ~ B.B. King

In May I keep count.
Two and a half more days of school;
five between exams.
Twenty thousand words of a novel
and four poems and six borrowed books.
More numbers to add to counting my pills
and trying to work out how to stay awake. ~ Miriam Joy

I only drink champagne on two occasions.When I am in love and when I am not ~ Coco Chanel

I am certain that many things will change in the life of man. Rituals and customs will change, including the traditional form of the institution of marriage, and many values will be reconsidered. Only the two most fundamental values - Your gifts to mankind - will remain unchanged: the inconsumable passion for gene preservation and expansion of the scope of individual freedom of choice. ~ Karmak Bagisbayev

If you want to succeed in making a son of Africa stupid, simply give him power or money. But If you intend to make him more stupid, then give him the two. ~ Oppong Amankwaa

After the dedication, Eleanor saw Bernard privately, probably at her own request. He came prepared to offer more spiritual comfort, thinking that she too might be suffering qualms of conscience over Vitry, but he was surprised to learn that she was not. Nevertheless, several matters were indeed troubling her, not the least the problems of her sister. She asked him to use his influence with the Pope to have the excommunication on Raoul and Petronilla lifted and their marriage recognised by the Church. In return, she would persuade Louis to make peace with Theobald of Champagne and recognise Pierre de la Chatre as Archbishop of Bourges.

Bernard was appalled at her brazen candour. In his opinion, these affairs were no business of a twenty-two-year-old woman. He was, in fact, terrified of women and their possible effects on him. An adolescent, first experiencing physical desire for a young girl, he had been so filled with self-disgust that he had jumped into a freezing cold pond & remained there until his erection subsided. He strongly disapproved of his sister, who had married a rich man; because she enjoyed her wealth, he thought of her as a whore, spawned by Satan to lure her husband from the paths of righteousness, and refused to have anything to do with her. Nor would he allow his monks any contact with their female relatives.

Now there stood before him the young, worldly, and disturbingly beautiful Queen of France, intent upon meddling in matte ~ Alison Weir

It wasn't really up to the writer to decide what questions were relevant. The conversation "out there" had already done that, and all the poor writer could do was to shake his head sadly and try to bring some clarity to it. Surely politics would be better if we could all just refocus the debate on the things that really mattered, but it never seemed to be the journalist's job to do the refocusing. The given issues were the given issues, in the same way that rivers just flow the way they flow, and all the helpless reporter could do was selflessly hurl himself into the murky current and try to help his readers navigate their way through. ~ Matt Bai

Joan Rivers is a very wise lady. We're good friends, and I find her very much an inspiration as to how to conduct your life, and how to remain very youthful, with ambitions and dreams. Anyway, she always says that she says "yes" to everything, because you never know which thing will click, or be thrilling.. ~ Charles Busch

Upon that cross of Jesus Mine eye at times can see The very dying form of One Who suffered there for me; And from my smitten heart with tears Two wonders I confess The wonders of redeeming love and my unworthiness. ~ Elizabeth C. Clephane

It will relax her, make her pliable. Women love having their feet rubbed."
"Most women beg me to rub somewhere other than their feet."
"They like their toes nibbled," Aiden said. "And suckled."
"Rub feet, suckle toes. Got it."
"Do it slowly, the strokes steady. Then move up her legs. Use her muscles as a guide. Not hard strokes - you want to soothe, not press."
"How long before I can massage her pussy?"
"Gods, level threes are impatient. The trick is to go slowly. By the time you've reached her ass, she's sighing with pleasure, but you don't stop there. You do her entire back and arms while she's longing for you to get to her pussy. Make her wait."
"Now that I can get into. Holding back, making her beg."
He saw Nella again, squirming on the sheets, her red hair tangled on the pillow, her hips lifting toward him. Please, Rio, she'd say.
Not yet, baby, he'd respond. I want you good and wet before I get there.
She'd whimper with disappointment, then he'd lift his strap and smack her sweet little backside.
Rio sighed and made the image dissolve. "Massage. Slowly. I'm not sure my programming will let me."
"Like this." Aiden moved his ale glass and pressed his hand to the table, thumb and last two fingers on the surface, the other two fingers held loosely. "Glide across her skin, pressing a little. Long strokes, following the curve of her leg." He moved his hand across the table, slowly and sensually, his ow ~ Allyson James

What if in Scotland's wilds we viel'd our head, Where tempests whistle round the sordid bed; Where the rug's two-fold use we might display, By night a blanket, and a plaid by day. ~ Oliver Goldsmith

The breezes at dawn have secrets to tell you
Don't go back to sleep!
You must ask for what you really want.
Don't go back to sleep!
People are going back and forth
across the doorsill where the two worlds touch,
The door is round and open
Don't go back to sleep! ~ Rumi

In the younger days of the Republic there lived in the county of - two men, who were admitted on all hands to be the very best men In the county; which, in the Georgia vocabulary, means they could flog any other two men in the county. ~ Augustus Baldwin Longstreet

Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire's flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It's not desiring the fall; it's terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling 'Don't!' and 'Hang on!', can understand the jump. Not really. ~ David Foster Wallace

If you think you're too far from Allah to return, and your 'past' continues to own you, just remember that Malik ibn Dinar (RA) was an alcoholic, and Omar (RA) was on his way to assassinate the Prophet (pbuh) before they became two of the greatest souls to walk the earth! ~ Yasmin Mogahed

Robotic cats, two for the price of one, today only! No shedding, just purring! ~ Marissa Meyer

I spoke on the phone with President Rouhani of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The two of us discussed our ongoing efforts to reach an agreement over Iran's nuclear program. While there will surely be important obstacles to moving forward and success is by no means guaranteed, I believe we can reach a comprehensive solution. ~ Barack Obama

The worst that could happen is you two get into a fist fight, in which I will referee but secretly be in your corner.
Oh really?
Really. I'll even rub Vaseline on your face when he isn't looking.
What would I do without you?
You'll never know. ~ Em Wolf

It win be a device that will permit communication without any time interval between two points in space. The device will not transmit messages, of course; simultaneity is identity. But to our perceptions, that simultaneity will function as a transmission, a sending. So we will be able to use it to talk between worlds, without the long waiting for the message to go and the reply to return that electromagnetic impulses require. It is really a very simple matter. Like a kind of telephone. ~ Ursula K. Le Guin

I've met the girl. She's a zero in my opinion but terrific-looking. I don't actually know that she's a zero. I mean she hardly said two words the night I met her. Just sat and smiled and smoked, so it isn't fair to say. ~ J.D. Salinger

If. If. If this all happened! I, F, - he had to hang on to those two little letters, just one tiny two letter word. If. So much hope and dread hung in the balance on those two little blips in the alphabet! A chasm in fact! ~ E.A. Bucchianeri

There was no shorthand for "I'm sorry." You were obliged to speak those two words. ~ Wally Lamb

In the U.S. there are two types of hipsters: those who know how to program and those who serve coffee. ~ Cesar Hidalgo

The other day as I was stepping out of Star Grocery on Claremont Avenue with some pork ribs under my arm, the Berkeley sky cloudless, a smell of jasmine in the air, a car driving by with its window rolled down, trailing a sweet ache of the Allman Brothers' "Melissa," it struck me that in order to have reached only the midpoint of my life I will need to live to be 92. That's pretty old. If you live to be ninety-two, you've done well for yourself. I'd like to be optimistic, and I try to take care of my health, but none of my grandparents even made it past 76, three killed by cancer, one by Parkinson's disease. If I live no longer than any of them did, I have at most thirty years left, which puts me around sixty percent of the way through my time.



I am comfortable with the idea of mortality, or at least I always have been, up until now. I never felt the need to believe in heaven or an afterlife. It has been decades since I stopped believing-a belief that was never more than fitful and self-serving to begin with-in the possibility of reincarnation of the soul. I'm not totally certain where I stand on the whole "soul" question. Though I certainly feel as if I possess one, I'm inclined to disbelieve in its existence. I can live with that contradiction, as with the knowledge that my time is finite, and growing shorter by the day. It's just that lately, for the first time, that shortening has become perceptible. I can feel each tiny skyward lurch of the balloo ~ Michael Chabon

He slides two fingers in my cunt so slowly, I feel my soul go to heaven. ~ C.D. Reiss

Despite the earnest belief of most of his fans, Einstein did not win his Nobel Prize for the theory of relativity, special or general. He won for explaining a strange effect in quantum mechanics, the photoelectric effect. His solution provided the first real evidence that quantum mechanics wasn't a crude stopgap for justifying anomalous experiments, but actually corresponds to reality. And the fact that Einstein came up with it is ironic for two reasons. One, as he got older and crustier, Einstein came to distrust quantum mechanics. Its statistical and deeply probabilistic nature sounded too much like gambling to him, and it prompted him to object that "God does not play dice with the universe." He was wrong, and it's too bad that most people have never heard the rejoinder by Niels Bohr: "Einstein! Stop telling God what to do. ~ Sam Kean