Don’t worry, it’s only death. Don’t let it bother you.
The cook hates the waiter, and they both hate the customer,” Haida said. “A line from the Arnold Wesker play The Kitchen. People whose freedom is taken away always end up hating somebody. Right? I know I don’t want to live like that.
The sky both exists and doesn’t exist. It has substance and at the same time doesn’t. And we merely accept that vast expanse and drink it in.
Things can be seen better in the darkness,” he said, as if he had just seen into her mind. “But the longer you spend in the dark, the harder it becomes to return to the world aboveground where the light is. You have to call a stop to it at some point.
I’ve chosen to live – and to live the best I know how.
The truth is a symbol, and symbols are the truth. It is best to grasp symbols the way they are. There’s no logic or facts, no pig’s belly button or ant’s balls. When people try to use a method other than the truth to follow along the path of understanding, it is like trying to use a sieve to hold water.
There’s a void inside me, a blank that’s slowly expanding, devouring what’s left of who I am. I can hear it happening. I’m totally lost, my identity dying.
Tsukuru’s mind grew still and tranquil. A quiet feeling, like a frozen tree on a windless winter night. But there was little pain mixed in. Over the years Tsukuru had grown used to this mental image, so much so that it no longer brought him any particular pain.
People can become accustomed to almost anything, especially when they’re pushed to the limit. It may become surprisingly easy then.
I felt alone, but not especially lonely. I guess I just took that for granted.
People have to get out sometimes – have something good to eat, have some drinks, belt out some songs, talk about nothing in particular.
Muscles are like work animals that are quick on the uptake. If you carefully increase the load, step by step, they learn to take it. As long as you explain your expectations to them by actually showing them examples of the amount of work they have to endure, your muscles will comply and gradually get stronger.
Danger comes the moment you relax.
How many girls has he slept with?” “It’s probably up to eighty now,” I said. “But in his case, the higher the numbers go, the less each individual act seems to mean. Which is what I think he’s trying to accomplish.
But metaphors can reduce the distance... metaphors help eliminate what separates you and me.
If I go for a time without seeing water, I feel like something’s slowly draining out of me. It’s probably like the feeling a music lover has when, for whatever reason, he’s separated from music for a long time.
It’s no fun growing old, no fun at all. The drawers where you store memories get harder to open.
Waiting for your answer is one of the most painful things.
On any given day, something can come along and steal our hearts. It may be any old thing: a rosebud, a lost cap, a favorite sweater from childhood, an old Gene Pitney record. A miscellany of trivia with no home to call their own. Lingering for two or three days, that something soon disappears, returning to the darkness. There are wells, deep wells, dug in our hearts. Birds fly over them.
Always remember that to argue, and win, is to break down the reality of the person you are arguing against. It is painful to lose your reality, so be kind, even if you are right.