But still, he reflected, I ought to wash my pajamas more often. Life is so uncertain: you never know what could happen. One way to deal with that is to keep your pajamas washed. – Tengo, IQ84.
No matter how empty it may be, this is still my heart.
I got to know her well, and we talked about all sorts of things. We understood each other. You could even say I loved her.
If you hurt her any more than you already have, the wound could be too deep to fix.
Even now, whenever I think of her, I envision a quiet Sunday morning. A gentle, clear day, just getting under way. No homework to do, just a Sunday when you could do what you wanted. She always gave me this kick-back-and-relax, Sunday-morning kind of feeling.
When I should have felt real pain, I stifled it. I didn’t want to take it on, so I avoided facing up to it. Which is why my heart is so empty now.
I need to learn not just to forget but to forgive.
We’re all wrong, every one of us.
It was still inchoate, something missing. Something that should be there was appealing to the nonvalidity of absence. And that missing element was rapping on the glass window separating presence and absence. I could make out its wordless cry.
One other thing I learned from working in a company was that the majority of people in the world have no problem following orders. They’re actually happy to be told what to do. They might complain, but that’s not how they really feel. They just grumble out of habit. If you told them to think for themselves, and make their own decisions and take responsibility for them, they’d be clueless.
Wrapped in the deep fragrance of the forest, I listen to the flapping of the birds’ wings, to the stirring of the ferns. I’m freed from gravity and float up – just a little – from the ground and drift in the air. Of course I can’t stay there forever. It’s just a momentary sensation – open my eyes and it’s gone. Still, it’s an overwhelming experience. Being able to float in the air.
No matter how far you run. Distance might not solve anything.
Enough of your prattle,” the old man said. “I cannot abide people who conjure up a raft of excuses, disparaging the efforts of those who have gone out of their way to help them. Such people are common trash.
I’m all through as a human being,” she said. “All you’re looking at is the lingering memory of what I used to be. The most important part of me, what used to be inside, died years ago, and I’m just functioning by rote memory.
Living turned me into nothing. Weird... People are born in order to live, right? But the longer I’ve lived, the more I’ve lost what’s inside me – and ended up empty. And I bet the longer I live, the emptier, the more worthless, I’ll become. Something’s wrong with this picture. Life isn’t supposed to turn out like this! Isn’t it possible to shift direction, to change where I’m headed?
Probably is a world you my find south of the border. But never, ever west of the sun.
The scene seemed somehow divorced from reality, although reality, he knew, could at times be terribly unreal.
There can be no meaning in what will someday be lost. Passing glory is not true glory at all.
In his life, after all, he had achieved nothing, had been totally unproductive. He couldn’t make anyone else happy, and, of course, couldn’t make himself happy. Happiness? He wasn’t even sure what that meant. He didn’t have a clear sense, either, of emotions like pain or anger, disappointment or resignation, and how they were supposed to feel. The most he could do was create a place where his heart – devoid now of any depth or weight – could be tethered, to keep it from wandering aimlessly.
I’m not very good at putting my feelings into words. That’s why people misunderstand me.