Red

When you dip her in the middle of the dance floor, it is the color of her dress. When she whispers in your ear, it is the color of her lips. When you make love, it is the trace you want her to leave all over your body. When she places her palm over your heart, it is the color that comes to the surface as her fingertips trail like a sentence that can never be finished. When you see her in your bedroom with another, it is the color of your breath. When you smash the vase in the hall, it is the color that threatens you to abandon the shattered pieces. When you scream at the top of your lungs, it is the color that pierces the atmosphere. When she hears you, it is the color of her pulse. When you look in her eyes for the last time, it is the fading color of your heart falling to your knees. It is not the color you see when she leaves.

— Tyler Ford, Red (via http://tylerthelatteboy.tumblr.com/)

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons that yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be critical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.

Be careful. Strive to be happy.

— Max Ehrmann 1927

Victims of Ourselves

"Your life is not an episode of Skins. Things will never look quite as good as they do in a faded, sun-drenched Polaroid; your days are not an editorial from Lula. Your life is not a Sofia Coppola movie, or a Chuck Palahniuk novel, or a Charles Bukowski poem. Grace Coddington isn't your creative director. Bon Iver and Joy Division don't play softly in the background at appropriate moments. Your hysterical teenage diary isn't a work of art. Your room probably isn't Selby material. Your life isn't a Tumblr screencap. Every word that comes out of your mouth will not be beautiful and poignant, infinitely quotable. Your pain will not be pretty. Crying till you vomit is always shit. You cannot romanticize hurt. Or sadness. Or loneliness. You will have homework, and hangovers and bad hair days. The train being late won't lead to any fateful encounters, it will make you late. Sometimes your work will suck. Sometimes you will suck. Far too often, everything will suck — and not in a Wes Anderson kind of way. And there is no divine consolation — only the knowledge that we will hopefully experience the full spectrum — and that sometimes, just sometimes, life will feel like a Coppola film."

— Letters from Nowhere (via http://www.vervelig.tumblr.com/)

The Way We Were, The Way We Are

"We are the girls with anxiety disorders, filled appointment books, five-year plans. We take ourselves very, very seriously. We are the peacemakers, the do-gooders, the givers, the savers. We are on time, overly prepared, well read, and witty, intellectually curious, always moving. We pride ourselves on getting as little sleep as possible and thrive on self-deprivation. We drink coffee, a lot of it. We are on birth control, Prozac, and multivitamins. We are relentless, judgmental with ourselves, and forgiving to others. We never want to be as passive-aggressive as our mothers, never want to marry men as uninspired as our fathers. We are the daughters of the feminists who said, "You can be anything," and we heard, "You have to be everything.""

— Courtney Martin

Soaked in Soul

Alienation: the crippling conviction that one is a minority of one.

Ambiguity: the bastard child of Creativity and Cowardice.

Aphorism: what is worth quoting from the soul's dialogue with itself.

Arrogance: the vain, younger sister of confidence.

Art: the trail of breadcrumbs left by artists, to remember the way.

Awakening: to see the old with new eyes.

Contradictions: the curse of the clever.

Crime: a sort of art made ugly.

Despair: an early surrender, where the spirit dies before the body does.

Discipline: the backbone without which potential cannot stand.

Dreams: what get us through the night, and oftentimes the day.

Eros: our last defense against the dust.

Existence: a caste system.

Idealist: lawyer who cannot see client, Life, confessing her guilt.

Ideals: maps that omit practical details — like mountain ranges.

Imagination: the invisible hand that masturbates.

Intensity: vast emotions condensed.

Intuition: generous deposits made to our account by an unknown benefactor.

Liar: one who claims to tell the truth, always.

Life: a midway point between two unknowns.

Morality: only permitting others to behave as we behave, when we behave.

Nostalgia: the familiar pinch of that outgrown garment.

Physiognomy: the art that says, yes, you may judge a book by its cover.

Romantic: one who professes to prefer the thorns to the rose.

Sarcasm: a wolf in sheep's skin.

Self: that invisible chain that snaps tight whenever we stray.

Self-consciousness: a weed in the garden of self-awareness.

Self-image: self-deception.

Solitude: the imprisoned soul's imprisonment of the body.

Spiritual Asthma: yearning tempered by shortage of breath.

Suicide: the desperate attempt to assume responsibility for what one is not responsible for.

Swear Words: discomfort regarding our sex organs, and their functions.

Temptation: seeds we're forbidden to water that are showered with rain.

Uncertainty: the starting and ending point of Knowledge.

Waking: waiting at the platform of existence for one's particular train of consciousness to arrive from strange, far-away lands.

Wit: the pounce of a restless insight.

— (via http://violentwavesofemotion.tumblr.com/)

Buzzcut Season

I wish I wrote the way I thought;
Obsessively,
Incessantly,
With maddening hunger.
I'd write to the point of suffocation.
I'd write myself into nervous breakdowns,
Manuscripts spiralling out like tentacles into abysmal nothing.
And I'd write about you
a lot more
than I should.

— Benedict Smith

Question Existing

I was sitting in a room with 20 different people from all walks of life. Half listening to a topic I have the slightest interest of, half wandering into my jungle of thoughts. And I went deep into the most bizarre pool of thought, what’s every person’s favorite word?

So I asked my seatmate, and he answered “love.” What a powerful word. But so disappointing at the same time. I asked him why nonetheless, and he was unable to give me an answer. I understood though. Love, in all its forms, is the most beautiful feeling in the world. But while he was thinking of his answer, I was searching for my favorite word as well. And then it hit me; sometimes.

A few days ago, I discussed about a quote on “almost.” And as parallel as almost and sometimes may simultaneously be, they are equally different. Almost involves being barely, hardly, quite, but not yet. And sometimes, well, here’s why. Sometimes, because sometimes never disappoint. Because sometimes is promising. Because sometimes is a yes or a no. With the shrilling thrill of going either way yet you’ll never know when. For the same reason that most of the time, someone can not keep a promise. Or sometimes, someone may.

What’s your favorite word?

Almost

And if this blog has not made that much of a statement to prove the things I love to love and do, let me reinstate it to you: I love quoting important and random people. I find it quite amusing to learn how some people make it look so easy for them to pour their hearts out in words that relates to people, touch lives and triggers emotions that most readers don't know existed.

Now, on my other blog on Tumblr (hahaha plug: http://cataclysmalblip.tumblr.com/), I don't reblog quotes as much as I want to. I currently have 4,500+ quotes I've found, appreciated and wished to share but I'm too much of a wuss to do so.

So today, after a week-long hiatus due to work, I stumbled onto a quote that I liked from years back and decided to make a change and share it this time:

Almost. It's a big word for me. I feel it everywhere. Almost home. Almost happy. Almost changed. Almost, but not quite. Not yet. Soon, maybe. 
— Joan Bauer

Enough said.

Wanderlust

Travel is little beds and cramped bathrooms. It's old bedroom television sets and slow Internet connections. Travel is extraordinary conversations with ordinary people. It's waiters, gas station attendants, and housekeepers becoming the most interesting people in the world. It's churches that are compelling enough to enter. It's McDonald's being a luxury. It's the realization that you may have been born in the wrong country. Travel is a smile that leads to a conversation in broken English. It's the epiphany that pretty girls smile the same way all over the world. Travel is tipping 10% and being embraced for it. Travel is the same white T-shirt again tomorrow. Travel is accented sex after good wine and too many unfiltered cigarettes. Travel is flowing in the back of the bus with giggly strangers. It's a street full of bearded backpackers looking down at maps. Travel is wishing for one more bite of whatever that just was. It's the rediscovery of walking somewhere. It's sharing a bottle of liquor on an overnight train with a new friend. Travel is 'Maybe I don't have to do it that way when I get back home.'

─ Nick Miller, Isn't It Pretty to Think So?

Oh Reckless Abandon

Stay


I once had someone tell me suicide was selfish 

That the scars those ghosts created would haunt those left behind
That their memories would ripple on into tomorrow and the
tomorrow after that
And I asked in return
What about the people asking them to stay? 
How was that any less selfish?
Any less cruel?
How was being forced to live through your own hell supposed to be
some sort of gift?
Now before you get the wrong idea
I was twelve when I asked that question

Now six years and two different types of anti-depressant later I can
comfortably say
That both happen to be equally selfish
But I need you to trust me
Let them want you
I know you might not feel wanted right now
But let your future want you
Give yourself over to the greedy minds that are smart enough to love 
you
And I promise you one day you'll be playing with sunbeams and 
friendship bracelets
Oceans and lovers
Laughter and wine glasses
Being selfish is a human gift
So let them consume you
Let life take you

(via Gabi of http://amberon.tumblr.com/)

The How I Can't Recall

I LIKED BEING ALONE.

I like drinking coffee alone, and reading alone. 

I like riding the bus alone, and walking home alone. 

I like eating alone, and listening to music alone. 

It gives me time to think, and set my mind free.

But when I see a mother with her child, a girl with her lover, or a friend laughing with their best friend, I realize that even though I like being alone, I don't fancy being lonely. The sky is beautiful, but the people are sad. I just need someone who won't run away.

(via Andy of http://buddhacoffee.tumblr.com/)

Even the Birds are Chained to the Sky

It's much easier to not know things sometimes.

Things change and friends leave. And life doesn't stop for anybody.

I wanted to laugh. Or maybe get mad.

Or maybe shrug at how strange everybody was, especially me. 

I think the idea is that every person has to live for his or her own life 

and then make the choice to share it with other people. 

You can't just sit there and put everybody's lives ahead of yours 

and think that counts as love. You just can't. 

You have to do things. I'm going to do what I want to do. 

I'm going to be who I really am. 

And I'm going to figure out what that is. 

And we could all sit around and wonder 

and feel bad about each other and blame a lot of people 

for what they did or didn't do or what they didn't know. I don't know. 

I guess there could always be someone to blame. 

It's just different. Maybe it's good to put things in perspective, 

but sometimes, I think that the only perspective is to really be there. 

Because it's okay to feel things. 

I was really there. And that was enough to make me feel infinite. 

I feel infinite.

— Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower

The More I See, The Less I Know

(photos via http://society6.com/artist/TinaCrespo)

Blind Man Looking for a Shadow of Doubt

(photo via http://dohanews.co/post/20276922255/the-souq-waqifs-army-by-habeeb-abu-futtaim-and)

if i knew where
i was going next,
i wouldn't be taking so many
naps, 
or reading all these books,
trying to divine my future 
in pillow cases
and stitched book bindings,
lost in the small decisions 
of each day,
only a little bit numb.

i am the inevitable wanderer
the boy who always says 
goodbye, 
but never knows
how to leave.

─ Habeeb Abu-Futtaim, The Souq Waqif's Army

(via http://thetopographeblog.com/)

Obsessed with the Mess that's America

"Being in New York, I was most impressed with the loneliness and talent show of emotions in the subways and cafeterias. One night, I borrowed a twin lens reflex and went out and photographed people in cafeterias. I developed the film as soon as I came back. What I saw pleased me more than anything I had done before. They weren't pictures of people, they were pictures of the way I felt."

─ Ted Croner, Street Seen: The Psychological Gesture in American Photography 1940-1959, p. 91

The Good in Goodbyes

No, nothing sums up to it. Just a separation; a gap, a void, a distance from everyone and everything. Towering. Extending. Prolonged. And I wish I was one of those many poets who could alter this hopelessness into something delightful. But you don't understand. You won't understand. And I can't explain.

We are all responding to our capacity to execute life and live fully; not in finding the breach that you thought never existed in the first place, not in filling holes, nor keeping up with someone who's lost, or probably wasn't even there to begin with. We don't have to venture and experience the world in the way we have been told to. So maybe, just maybe, in parting we could grow.

One day, you'll grasp the subterfuge of our existence. When the day comes, you'll gaze at life with the brightest smile, whispering to the restless winds: "I am just passing by." 

So this is your maverick. And this is Vienna.

Pillars of Salt and Pillars of Sand

If there is no love in the world, we will make a new world, and we will give it heavy walls, and we will furnish it with soft red interiors, from the inside out, and give it a knocker that resonates like a diamond falling to a jeweler's felt so that we should never hear it. Love me, because love does not exist, and I have tried every thing that does. 

— Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything is Illuminated 

Innate Ramblings

Untame, these vast, swirling,
Oceans of mischief and wonder,
Lie dark, their waves curling,
Lapping at the prow as we sail yonder.

Wind battered sails, billowing, 
Canvases of cloth of fabric;
Pulling our vessel to the elements, bellowing,
And howling to the midnight storm, the thunderclap.

Crash, a flash, a dash,
Of light enchants us, to,
Look above!
An albatross, flying to our destination anew,

Its white glows,
Against the midnight cloud,
It flies across, to a place only it knows,
Its purity lies against a shroud:

Of billowing nature, swirling,
Skies of mischief and wonder,
Lie dark, their winds howling,
Lightning flashing, thunder crashing, waves thrashing.

-A

(via James of http://jharatac.tumblr.com/)

The War Without

You don't need water to feel like you're drowning, do you? ─ Jodi Lynn Picoult, Nineteen Minutes

I felt that there was a piece of me missing, a piece that had become so unnerved that it fell away without me feeling it. I didn't even know what piece it was ─ I just felt the gap, and whatever it was, it must have been important. ─ David Levithan, Love is the Higher Law

I remained too much inside my head and ended up losing my mind. ─ Edgar Allan Poe, Complete Writings

We are dying from overthinking. We are slowly killing ourselves by thinking about everything. Think. Think. Think. You can never trust the human mind anyway. It's a death trap. ─ Philip Anthony Hopkins

It is the ultimate shadow, the defeat of creation; this is the curse at work, the curse that feeds on all life. Everywhere in the universe. ─ Philip Kindred Dick, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

I only feel like myself when I am alone. ─ Peter Cameron, Someday This Pain will be Useful to You

I'm full of love, and nobody wants it. ─ Dylan Klebold

I was interested in everything and committed to nothing. ─ Gregory David Roberts, Shantaram

I am a lover without a lover. I am lovely and lonely and I belong deeply to myself. ─ Warsan Shire

It was not the feeling of completeness that I so needed, but the feeling of not being empty. ─ Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything is Illuminated

Maybe you're right. Maybe there's no escape. After all, how can you run from what's inside you? ─ Sam Winchester, Supernatural

Sometimes I think everyone is just pretending to be brave, and none of us really are. Maybe pretending is how you get brave, I don't know. ─ George Raymond Richard Martin, A Storm of Swords

Maybe this world is another planet's hell. ─ Aldous Huxley

I think I'm moving but I go nowhere.

All That He Ever Was

He talks as if everything is fine
Questions my motives
as if I'm calling my bluff
Insults my character
as if I'm lesser than the entirety of this generation's worst
He talks as if everything is fine

He talks as if everything is fine
Degrades my goals
as if I'm incapable of achieving them
Tears my dreams
as if I'm better off living his reality
He talks as if everything is fine

He talks as if everything is fine
"I love you," in the end, he says
He talks as if everything is fine
He is everything.