--BABY YOU’RE A FIREWORK

…You’re worth it.  Until you understand that this is all that matters, it will always be too much.

…Sometimes I think it’s the bullfrogs out in the marsh making all that racket, when it’s really just the squeeze toys in my head.

…For a second there, I thought something bad might happen, but then I remembered that 90 percent of what we worry about never comes to fruition.  I also remembered that it’s best not to look down when you’re up high in a tall building. 

…I think I would start to lose my grip on reality if I didn’t have people I loved and needed on hand, people who loved and needed me right back.

…I’ll stand by you, won’t let nobody hurt you.—That’s a simply lyric, but pretty powerful, if you think about it.

…But it’s not that simple.  I mean what is?  What’s worth something, really worth something, that is just so easy to get?

…It’s almost strange, what you can see so clearly once you detach from a situation. 

…Lately I have been having the types of exchanges that don’t involve me, but are still filled with lots of meaningful eye contact.

…Sometimes I watch the moon (I know, I know, the damn moon again…) the way some people are mesmerized by a lava lamp.

…I’m sorry, but I can still be half lonely, yet half alive, and those can both happen when I’m in a crowded room.

…I’ve been really lethargic lately.  But don’t worry, it’s not your fault.

…Do you want to talk about it?

…When the crowds push against you inelegantly, it’s best not to push back.  It’s best to let them push and push and push until they’re tuckered out.

…After all these years I’m still having epiphanies about myself.  I’ll take that as a good sign.  The other option would just be playing into one of the latest epiphany I’ve had.

…Often the best thing to do when everything seems jagged or muddy is to communicate, and be gentle.

…Not to be political, but why do Republicans think they have the corner on God?  Seems to me there’s plenty of God to go around.

…I prefer my heroes flawed.

…Let’s celebrate the first time you cried naked in someone’s bed.  Let’s honor that with a thin, honest smile.

…Some people like the act of cleaning up small, organized messes of planned mistakes.  Me, I’d rather not make them, but probably most of us feel this way.

…Forget logic.  Logic doesn’t know what you want.

…Hey, what do you have to hide?

…You can tell a lot about a family from the photos on their mantle.  You can tell a lot from the ornaments on a family’s tree.

…I’m just thinking out loud.

…Yet I’m still here.

…And we’re going to be fine, so the Haters can go ahead and hate someplace else.

--A BOY IS A HALF-FORMED THING

…Some people like to sweat.  Others would rather take a bath with bubbles, a glass of wine, and a book.

…Some people have a fear of long words.  It’s actually called Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia, a word that my computer underscores in red, though it’s actually a real word.

…It’s nice to have someone check in on you.  I think it’s one of the kinder things a person can do for you.

…Knowing my flaws is one thing I’m really good at, but sometimes the less I know, the better.

…I believe everyone is allowed to have a bad day.  I just have to remind myself of that when someone is really rude or cruel.

…You don’t always need a silver lining, but I’m always happy when I find one.

…Words are all I’ve ever lived by, and yet, after all these years they can still confound me.  If I parse them too much, I’m really in trouble.

…Last year, TSA confiscated almost 4,000 guns at the airport, ten guns a day per airport, and a 17% increase from the prior year.  Really?  What are people thinking?

…It’s important to remember that sometimes when you call someone a Bitch, or they call you one, it’s done in fun, or in love.

…Whenever I get painfully honest with my friends, I feel a sense of lightness.

…I think it’s always important to emphasize the importance of forgiveness.  In little things, but mostly in the big ones.

…People will think what they think, and I’ve never been a fan of gossip.  There’s a difference between gossip and useful information.  I find gossip almost always to be petty and most telling about the gossiper.

…Where’s all of your stuff?  It was a pretty short list.

…It’s Super Bowl weekend.  I’m going to go out on a limb and predict it will be the lowest rated Super Bowl in a long while.  Still, Americans will eat 1.4 billion chicken wings during the game, 15,000 tons of chips, 8 million pounds of guacamole and 10 million pounds of ribs.  Just watch.

…Tonight, the moon looks like I feel--wayward, thin, lightheaded and pale.  In fact, we could be twins.  That’s why we need to talk.

…Sometimes the moon’s gleaming indifference is a little hard to take.  But she’s a beauty nonetheless.

…"Aspire, break bounds. Endeavor to be good, and better still, best."  Robert Browning said that.  Yep.  He was right.

…Sometimes you don’t choose the book.  Sometimes it chooses you.

…The rain sounds like it’s trying to tell me something.  Like, “Get out.”

…Sometimes the rain has some big fists, and it’s not exactly patient either.

...One of the best questions I’ve been asked this week is, “Why did you burn the pictures?”

…I could be less tender.  It might be good to add some concrete mix to my diet.

…This is the end of my body as you know it, its superfluous penchant for love, its poorer costume, its shiny disaster.

…Don’t cry for me, Argentina.

--I KEEP LOSING IT

"In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer."- Albert Camus

"When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than my talent for absorbing positive knowledge."- Albert Einstein

"It takes less time to do a thing right, than it does to explain why you did it wrong."- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 

"Every life is a daily series of advances and retreats, intimate victories and private defeats, all measured not by grand events but by an awareness of the obstacles that have been overcome along the way."- Simon Baatz

“I can have that feeling sometimes of real joy in sadness, that kind of joy that you get from a sad song that’s got you crying your eyes out.”  Paul Thomas Anderson

“When we’re isolated, it becomes very difficult to know how much of your pain is specific to you—how low or high your threshold is for feeling sad or melancholy or just plain blue compared to other people.”  Paul Thomas Anderson

"Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every man has many--not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some."- Charles Dicken

"I am convinced that the world is not a mere bog in which men and women trample themselves and die. Something magnificent is taking place here amidst the cruelties and tragedies, and the supreme challenge to intelligence is that of making the noblest and best in our curious heritage prevail."- Charles A. Beard

"Most groups have a potential for greatness that never quite takes off. But every so often the right person comes along who can put together a handful of superb people, set an impossible goal, engage them in a holy war, and let them rip."- Jennifer Clark

“I feel like I’m just starting.”  Quincy Jones

--SO HOW ARE YOU NOW?

…The best kind of happiness is the kind that spreads.

…When is it time to knock down the whitewashed walls?

When is it time to beat the bricks like bass drums?

When is it time to risk your skull and all the squishy thoughts you hold so dear?

Why not go ahead and bang your head?

…To a greater or lesser degree, and manifesting one way or another, all human beings are afraid.  And some of us are so afraid that we dare not show our fear.  Sometimes we dare not even know our fear.  For fear itself is a terrifying concept to behold.

…Where no sea runs, the heart of the water pushes its tide.  Or so says Dylan Thomas

…The trick is to cut off the tears at the swell, but sometimes the tide is too hurried and rough.

…While I fear that we’re drawn to what abandons us, and to what seems most likely to abandon us, in the end I believe we’re defined by what embraces us.

…Life is all a matter of mountains and caves—mountains we must climb, and caves where we hide when we can’t face our mountains.

…Imagine a childhood of crushing loneliness, then imagine letting it slip away like dandelion seeds in the breeze.

…Without this sheet, I might be invisible.

…Wait a minute, cottage cheese?  Is that a joke?

…Here’s a happy poem I had published the other day:

https://inbetweenhangovers.wordpress.com/2018/01/25/grappling-by-len-kuntz/

…Some people act like they’ve never made a mistake.  Me, I make them all the time.  

…Some people never let go of Christmas, which is understandable to a degree.  But what about all of the other days?

…I want a life of wind on skin.  That’d be really nice.

…I’m looking for signs that I’m okay, but it feels like I’m ten degrees off.

  

…Sometimes palinoia gets the best of me.

…Sometimes I’m not as sad as I seem/sound.  It’s just that I’m drawn to sadness in the way that most people are drawn to beauty or joy.

…I knew this would happen.  I mean, I really wished it would happen, to be here again.

…How many chances does one person get?  I don’t know, but I guess I need one more.

…Don’t be mad at me.  It’s just fiction.  Or at least I think it is.