Accidental Friends Quotes

I can find another maid; I cannot find another Sophie. If being a Shadowhunter was what you wanted, my girl, I wish you had spoken. I could have gone to the Consul before I was at odds with him. Still, when we return-' She broke off, and Cecily heard the words beneath the words: If we return. 'When we return, I will put you forward for Acension,' Charlotte finished. 'I will speak out for her aswell,' Gideon said. 'After all, I have my father's place on the Council-his friends will listen to me; they still owe loyalty to our family-and besides, how else can we be married?' 'What'? said Gabriel with a wild hand gesture that accidentally flipped the nearest plate on the floor, where it shattered. 'Married?' said Henry. 'You're marrying your father's friends on the Council? Which of them?

It's true, I did say I wanted girlfriends," I capitulated hesitantly, "but couldn't we start with something smaller and less terrifying? Like maybe spend a weekend at a crack house? I heard those people are very nonjudgmental, and if you accidentally say something offensive you can just blame it on their hallucinations.

He had two lives: one, open, seen and known by all who cared to know, full of relative truth and of relative falsehood, exactly like the lives of his friends and acquaintances; and another life running its course in secret. And through some strange, perhaps accidental, conjunction of circumstances, everything that was essential, of interest and of value to him, everything in which he was sincere and did not deceive himself, everything that made the kernel of his life, was hidden from other people.

But if she had Clay and Turtle as friends, and then Turtle got himself killed by Queen Scarlet or accidentally set on fire, well, then she’d survive OK, because she’d still have Clay. It occurred to her that this was a rather morbid train of thought to be having about a new friend.

She certainly did not hate him. No; hatred had vanished long ago, and she had almost as long been ashamed of ever feeling a dislike against him, that could be so called. The respect created by the conviction of his valuable qualities, though at first unwillingly admitted, had for some time ceased to be repugnant to her feelings; and it was now heightened into somewhat of a friendlier nature, by the testimony so highly in his favour, and bringing forward his disposition in so amiable a light, which yesterday had produced. But above all, above respect and esteem, there was a motive within her of good will which could not be overlooked. It was gratitude.--Gratitude not merely for having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough, to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him, and all the unjust accusations accompanying her rejection. He who, she had been persuaded, would avoid her as his greatest enemy, seemed, on this accidental meeting, most eager to preserve the acquaintance, and without any indelicate display of regard, or any peculiarity of manner, where their two selves only were concerned, was soliciting the good opinion of her friends, and bent on making her known to his sister. Such a change in a man of so much pride, excited not only astonishment but gratitude--for to love, ardent love, it must be attributed; and as such its impression on her was of a sort to be encouraged, as by no means unpleasing, though it could not exactly be defined.

I can't bury another friend." "You won't." "If anything ever happened to you, Rowan-" "Don't" he breathed. "Don't even say it. We dealt with that enough the other night." He lifted a hand - hesitated, and then brushed back a strand of hair that had fallen across her face. His callused fingers scrapped against her cheekbone, then caressed the shell of her ear. It was foolish to even start down that road, when every other man she'd let in had left some wound, in one way or another, accidentally or not. There was nothing tender in his face. Only a predator's glittering gaze. "When we get back," he said, "remind me to prove you wrong about every thought that just went through your head." She lifted an eyebrow. "Oh?" He gave her a sly smile that made thinking impossible. Exactly what he wanted - to distract her from the horrors of tomorrow. "I'll even let you decide how I tell you: with words"- his eyes flickered once to her mouth- "or with my teeth and tongue.

I’m smart in some ways- pretty good vocabulary, solid at math – but I am definitely the stupidest smart person there is… I was going to be the worst friend in the history of dying girls… Because I don’t really have a moral compass and I need to rely on (Earl) for guidance, or else I might accidentally become like a hermit or a terrorist or something. How fucked up is that.

No Angie, it's instant. Like when someone trips in the cafeteria and you're laughing so hard milk comes out of your nose, the guy next to you is laughing so hard he accidentally farts. BOOM! Friends for life!

When we return, I will put you forward for Ascension,” Charlotte finished. “I will speak out for her case as well,” Gideon said. “After all, I have my father’s place on the Council—his friends will listen to me; they still owe loyalty to our family—and besides, how else can we be married?” “What?” said Gabriel with a wild hand gesture that accidentally flipped the nearest plate onto the floor, where it shattered. “Married?” said Henry. “You’re marrying your father’s friends on the Council? Which of them?

My daughter described her imaginary friend Lily as a girl who was always covered in blood. Lily is the name of the little girl who died in an accidental hit-and-run I was responsible for.

In Egypt: Under no conditions, under threat of death could anyone kill a cat. People were exceuted for even killing a cat accidentally. And when a cat died, the whole family, and probably their closest friends, went into mourning, the measure of their personal loss signalled by their shaving off their eyebrows.

A little boy and his friends are being called bastards and bitches by bullies at school. The boy goes home and asks, "Dad, what are bastards and bitches?" And his dad replies, "Bitches are ladies and bastards are gentlemen." Then the boy goes upstairs to see his mom. As he enters the room, he accidentally drops a perfume bottle, and his mom says, "Shit!" "Mom, what is shit?" and she says, "Perfume." So he goes to see his dad (who is carving a chicken), and his dad cuts himself and yells, "Fuck!" The boy asks, "Dad, what does fuck mean?" and dad says "preparing." Then he follows his dad upstairs. A few minutes later his mom and dad are about to have sex when his dad says, "Where are the condoms?" The little boy asks, "What are condoms?" and his father says, "Condoms are coats and jackets." The following night his father invites over some important business clients. The boy opens the door for them and says, "Hello! Please come in, Bastards and bitches. Hang your condoms up here, my mom is upstairs rubbing shit on her face and my dad is downstairs fucking the chicken.

My head don't work any more and it's hard for me to understand how anybody could care if he lived or died or was dying or cared about anything but whether or not there was liquor left in the bottle and so I said what I said without thinking. In some ways I'm no better than the others, in some ways worse because I'm less alive. Maybe it's being alive that makes them lie, and being almost not alive that makes me sort of accidentally truthful--I don't know but--anyway--we've been friends...And being friends is telling each other the truth...

If you’re reading this, you’re probably a woman. Or perhaps you’re a gay man getting a present for your even gayer friend. Maybe you accidentally bought this thinking it was the Malala book.

Just as the hand rushes involuntarily to protect one's honor in case of accidental state of undress, so does a friend come to his friend's aid without being asked

Warning: Contains old friends, old enemies, a dramatic cat rescue, soft drink references and a lot of teasing before the steamy sex. Readers are cautioned against drinking any beverage while reading to avoid accidental snorting or spraying of said beverages.

And, let me compliment your fashionable attire, my friend. Is naked the new black?” said Rodrigo. Apparently, the two men could see each other. That figures; all monsters can see in dark. “I am uncertain of what happened to the old black while I have been indisposed,” Niccolo replied flatly.

It is a difficult question, my friends, for any young man-- that question I had to grapple with, and which thousands are weighing at the present moment in these uprising times-- whether to follow uncritically the track he finds himself in, without considering his aptness for it, or to consider what his aptness or bent may be, and re-shape his course accordingly. I tried to do the latter, and I failed. But I don't admit that my failure proved my view to be a wrong one, or that my success would have made it a right one; though that's how we appraise such attempts nowadays--I mean, not by their essential soundness, but by their accidental outcomes. If I had ended by becoming like one of these gentlemen in red and black that we saw dropping in here by now, everybody would have said: 'See how wise that young man was, to follow the bent of his nature!' But having ended no better than I began they say: 'See what a fool that fellow was in following a freak of his fancy!

Words actually failed me. I felt as dumb as my lounge-less friend in the corner. "You injected me with vampire blood?" My words were said slowly, ensuring that I didn't get one wrong or accidentally call Francis a fucking asshat. "You're a vampire?" Francis' expression managed to convey how stupid he thought that question was. "I live underground, and you've never seen me outside. I'm pale in complexion ands obviously hundreds of years old. What did you think I was? Agoraphobic?

It's always best to avoid strangling the person you're on a date with. No matter how crazy he makes you.

Lupe Hidalgo is an eclipse. She slides over everything like a glamorous shadow, and even though you know it’s going to hurt, you look anyway. And I accidentally do.

You loved each other so much that you were scared of accidentally breaking each other.

I wanted to deny him, but that's the terrible power of a diary: it not only calls forth the person you used to be but rubs your nose in him, reminding you that not all change is evolutionary. More often than not, you didn't learn from your mistakes. You didn't get wiser, but simply older, growing from the twenty-five-year-old who got stoned and accidentally peed on his friend Katherine's kitten to the thirty-five-year-old who got drunk and peed in the sandbox at his old elementary school. "The sandbox!" my sister Amy said at the time. "Don't you realize that children have to pee in there?

There are many reasons to steer clear of  Christianity. No question. I fully understand why people make that choice. Christianity has survived some unspeakable abominations: the Crusades, clergy sex-scandals, papal corruption, televangelist scams, and clown ministry. But it will survive us, too. It will survive our mistakes and pride and exclusion of others. I believe that the power of  Christianity — the thing that made the very first disciples drop their nets and walk away from everything they knew, the thing that caused Mary Magdalene to return to the tomb and then announce the resurrection of Christ, the thing that the early Christians martyred themselves for, and the thing that keeps me in the Jesus business (or, what my Episcopal priest friend Paul calls “working for the company”) — is something that cannot be killed. The power of unbounded mercy, of what we call The Gospel, cannot be destroyed by corruption and toothy TV preachers. Because in the end, there is still Jesus.

Helena abruptly stopped, cursing herself for deciding to go on this stupid trip to the ruins. If only she’d stayed at the hotel with her friends, none of this would’ve happened. Now her life was basically over; she’d end up dinner or a prisoner of some deranged nudist vampire.

I meant to text quickly, but it took five attempts to type with my thumbs. Ever since the time I accidentally told Wick I'd stopped for cocaine instead of coffee and when Mel, my best friend, asked me to get penis instead of pedis, I lost my faith in technology and proofread all my messages

Lord, convert our friends that still remain unsaved. Oh mighty power of God, let none come into this house even accidentally and casually without receiving some devout impression.

You find out who your real friends are when you call and tell 'em you just accidentally killed a hooker and they show up with a shovel and full tank of gas.

small coven I could count on to cast spells on my enemies. Brené Brown calls these friends “move a body” friends. You know. The people you call when you accidentally murder somebody.

When I stay with the couple who are my closest friends, I hear them laughing and talking in bed, and sometimes in the middle of the night one of them goes down and makes tea, and when the clock goes off in the morning, they start again, talking to each other.

Her old introverted instincts told her to fold in on herself and, in lieu of actually speaking to other humans, dream up scenarios in the shower where she and some chick would accidentally grab each other’s orders at a cute smoothie spot, and POOF: instant best friend origin story.

I think you’re more an archivist than a librarian,” he said. He told me that archivists and librarians were opposite personas. True librarians are unsentimental. They’re pragmatic, concerned with the newest, cleanest, most popular books. Archivists, on the other hand, are only peripherally interested in what other people like, and much prefer the rare to the useful. ”They like everything,” he said, “gum wrappers as much as books.” He said this with a hint of disdain. ”Librarians like throwing away garbage to make space, but archivists,” he said, “they’re too crazy to throw anything out.” ”You’re right,” I said. ”I’m more of an archivist.” ”And I’m more of a librarian,” he said. ”Can we still be friends?

I wrote a sample message, and then deleted the draft in case I might accidentally hit send. Then I wrote the same thing over again. I sat staring at my laptop screen until it went black. Things matter to me more than they do to normal people, I thought. I need to relax and let things go. I should experiment with drugs. These thoughts were not unusual for me.

Emira had met several "Mrs. Chamberlains" before. They were all rich and overly nice and particularly lovely to the people that served them. Emira knew that Mrs. Chamberlain wanted a friendship, but she also knew that Mrs. Chamberlain would never display the same efforts of kindness with her friends as she did with Emira: "accidentally" ordering two salads and offering one to Emira, or sending her home with a bag filled with frozen dinners and soups.

We are not into trying to educate white America, but may we accidentally did. Maybe white readers learned that just because your Black friends aren't sitting you down, going over all their trauma with you, doesn't mean it doesn't exist!

But above all, above respect and esteem, there was a motive within her of good will which could not be overlooked. It was gratitude. -- Gratitude, not merely for having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough, to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him, and all the unjust accusations accompanying her rejection. He who, she had been persuaded, would avoid her as his greatest enemy, seemed, on this accidental meeting, most eager to preserve the acquaintance, and without any indelicate display of regard, or any peculiarity of manner, where their two selves only were concerned, was soliciting the good opinion of her friends, and bent on making her known to his sister.

I have a fairy godmother named Mr. Nuggy, and he accidentally turned into a chicken.

As he was speaking, he kept reminding himself that he was going to a rendezvous and that not a living soul knew about it, or, probably, ever would. He led a double life--one in public, in the sight of all whom it concerned, full of conventional truth and conventional deception, exactly like the lives of his friends and acquaintances, and another which flowed in secret. And, owing to some strange, possibly quite accidental chain of circumstances, everything that was important, interesting, essential, everything about which he was sincere and never deceived himself, everything that composed the kernel of his life, went on in secret, while everything that was false in him, everything that composed the husk in which he hid himself and the truth which was in him--his work at the bank, discussions at the club, his 'lower race,' his attendance at anniversary celebrations with his wife--was on the surface. He began to judge others by himself, no longer believing what he saw, and always assuming that the real, the only interesting life of every individual goes on as under cover of night, secretly. Every individual existence revolves around mystery, and perhaps that is the chief reason that all cultivated individuals insisted so strongly on the respect due to personal secrets.

Church is messed up. I know that. People, including me, have been hurt by it. But as my United Church of  Christ pastor friend Heather says, “Church isn’t perfect. It’s practice.” Among God’s people, those who have been knocked on their asses by the grace of  God, we practice giving and receiving the undeserved. And receiving grace is basically the best shitty feeling in the world. I don’t want to need it. Preferably I could just do it all and be it all and never mess up. That may be what I would prefer, but it is never what I need. I need to be broken apart and put back into a different shape by that merging of things human and divine, which is really screwing up and receiving grace and love and forgiveness rather than receiving what I really deserve. I need the very thing that I will do everything I can to avoid needing. The sting of grace is not unlike the sting of  being loved well, because when we are loved well, it is inextricably linked to all the times we have not been loved well, all the times we ourselves have not loved others well, and all the things we’ve done or not done that feel like evidence against our worthiness.

When I got to school the next morning I had stepped only one foot in the quad when he spotted me and nearly tackled me to the ground. “Jamie!” he hollered, rushing across the lawn without caring the least bit about the scene he was creating. The next thing I knew, my feet were off the ground and I was squished so tightly in Ryan’s arms that I could barely breathe. “Okay, Ryan?” I coughed in a hushed tone. “This is exactly the kind of thing that can get you killed.” “I don’t care, I’m not letting go. Don’t ever disappear like that again!” he scolded, but his voice was more relieved than angry. “It’s been days! You had your mother worried sick!” “My mother?” I questioned sarcastically. Ryan laughed as he finally set me back on my feet. “Okay, fine, me too.” He still wouldn’t let go of me, though. He was gripping my arms while he looked at me with those eyes, and that smile… You know, being all Ryan-ish. And then, when I got lost in the moment, he totally took advantage of how whipped I was and he kissed me. The jerk. He just pulled my face to his right then and there, in the middle of a crowded quad full of students, where I could have accidentally unleashed an electrical storm at any moment. And okay, maybe I liked it, and maybe I even needed it, but still! You can’t just go kissing Jamie Baker whenever you want, even if you are Ryan Miller! “Ryan!” I yelled as soon as I was able to pull away from him—which admittedly took a minute. “I’m sorry.” Ryan laughed with this big dopey grin on his face and then kissed me some more. I had to push him away from me. “Don’t be sorry, just stop!” I realized I was screaming at him when I felt a hundred different pairs of eyes on me. I tried to ignore the audience that Ryan seemed oblivious to and dropped the audio a few decibels. “I wasn’t kidding when I said this has to stop. Look, I will be your friend. I want to be your friend. But that’s it. We can’t be anything more. It’ll never work.” Ryan watched me for a minute and then whispered, “Don’t do that.” I was shocked to hear the sudden emotion in his voice. “Don’t give up.” It was hopeless. “Fine!” I snapped. “I’ll be your stupid girlfriend!” Big shocker, me giving Ryan his way, I know. But let’s face it—it’s just what I do best. I had to at least act a little tough, though. “But!” I said in the harshest voice I was capable of. “You can’t ever touch me unless I say. No more tackling me, and especially no more surprise kissing.” He actually laughed at my request. “No promises.” Stupid, cocky boyfriend. “You’re crazy. You know that, right?” Ryan got this big cheesy smile on his face and said, “Crazy about you.” “Ugh,” I groaned. “Would you be serious for a minute? Why do you insist on putting your life in danger?” “Because I like you.” His stupid grin was infectious. I wanted to be angry, but how could I with him looking at me like that? “I’m not worth it, you know,” I said stubbornly. “I have issues. I’m unstable.” “You’re cute when you’re unstable,” Ryan said, “and I like your issues.” The stupid boy was straight-up giddy now. But he was so cute that I cracked a smile despite myself. “You really are crazy,” I muttered.

As to the Divine Design, is it not an instance of incomprehensibly and infinitely marvellous Wisdom and Design to have given certain laws to matter millions of ages ago, which have surely and precisely worked out, in the long course of those ages, those effects which He from the first proposed. Mr. Darwin's theory need not then to be atheistical, be it true or not; it may simply be suggesting a larger idea of Divine Prescience and Skill. Perhaps your friend has got a surer clue to guide him than I have, who have never studied the question, and I do not [see] that 'the accidental evolution of organic beings' is inconsistent with divine design—It is accidental to us, not to God.

My personal experiences of openly declaring myself a survivor taught me that if you want to tell someone that their friend or acquaintance raped you, you must be prepared for an intense examination of your every mistake, accidental dishonesty or white lie. If they can find anything (which they will, because we are human) it may well be enough for them to discredit you in their own minds, because that is easier than accepting rapists live among us. They are not scary monsters hiding in the dark, they are part of our society, our colleagues and our friends. If

In some ways I'm no better than the others, in some ways I'm worse because I'm less alive. Maybe it's being alive that makes them lie, and being almost not alive makes me sort of accidentally truthful - I don't know but - anyway - we've been friends... - And being friends is telling each other the truth...

You’re correct that I’ve never experienced poverty, but you’ve never experienced a man you’ve grown up with for 20 years, more brother than friend, try to assassinate you because another man wanted what was yours. You’ve never had your older sister gouge you in the leg with a throwing star and try to end your life. You’ve never had to live every day knowing the only thing between you and a body bag is a good bodyguard and the people who would kill you being too afraid of what you’d do if they failed.

Sometimes when I was doing something dull, like walking home from work or hanging up laundry, I liked to imagine that I looked like Bobbi. She had better posture than I did, and a memorably beautiful face. The pretence was so real to me that when I accidentally caught sight of my reflection and saw my own appearance, I felt a strange, depersonalising shock.

And that, my friend, is why you’re not even close to second place,” I replied. “Weak men destroy. Strong men build.

That’s the best proof of our absurd existence, my dear friend: Nobody’s granted a final day, just an accidental interruption in his life.

The pretense was so real to me that when I accidentally caught sight of my reflection and saw my own appearance, I felt a strange depersonalizing shock

Step one in Brad’s Guide to Finding Himself and Falling in Love: Make a new friend. Nailed it.

I could easily be Skylar’s friend. Sometimes friends accidentally kiss. Sometimes friends get accidental raging hard-ons thinking about said kiss. Totally normal.

My eyes accidentally drift back down to his chest, and I think of Wila and her friends, laughing and giggling. Patrick Mansfield. A god. God is a pretty good description.

We thought about Thanksgiving, planned for Thanksgiving and talked of Thanksgiving for weeks beforehand, but the evening before the actual day was the best time of all. Then the house seethed with children and dogs, with friends and cooks, and with delightful smells of baking pie, turkey stuffing and coffee. Every time the doorbell rang we put on another pot of coffee and washed the cups and by the time we went to bed we were so nervous and flighty that when accidentally bumped or brushed against, we buzzed and lit up like pin-ball machines.

Food isn’t just food, though. It’s comfort and memory. It’s family recipes and meals shared with friends. Food is a fulcrum of socializing and relationships, and now you don’t get to just show up to that. You have to think ahead and tell people your dietary needs and explain them again when they’re lunkheads about it or, worse, well-meaning, but very poor at understanding it. You’ll probably end up accidentally eating something that hurts you every once in a while, and going to a restaurant will sort of suck until you find places that have nice gluten-free options. It’s a big deal. It’s a disease that’s interrupted and fundamentally altered your lifestyle, impacted your relationships. It’s very valid to be upset about that.

Eternal Friend, I hereby forgive anyone who hurt, upset, or offended me; damaging my body, my property, my reputation, or people whom I love; whether done accidentally or willfully, carelessly or purposely; whether done with words, deeds, thoughts, or attitudes; whether in this lifetime or another incarnation. I forgive every person; may no one be punished because of me. After

I'll be right here. Good luck, or break a leg, or something.” As Jay and Gregory turned and headed into the crowd, my traitorous eyes returned to the corner and found another pair or eyes staring darkly back. I dropped my gaze for three full seconds, and then lifted my eyes again, hesitant. The drummer was still staring at me, oblivious to the three girls trying to win back his attention. He put up one finger at the girls and said something that looked like, “Excuse me.” Oh, my goodness. Was he...? Oh, no. Yes, he was walking this way. My nerves shot into high alert. I looked around, but nobody else was near. When I looked back up, there he was, standing right in front of me. Good gracious, he was sexy-a word that had not existed in my personal vocabulary until that moment. This guy was sexy like it was his job or something. He looked straight into my eyes, which threw me off guard, because nobody ever looked me in the eye like that. Maybe Patti and Jay, but they didn't hold my stare like he was doing now. He didn't look away, and I found that I couldn't take my gaze off those blue eyes. “Who are you?” he asked in a blunt, almost confrontational way. I blinked. It was the strangest greeting I'd ever received. “I'm...Anna.” “Right. Anna. How very nice.” I tried to focus on his words and not his luxuriously accented voice, which made everything sound lovely. He leaned in closer. “But who are you?” What did that mean? Did I need to have some sort of title or social standing to enter his presence? “I just came with my friend Jay?” Oh, I hated when I got nervous and started talking in questions. I pointed in the general direction of the guys, but he didn't take his eyes off me. I began rambling. “They just wrote some songs. Jay and Gregory. That they wanted you to hear. Your band, I mean. They're really...good?” His eyes roamed all around my body, stopping to evaluate my sad, meager chest. I crossed my arms. When his gaze landed on that stupid freckle above my lip, I was hit by the scent of oranges and limes and something earthy, like the forest floor. It was pleasant in a masculine way. “Uh-huh.” He was closer to my face now, growling in that deep voice, but looking into my eyes again. “Very cute. And where is your angel?” My what? Was that some kind of British slang for boyfriend? I didn't know how to answer without continuing to sound pitiful. He lifted his dark eyebrows, waiting. “If you mean Jay, he's over there talking to some man in a suit. But he's not my boyfriend or my angel or whatever.” My face flushed with heat and I tightened my arms over my chest. I'd never met anyone with an accent like his, and I was ashamed of the effect it had on me. He was obviously rude, and yet I wanted him to keep talking to me. It didn't make any sense. His stance softened and he took a step back, seeming confused, although I still couldn't read his emotions. Why didn't he show any colors? He didn't seem drunk or high. And that red thing...what was that? It was hard not to stare at it. He finally looked over at Jay, who was deep in conversation with the manager-type man. “Not your boyfriend, eh?” He was smirking at me now. I looked away, refusing to answer. “Are you certain he doesn't fancy you?” Kaidan asked. I looked at him again. His smirk was now a naughty smile. “Yes,” I assured him with confidence. “I am.” “How do you know?” I couldn't very well tell him that the only time Jay's color had shown mild attraction to me was when I accidentally flashed him one day as I was taking off my sweatshirt, and my undershirt got pulled up too high. And even then it lasted only a few seconds before our embarrassment set in.

It was true that she didn't have many friends, not of the flesh-and-blood variety, but the fact did not upset her. It was tiring, all that smiling and sharing and speculating about the weather, and she always left a gathering, no matter how intimate, feeling depleted, as if she'd accidentally left behind some vital layers of herself she'd never get back. --Part I: The Satchel> Chapter 1

They had vacationed in Hawaii, shared a house in the Santa Cruz mountains, and even gone to one of Baez’s concerts together. As his relationship with Jasinski flamed out, Jobs began getting more serious with Baez. He was twenty-seven and Baez was forty-one, but for a few years they had a romance. “It turned into a serious relationship between two accidental friends who became lovers,” Jobs recalled in a somewhat wistful tone.

The Catechism explained that praying for the souls of the dead is a tradition going back to the first Christians and to the Jews before them. On the walls of the catacombs, where the earliest Christians worshipped, there were scrawled prayers for friends who’d died during persecutions. The living sent their love for the deceased into the spiritual world, like adding water to a stream that would eventually float their lost friends home.

Survival value and civilisation value coincide at some periods and in some circumstances, but not in all. What at any rate seems certain is that when Friendship bears fruit which the community can use it has to do so accidentally, as a by-product. Religions devised for a social purpose, like Roman emperor-worship or modern attempts to ‘sell’ Christianity as a means of ‘saving civilisation’, do not come to much. The little knots of Friends who turn their backs on the ‘World’ are those who really transform it.

According to the L.A. news, the explosion at the Santa Monica beach had been caused when a crazy kidnapper fired a shotgun at a police car. He accidentally hit a gas main that had ruptured during the earthquake. This crazy kidnapper (a.k.a. Ares) was the same man who had abducted me and two other adolescents in New York and brought us across country on a ten-day odyssey of terror. Poor little Percy Jackson wasn’t an international criminal after all. He’d caused a commotion on that Greyhound bus in New Jersey trying to get away from his captor (and afterward, witnesses would even swear they had seen the leather-clad man on the bus—“Why didn’t I remember him before?”). The crazy man had caused the explosion in the St. Louis Arch. After all, no kid could’ve done that. A concerned waitress in Denver had seen the man threatening his abductees outside her diner, gotten a friend to take a photo, and notified the police. Finally, brave Percy Jackson (I was beginning to like this kid) had stolen a gun from his captor in Los Angeles and battled him shotgun-to-rifle on the beach. Police had arrived just in time. But in the spectacular explosion, five police cars had been destroyed and the captor had fled. No fatalities had occurred. Percy Jackson and his two friends were safely in police custody.

A guy approached her, beer bottle in one hand, smiling at her in that way guys do when they think they’re good- looking enough to smile and get anything they want. “My friend and I were just talking about what a sausage fest this was, and then you came in.” He ran his appraising gaze down her body, lingering on the V of her neckline. Faith crossed her arms. “That works out, because I’m here for a weenie roast. He put a protective hand over his package—probably without realizing he was doing it—but his smile widened.

Now talking about my best friends, Samara and Zara, I need to write they are perfect in being really my friends and they have been a part of my support in the present days and I am content to have them beside me here in the Campus. Accidentally Angels 2 - Pet TorreS

A recognisable picture of a spoilt 22-year-old girl experiencing her first love affair, knowing that she is infatuated with a totally unsuitable man who will alienate her friends and eventually cause herself serious damage, yet determined to press ahead whatever the cost.

Here’s a theory: Maybe I had not really been broken this whole time. Maybe I had been a human—flawed and still growing but full of light nonetheless. All this time, I had received plenty of love, but I’d given it, too. Unbeknownst to me, I had been scattering goodness all around like fun-sized chocolates accidentally falling out of my purse as I moved through the world. Perhaps the only real thing that was broken was the image I had of myself—punishing and unfair, narrow and hypercritical. Perhaps what was really happening was that, along with all my flaws, I was a fucking wonder. And I continue to be a fucking wonder. A fun, dependable friend who will always call you back, cook for you, and fiercely defend your honor. A devoted sister and daughter who prioritises and appreciates family in ways less-traumatised people can never quite understand. A hardworking, capable employee who brings levity and mischievousness to the offices I inhabit. I am a person who is generous with her love, who is present in texts and calls and affirmations, because I know so intimately how powerful that love can be.

It looks as though your shop is doing well,” Luka said, gazing around. “Could you help me find a gift for a lady friend of mine?” My heart plunged to my green satin slippers, and I had to stare down at Azarte for a minute, petting him hard. Naturally Luka had a “lady friend.” She was probably nobly born: the daughter of a count or a duke. I imagined her having thick dark hair and clear skin, and was bitterly jealous. “Of c-course,” I stammered after a time. “What would she like? A gown? A sash?” If she came in for a fitting, I decided to “accidentally” poke her with every pin. “Hmm, well, she is wearing a lovely gown today,” he said. “Although no sash.” So. He’d already seen her today, and it was not yet noon. I rubbed Azarte’s ears furiously. “What color is her gown?” “It’s sort of green, with more green, and the design looks like stained glass windows,” he said. “It’s very beautiful, like her.” I stopped petting the dog and looked up at him, not sure what I was hearing. “Oh?” My heart thumped painfully. “Yes, so perhaps she doesn’t need a sash after all. No sense gilding the lily.” He gave a melancholy sigh. “But I really would love to give her a very special gift. I was hoping if I did, she might give me a kiss in return, instead of the brotherly hugs I always get instead.” I raised my eyebrows, trying for casual interest even though I could feel my pulse beating in the blood rushing to my cheeks. “I know!” Luka snapped his fingers. “Forget a sash. I’ll give her this!” And with a flourish, he pulled a roll of parchment from his belt pouch. More confused than ever, I unrolled the paper and read. It was a letter from a priest in the Southern Counties, addressed to King Caxel. In it the priest begged for a grant of money. They had recently built a large chapel, the finest that had ever been dedicated to the Triune Gods in that region, and it had only been completed the year before. “But we do need another grant from the crown,” the priest wrote. “For a most heinous act of vandalism has taken place. Our rose-glass window, which illuminates the Triple Altar in glorious colors pleasing to the gods, has been stolen. It was removed from its frame the night before last, and not a pane of it can be found.” “Shardas?” I looked up at Luka with my eyes brimming. “Shardas!” “I have a pair of horses waiting outside,” Luka said. “We can be at Feniul’s cave by nightfall.” I threw my arms around him again, and this time I gave him the kiss he’d been waiting for.

There are cases that I just can't forget.....What it is. I don't know. I think it's the ones where something small changes everything. Where the tiniest act , the smallest space of time, the most inconsequential of decisions, changes a life. A split second separates the long-lost friends who either see or miss each other at an airport. And from that , a relationship does or does not develop, perhaps a lifetime partnership,, perhaps even children. Human beings who might or might not have existed. Whole lives built out of the most fragile of happenstance. And maybe that's why our lives are beautiful; why they're tragic. One perfect child can be born of an accidental encounter, and another lost to a split-second lapse in attention. If a motorist leans over to change a radio station at the same moment that it first occurs to a four year old that he can let go of his mother's hand as easily as hang onto it, and that if he lets go he will be across the road first, before his mother, and that she will certainly laugh and say, "How fast you are, Johnny!" If the child does this and the motorist does that , and if the world then changes forever and unbearably for everyone involved, then is that not life in its simplest form? That so little matters so much, and so much matters so little.

Rather than struggling to be a 'perfect' vegan—freaking out if you accidentally ingest an animal ingredient you hadn’t heard of before—adopt the 'practice makes progress' approach. Keep trying new recipes and share them with friends and family. Do all you can to avoid animal byproducts, but don’t beat yourself up if you eat something by mistake.

I do have a bad habit,” he says. “of falling in love. With regularity and to spectacular effect. You see, it never goes well.” I wonder if this conversation makes him think of our kiss, but then, I was the one who kissed him. He’d only kissed back. “As charming as you are, how can that be?” I say. He laughs again. “That’s what my sister Taryn always says. She tells me that I remind her of her late husband. Which makes some sense, since I would be his half brother. But it’s also alarming, because she’s the one who murdered him.” Much as when he spoke about Madoc, it’s strange how fond Oak can sound when he tells me a horrifying thing a member of his family has done. “Whom have you fallen in love with?” I ask. “Well, there was you,” the prince says. “When we were children.” “Me?” I ask incredulously. “You didn’t know?” He appears to be merry in the face of my astonishment. “Oh yes. Though you were a year my senior, and it was hopeless, I absolutely mooned over you. When you were gone from Court, I refused any food but tea and toast for a month.” I cannot help snorting over the sheer absurdity of his statement. He puts a hand to my heart. “Ah, and now you laugh. It is my curse to adore cruel women. He cannot expect me to believe he had real feelings. “Stop with your games.” “Very well,” he says. “Shall we go to the next? Her name was Lara, a mortal at the school I attended when I lived with my eldest sister and her girlfriend. Sometimes Lara and I would climb into the crook of one of the maple trees and share sandwiches. But she had a villainous friend, who implicated me in a piece of gossip—which resulted in Lara stabbing me with a lead pencil and breaking off our relationship.” “You do like cruel women,” I say. “Then there was Violet, a pixie. I wrote terrible poetry about how I adored her. Unfortunately, she adored duels and would get into trouble so that I would have to fight for her honor. And even more unfortunately, neither my sister nor my father bothered to teach me how to fight for show. I thought of the dead-eyed expression on his face before his bout with the ogre and Tiernan’s angry words. “That resulted in my accidentally killing a person she liked better than me.” “Oh,” I say. “That is three levels of unfortunate.” “Then there was Sibi, who wanted to run away from Court with me, but as soon as we went, hated it and wept until I took her home. And Loana, a mermaid, who found my lack of a tail unbearable but tried to drown me anyway, because she found it equally unbearable that I would ever love another.” The way he tells these stories makes me recall how he’s told me many painful things before. Some people laugh in the face of death. He laughed in the face of despair. “How old were you?” “Fifteen, with the mermaid,” he said. “And nearly three years later, I must surely be wiser.” “Surely,” I say, wondering if he was. Wondering if I wanted him to be.

I watched him make his way through the crowd, feeling proud I could call him mine. My boyfriend, my Jeremiah. The first boy I had ever fallen asleep next to. The first boy I ever told about the time I accidentally walked in on my parents doing it when I was eight. The first boy to go out and buy me Midol because my cramps were so bad, the first boy to paint my toenails, to hold my hair back when I threw up that time I got really drunk in front of all his friends, the first boy to write me a love note on the whiteboard hanging outside my dorm room. YOU ARE THE MILK TO MY SHAKE, forever and ever. Love, J. He was the first boy I ever kissed. He was my best friend. More and more, I understood. This was the way it was supposed to be. He was the one. My one.

We have a perfect idea of a natural enemy when we think of the devil, because the enmity is perpetual, unalterable and unabateable. It admits, neither of peace, truce, or treaty; consequently the warfare eternal and therefore is natural. But man with man cannot arrange in the same opposition. Their quarrels are accidental and equivocally created. They become friends or enemies as the change of temper, or the cast of interest inclines them. The Creator of man did not constitute them the natural enemy of each other. He has not made any one order of beings so. Even wolves may quarrel, still they herd together. If any two nations are so, then must all nations be so, otherwise it is not nature but custom, and the offence frequently originates with the accuser.

He had two lives: an open one, seen and known by all who needed to know it, full of conventional truth and conventional falsehood, exactly like the lives of his friends and acquaintances; and another life that went on in secret. And through some strange, perhaps accidental, combination of circumstances, everything that was of interest and importance to him, everything that was essential to him, everything about which he felt sincerely and did not deceive himself, everything that constituted the core of his life was going on concealed from others; while all that was false, the shell in which he hid to cover the truth … went on in the open. Judging others by himself, he did not believe what he saw, and always fancied that every man led his real, most interesting life under cover of secrecy as under cover of night.

Besides, those few people who aren’t a mess are probably good for about twenty minutes of dinner conversation. This is good news, that almost everyone is petty, narcissistic, secretly insecure, and in it for themselves, because a few of the funny ones may actually long to be friends with you and me. They can be real with us, the greatest relief. As we develop love, appreciation, and forgiveness for others over time, we may accidentally develop those things toward ourselves, too.

Besides, those few people who aren’t a mess are probably good for about twenty minutes of dinner conversation. This is good news, that almost everyone is petty, narcissistic, secretly insecure, and in it for themselves, because a few of the funny ones may actually long to be friends with you and me. They can be real with us, the greatest relief. As we develop love, appreciation, and forgiveness for others over time, we may accidentally develop those things toward ourselves, too.

But she needed ice on the roads. She needed her accident to look as accidental as possible. And she just didn’t think she was capable of waiting another three months. Julia, however, knows none of this. She looks down at what remains of her best friend, and she thinks of all the times Liz was quiet and not really there. The times when she was the Liz everyone else knows, all snark and insanity, and the moments when she was the one that stared at invisible things and hadn’t truly smiled in a long time.

I woke a few moments ago from a fever and a host of interlocking fever dreams, one after the next. There was one where I was in London, walking through old abandoned formerly beautiful buildings, all of them about to be demolished. Sometimes I'd find myself walking past the enormous line of people waiting to attend the television memorial for a dead author friend of mine, but his memorial was a television spectacular with comedians and big band music. There was the one where I had accidentally connected my bank card to a portable printer and the little printer kept printing cash but on the wrong paper and at the wrong size, so my money had huge, incredibly detailed faces on it, works of art that could not be spent. Then I woke from one dream into another: I was asleep in the passenger seat of the car, and saw that we were driving through a densely populated town, and that the driver was also asleep. I tried hard to wake her up and failed, and knew that no one was in control, no one was at the wheel, and soon someone was going to be killed, and I was shouting and calling without effect; but I whimpered and snuffled enough in the real world that my wife stroked my face and said, "Honey? You're having a nightmare," and, finally, I woke for real. But I woke into a world in which, somewhere, I am still being driven through my life by a sleeping driver, in which money is only good as art, in which we can write the finest books but at the end the crowds will come out and say good-bye for the entertainment, in which the buildings and cities we inhabit will relentlessly be destroyed by progress and time: a world colored by dreams and illuminated by them, too.

It was gratitude; gratitude, not merely for having once loved her, but for loving her still well enough to forgive all the petulance and acrimony of her manner in rejecting him, and all the unjust accusations accompanying her rejection. He who, she had been persuaded, would avoid her as his greatest enemy, seemed, on this accidental meeting, most eager to preserve the acquaintance, and without any indelicate display of regard, or any peculiarity of manner, where their two selves only were concerned, was soliciting the good opinion of her friends, and bent on making her known to his sister.

A conversation that took place between two American women describes this intimate relationship between physical and immaterial forms of dying. One of these women came to see me soon after her only child, a twenty-year-old son, died from an accidental drug overdose. We spoke of ways to help her live with this tragic loss. About two years later, this woman’s best friend found herself struggling through a very painful divorce. The first woman explained to her friend: My son is never coming back. I entertain no fantasies about this. My relationship to myself and to how I relate to the world has changed forever. But the same is true for you. Your sense of who you are, of who is there for you and who you will travel through life with, has also changed forever. You too need to grieve a death. You are thinking that you have to come to terms with this intolerable situation outside of yourself. But just as I had to allow myself to die after my son’s death, you must die to a marriage that you once had. We grieve for the passing of what we had, but also for ourselves, for our own deaths. The profound misfortune of the death of this woman’s son opened her heart to an exploration of impermanence and death that went far beyond her own personal story.

She could have called up her friends, of course; she had plenty of friends. But with them she would simply have worn her normal face and manner, and kept her own counsel. You do not burden your friends with a sudden stranger half-way to the grave. You hide yourself while the darkness lasts - being, even at this crisis, reasonably secure that it will not last long - and emerge when you are yourself as they know you, and fit for their society again. No, at this moment what you need is a stranger in an express train, someone you need never see again, one of those accidental priests in the fleeting confessionals of this life where souls are often saved against the odds.

When you’re a teenager, everybody is waiting for you to be something or someone else - your friends, your parents, your teachers. Sometimes you lose track. Are you the shy kid in the back of the room who apologizes for even accidentally touching Susan Childress’s arm, or the guy making bombs in the backyard? Are you the helpless nerd with the backpack on hoping you don’t get the snot beat out of you by the school bully, or the helpless nerd with the mask on, hoping you don’t get the snot beat out of you by the town’s newest supervillain? Or maybe you’re just the helpless nerd staring at the helpless nerd in the mirror, talking to yourself, wondering which one of you needs more help.

Claire reads the tagline on the newsfeed detailing some kind of murder investigation. “The victim was strangled in her bedroom with friends just outside her door. There appears to be evidence of indignity to the body and may be the work of a serial killer. Police are considering a link to previous cases where the death has been made to look accidental or natural. This is the first case where…” Claire stops to pay closer attention, but the news switches to some other story. Claire quickly moves over to the television and starts switching channels to find more on the story she just heard. There is nothing. What is going on? She wonders. The class resumes in chit-chat, loud whispers, and long-faces.

Because DT was the origin. The end and the beginning. The monster in the dark, the creator, the source. Everything that had happened traced right back to him. All of it. Andie Bell knew who DT was and she was terrified, so she sold drugs for Howie Bowers to save up money to escape, to get far away from Fairview. She sold Rohypnol to Max Hastings, who then used those drugs to rape her little sister, Becca. Andie pursued Elliot Ward in her desperate plan to escape to Yale with Sal. Elliot thought he accidentally killed Andie, so he murdered Sal to cover it up, Ravi’s brother dead in the woods. But Elliot didn’t kill Andie, not really; it was Becca Bell, too angry and shocked at her sister’s role in her own tragedy that she froze and let Andie die from her head injury, choking on her own vomit. Five years went by and then Pip came along, uncovered all those truths. Elliot in prison, Becca in prison though she shouldn’t be, Max not in prison though he should be. And, most importantly, Howie Bowers in prison. Howie told his cellmate that he knew the real Child Brunswick. The cellmate told his cousin, who told a friend, who told a friend, who put the rumor online. Charlie Green read that rumor and came to Fairview. Layla Mead, wearing the face of Stella Chapman. Jamie Reynolds missing. Stanley Forbes with six holes blown in him, bleeding out on Pip’s hands. Three different stories, but one interconnected knot. And in the center of that writhing knot, grinning at her from the dark, was DT

I can’t recapture that feeling of euphoric gratitude any more than I can really remember the mortal terror I felt when I was pretty sure I had about four minutes to live. But I know that it really happened, that that state of grace is accessible to us, even if I only blundered across it once and never find my way back. At my cabin on the Chesapeake Bay I’ll see bald eagles swoop up from the water with wriggling little fish in their talons, and whenever they accidentally drop their catch, I like to imagine that fish trying to tell his friends about his own near-death experience, a perspective so unprecedented there are no words in the fish language to describe it: for a short time he was outside the world, he could see forever, there’s so much more than they knew, but he’s glad to be back.

A common lament of the World War II generation is the absence today of personal responsibility. Broderick remembers listening to an NPR broadcast and hearing an account of how two boys found a loaded gun in one of their homes. The visiting boy accidentally shot his friend. The victim’s father was on the radio, talking about suing the gun manufacturer. That got to Tom Broderick. “So,” he said, “here’s this man talking about suing and he’s not accepting responsibility for having a loaded gun in the house.” Tom knows something about personal responsibility. He’s been forced to live as a blind man for more than fifty years, and when asked about the moment when the lights were literally shot out of his eyes, he says only, “It was my fault for getting too high in the foxhole. That happens sometimes.

I would say to people, “I’m looking for new friends” and people would hear, “I have no friends”,’ Rachel B tells me over the phone from Chicago. ‘I had friends – just none in my current city. We feel desperate or weird reaching out for friendship, but we shouldn’t. It’s important.’ True. Friends listen to you, laugh with you, give you advice, encourage you, inspire you, fill your life with joy. A big source of my loneliness is not having a close friend I can call and meet for coffee at a moment’s notice and share everything that’s been happening in my life. Or a group of friends to go out with. Nothing big. Not too showy. A small coven I could count on to cast spells on my enemies. Brené Brown calls these friends ‘move a body’ friends. You know. The people you call when you accidentally murder someone.

The lie stands alone, the solitary deceit with its back turned no matter the direction of your reluctant approach, and with each step your goal is driven on, your stride carried astray, the path enfolding upon itself, round and round you walk and what stood alone before you, errant as mischance, an accidental utterance, now reveals its legion of children, this mass seething in threads and knots and surrounded, you cannot draw breath, cannot move. The world is of your making and one day, my friend, you will stand alone amidst a sea of dead, the purchasing of your words all about you and the wind will laugh you a new path into unending torment -the solitary deceit is its solitude, the lie is the lie standing alone, the threads and knots of the multitude tighten in righteous judgement with which you once so freely strangled every truthsayer, every voice of dissent.

Considering that I tried to be friendly with everyone, I was never honoured with anyone's “friendship”. Horiki and other friends for entertainment like him, do not count. Every communication left me with a bitter feeling, and to get rid of it I had to play out a barbed comedy routine, but it only wore me out even more. And if I happened to accidentally meet someone I knew, or even a person who just looked like one of the rare people I knew, it sent shivers down my spine. When it happened that I was well regarded, I was not able to love people. (Speaking of which, I doubt that in this world such “love for people” exists.) Consequently, “friendship“ was something I was unable to reach, I could not even manage such a simple gesture as a “friendly visit“. I associated the gates of other people's houses with the gates of hell, behind which a bloodthirsty and monstrous dragon was waiting for me. I had no friends. I had nowhere to go.

Satanism encourages any form of sexual expression you may desire, so long as it hurts no one else. This statement must be qualified, to avoid misinterpretation. By not hurting another, this does not include unintentional hurt felt by those who might not agree with your views on sex, because of their anxieties regarding sexual morality. Naturally, you should avoid offending others who mean a great deal to you, such as prudish friends and relatives. However, if you earnestly endeavor to escape hurting them, and despite your efforts they accidentally find out, you cannot be held responsible, and therefore should feel no guilt as a result of either your sexual convictions, or their being hurt because of those convictions. If you are in constant fear of offending the prudish by your attitude towards sex, then there is no sense in trying to emancipate yourself from sexual guilt. However, no purpose is served by flaunting your permissiveness.

Hiya, cutie! How was your first day of school?" She pops the oven shut with her hip. He shakes his head and pulls up a bar stool next to Rayna, who's sitting at the counter painting her nails the color of a red snapper. "This won't work. I don't know what I'm doing," he says. "Sweet pea, what happened? Can't be that bad." He nods. "It is. I knocked Emma unconscious." Rachel spits the wine back in her glass. "Oh, sweetie, uh...that sort of thing's been frowned upon for years now." "Good. You owed her one," Rayna snickers. "She shoved him at the beach," she explains to Rachel. "Oh?" Rachel says. "That how she got your attention?" "She didn't shove me; she tripped into me," he says. "And I didn't knock her out on purpose. She ran from me, so I chased her and-" Rachel holds up her hand. "Okay. Stop right there. Are the cops coming by? You know that makes me nervous." "No," Galen says, rolling his eyes. If the cops haven't found Rachel by now, they're not going to. Besides, after all this time, the cops wouldn't still be looking. And the other people who want to find her think she's dead. "Okay, good. Now, back up there, sweet pea. Why did she run from you?" "A misunderstanding." Rachel clasps her hands together. "I know, sweet pea. I do. But in order for me to help you, I need to know the specifics. Us girls are tricky creatures." He runs a hand through his hair. "Tell me about it. First she's being nice and cooperative, and then she's yelling in my face." Rayna gasps. "She yelled at you?" She slams the polish bottle on the counter and points at Rachel. "I want you to be my mother, too. I want to be enrolled in school." "No way. You step one foot outside this house, and I'll arrest you myself," Galen says. "And don't even think about getting in the water with that human paint on your fingers." "Don't worry. I'm not getting in the water at all." Galen opens his mouth to contradict that, to tell her to go home tomorrow and stay there, but then he sees her exasperated expression. He grins. "He found you." Rayna crosses her arms and nods. "Why can't he just leave me alone? And why do you think it's so funny? You're my brother! You're supposed to protect me!" He laughs. "From Toraf? Why would I do that?" She shakes her head. "I was trying to catch some fish for Rachel, and I sensed him in the water. Close. I got out as fast as I could, but probably he knows that's what I did. How does he always find me?" "Oops," Rachel says. They both turn to her. She smiles apologetically at Rayna. "I didn't realize you two were at odds. He showed up on the back porch looking for you this morning and...I invited him to dinner. Sorry." As Galen says, "Rachel, what if someone sees him?" Rayna is saying, "No. No, no, no, he is not coming to dinner." Rachel clears her throat and nods behind them. "Rayna, that's very hurtful. After all we've been through," Toraf says. Rayna bristles on the stool, growling at the sound of his voice. She sends an icy glare to Rachel, who pretends not to notice as she squeezes a lemon slice over the fillets. Galen hops down and greets his friend with a strong punch to the arm. "Hey there, tadpole. I see you found a pair of my swimming trunks. Good to see your tracking skills are still intact after the accident and all." Toraf stares at Rayna's back. "Accident, yes. Next time, I'll keep my eyes open when I kiss her. That way, I won't accidentally bust my nose on a rock again. Foolish me, right?" Galen grins.

We all know the elementary form of politeness, that of the empty symbolic gesture, a gesture-an offer-which is meant to be rejected. In John Irving's A Prayer for Owen Meany, after the little boy Owen accidentally kills John's-his best friend's, the narrator's-mother, he is, of course, terribly upset, so, to show how sorry he is, he discreetly delivers to John a gift of the complete collection of color photos of baseball stars, his most precious possession; however, Dan, John's delicate stepfather, tells him that the proper thing to do is to return the gift. What we have here is symbolic exchange at its purest: a gesture made to be rejected; the point, the "magic" of symbolic exchange, is that, although at the end we are where we were at the beginning, the overall result of the operation is not zero but a distinct gain for both parties, the pact of solidarity. And is not something similar part of our everyday mores? When, after being engaged in a fierce competition for a job promotion with my closest friend, I win, the proper thing to do is to offer to withdraw, so that he will get the promotion, and the proper thing for him to do is to reject my offer-in this way, perhaps, our friendship can be saved.... Milly's offer is the very opposite of such an elementary gesture of politeness: although it also is an offer that is meant to be rejected, what makes hers different from the symbolic empty offer is the cruel alternative it imposes on its addressee: I offer you wealth as the supreme proof of my saintly kindness, but if you accept my offer, you will be marked by an indelible stain of guilt and moral corruption; if you do the right thing and reject it, however, you will also not be simply righteous-your very rejection will function as a retroactive admission of your guilt, so whatever Kate and Densher do, the very choice Milly's bequest confronts them with makes them guilty.

Finally, I would like to point out that now in the age of English, choosing a language policy is not the exclusive concern of non-English-speaking nations. It is also a concern for English-speaking nations, where, to realize the world’s diversity and gain the humility that is proper to any human being, people need to learn a foreign language as a matter of course. Acquiring a foreign language should be a universal requirement of compulsory education. Furthermore, English expressions used in international conferences should be regulated and standardized to some extent. Native English speakers need to know that to foreigners, Latinate vocabulary is easier to understand than what to the native speakers is easy, child-friendly language. At international conferences, telling jokes that none but native speakers can comprehend is inappropriate, even if fun. If native speakers of English – those who enjoy the privilege of having their mother tongue as the universal language – would not wait for others to protest but would take steps to regulate themselves, what respect they would earn from the rest of the world! If that is too much to ask, the rest of the world would appreciate it if they would at least be aware of their privileged position – and more important, be aware that the privilege is unwarranted. In this age of global communication, some language or other was bound to be come a universal language used in every corner of the world English became that language not because it is intrinsically more universal than other languages, but because through a series of historical coincidences it came to circulate ever more widely until it reached the tipping point. That’s all there is to it. English is an accidental universal language. If more English native speakers walked through the doors of other languages, they would discover undreamed-of landscapes. Perhaps some of them might then begin to think that the truly blessed are not they themselves, but those who are eternally condemned to reflect on language, eternally condemned to marvel at the richness of the world.

Knowing Chris was getting married, his fellow Team members decided that they had to send him off with a proper SEAL bachelor party. That meant getting him drunk, of course. It also meant writing all over him with permanent markers-an indelible celebration, to be sure. Fortunately, they liked him, so his face wasn’t marked up-not by them, at least; he’d torn his eyebrow and scratched his lip during training. Under his clothes, he looked quite the sight. And the words wouldn’t come off no matter how he, or I scrubbed. I pretended to be horrified, but honestly, that didn’t bother me much. I was just happy to have him with me, and very excited to be spending the rest of my life with the man I loved. It’s funny, the things you get obsessed about. Days before the wedding, I spent forty-five minutes picking out exactly the right shape of lipstick, splurging on expensive cosmetics-then forgot to take it with me the morning of the wedding. My poor sister and mom had to run to Walgreens for a substitute; they came back with five different shades, not one of which matched the one I’d picked out. Did it matter? Not at all, although I still remember the vivid marks the lipstick made when I kissed him on the cheek-marking my man. Lipstick, location, time of day-none of that mattered in the end. What did matter were our families and friends, who came in for the ceremony. Chris liked my parents, and vice versa. I truly loved his mom and dad. I have a photo from that day taped near my work area. My aunt took it. It’s become my favorite picture, an accidental shot that captured us perfectly. We stand together, beaming, with an American flag in the background. Chris is handsome and beaming; I’m beaming at him, practically glowing in my white gown. We look so young, happy, and unworried about what was to come. It’s that courage about facing the unknown, the unshakable confidence that we’d do it together, that makes the picture so precious to me. It’s a quality many wedding photos possess. Most couples struggle to make those visions realities. We would have our struggles as well.

Just walking,” he said quickly. “I know it looks odd, but we didn’t come to the Lower City for trouble.” “We came here for love,” Romeo said earnestly. “Love,” the subcaptain echoed, sounding faintly amused. It was like the time when Paris was a child, and he’d accidentally knocked over a pile of expensive dishes waiting for the servants to clean them. The pile had tottered for several moments, but Paris hadn’t been able to grab and steady them, or even flee before the crash gave him away. He’d been too entranced by the oncoming disaster. It was like that now. Paris knew this was going to end badly, but he couldn’t seem to get his mouth working, and meanwhile Romeo was rambling enthusiastically. “Yes!” he said. “It’s my friend here—he fell in love with a girl who worked in his family’s kitchen, and she loved him in return, but when his father found out he was furious and had her cast out into the Lower City, and then he lied and forged letters and tried to make him believe she had renounced him. But my friend loved her too dearly and trusted her too deeply, and he discovered the truth, and so we’ve come to find her!” Paris found that his panic was turning into a peculiar sort of calm. They were doomed. If he was lucky, he would be executed along with Romeo. If not, he would be handed back to Lord Catresou. “And you, a Mahyanai, are helping him?” asked the subcaptain. “Because I love her as well,” Romeo said earnestly, “and I will see her happy though it breaks my heart in two. Lovely, kind Maretta with eyes like the summer sky at twilight. Have you seen her?” “No,” said the subcaptain, “but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anyone so bad at lying, either.” Romeo looked uncommonly like a bird fluffing itself up for a mating display. “My love is as true as the stars are bright,” he said with terrifying intensity. “So is his.” The subcaptain’s mouth quirked. “Tiny and flickering and easily clouded over?” She doesn’t believe you, said Paris silently, so can you stop humiliating us? There is no shame in love! It shouldn’t have been possible to shout silently, but Romeo managed it.

That was the first thing that struck him: although he had never given people cause to doubt his integrity, they were ready to bet on his dishonesty rather than on his virtue. The second thing that struck him was their reaction to the position they attributed to him. I might divide it into two basic types: The first type of reaction came from people who themselves (they or their intimates) had retracted something, who had themselves been forced to make public peace with the occupation regime or were prepared to do so (unwillingly, of course—no one wanted to do it). These people began to smile a curious smile at him, a smile he had never seen before: the sheepish smile of secret conspiratorial consent. It was the smile of two men meeting accidentally in a brothel: both slightly abashed, they are at the same time glad that the feeling is mutual, and a bond of something akin to brotherhood develops between them. Their smiles were all the more complacent because he had never had the reputation of being a conformist. His supposed acceptance of the chief surgeon's proposal was therefore further proof that cowardice was slowly but surely becoming the norm of behavior and would soon cease being taken for what it actually was. He had never been friends with these people, and he realized with dismay that if he did in fact make the statement the chief surgeon had requested of him, they would start inviting him to parties and he would have to make friends with them. The second type of reaction came from people who themselves (they or their intimates) had been persecuted, who had refused to compromise with the occupation powers or were convinced they would refuse to compromise (to sign a statement) even though no one had requested it of them (for instance, because they were too young to be seriously involved). . . . And suddenly Tomas grasped a strange fact: everyone was smiling at him, everyone wanted him to write the retraction; it would make everyone happy! The people with the first type of reaction would be happy because by inflating cowardice, he would make their actions seem commonplace and thereby give them back their lost honor. The people with the second type of reaction, who had come to consider their honor a special privilege never to be yielded, nurtured a secret love for the cowards, for without them their courage would soon erode into a trivial, monotonous grind admired by no one.

This night is going well. "Hello there." I speak too soon. Dunstan enters, his two cronies behind him. Everyone standing around goes quiet. I flinch, but not for me; he's gazing at Ivy like a lion at a piece of meat. Ivy just keeps grinning. "And may I say you are the prettiest girl I've seen all night," Dunstan says, not noticing the fact Ivy's already taken. Ivy stares down at her feet, a pale blush the color of pink roses brushed across her cheeks. "You don't mean that," she whispers, not knowing she's accidentally flirting. "I really do," Dunstan continues in his oily, supposedly charming voice, and I roll my eyes. I want to pull Ivy away, but if I do, Dunstan will notice me. And without Melanie breathing down his neck, who knows what he'll try to pull? "So what's your name, beautiful?" Ivy blush deepens and i feel my nails dig into my skin. I'm the one whose supposed to tell her she's pretty, not this jerk. "My name is Ivy," Ivy replies. "Ivy. I like it. It suits you." I feel an arm on my shoulder and turning around, I see Aidan holding me back. Unconsciously, I've stepped forward, ready to challenge him. "So what is your name?" Ivy asks, still shyly peering down at her shoeless feet. Acting all surprised he got asked this, Dunstan runs a hand through his hair. "My name is Dunstan." Ivy's flush instantly vanishes, the corners of her mouth turns down, and her eyebrows knit together. "Dunstan? This is your name?" Quiet as she's being, I know there's anger there. I'd hate to be the recipient of this tone. But Dunstan the egotistical baboon butt isn't aware of the change. "Yep, that's me." "What is your last name?" I feel someone shaking. Aidan's still hanging on to me, and he's nervous, too. Dunstan still doesn't detect her malice. "Why, my last name's Lebelle. Dunstan Lebelle." He chuckles. "Perhaps you've heard of me?" "Oh yes," Ivy hisses, suddenly radiating ferocious fury. "I've heard much about the boy who nearly got Rylan Forester killed." Even with blaring music in the next room, you can hear a pin drop throughout the kitchen as everyone goes quiet, having lost all ability to talk due to flapping jaws. Someone whistles. "Excuse me?" Dunstan sounds like he can't believe what he's hearing. "You heard me." Ivy glares, knowing she has him caught. "You pushed Rylan into the swamp where the alligator attacked him. Sure, you can blame the alligator, but when you really think about, if you had not pushed him in, Rylan wouldn't have nearly died. Who, by the way," Ivy steps back, clasping my free hand in hers, "happens to be my friend and my date." Everyone bursts into titters—no one has ever spoken to Dustan Lebelle like that—as Dunstan stares at me wide-eyed, finally taking in my existence. But before he can do anything, Ivy pulls my hand. "We're leaving," she declares, giving Dunstan one last stink eye. And with her nose in the air and me following, Ivy boldly walks right out the back door.

Question : YOU HAVE DEFINED YOURSELF AS THE RICH MAN'S GURU. DON'T THE OTHER PEOPLE INTEREST YOU? ARE THE RICH PARTICULARLY IN NEED OF A GURU? OR ARE YOU THEIR GURU BECAUSE THEY HAVE MONEY? Osho : The first thing to be understood: I have not defined myself as the rich man's guru. It is the yellow journalism, which dominates the mind of the masses around the world, which came up with the definition. I simply accepted it with my own meanings. They were saying it to be derogatory, but my meaning is totally different. A Vincent van Gogh is far more rich than Henry Ford. Richness does not mean only wealth or money; richness is a multidimensional phenomenon. A poet may be poor, but he has a sensitivity that no money can purchase. He is richer than any rich man. A musician may not be rich, but as far as his music is concerned, no wealth is richer than his music. To me the rich man is one who has sensitivity, creativity, receptivity. The man of wealth is only one of the dimensions. According to me the man of wealth is also a creative artist: he creates wealth. Not everybody can be a Henry Ford. His talents should be respected, although what he creates is mundane. It cannot be compared to Mozart's music or Nijinsky's dance, or Jean-Paul Sartre's philosophy. But still, he creates something which is valuable, utilitarian, and the world would be better if there were many more Henry Fords. So when I accepted the definition, my meaning was richness in any dimension. Only a rich being can have some connection with me. A certain sensitivity is absolutely needed, a certain vision is needed. A poor man is one whose mind is retarded - he may have immense wealth; that does not matter - who cannot understand classical music, who cannot understand poetry, who cannot understand philosophy, who cannot understand the high flights of human spirit. There are certain basic necessities which should be fulfilled; there is a hierarchy. First your bodily needs should be fulfilled; then your psychological needs should be fulfilled. Only then for the first time you become hungry for spiritual experiences. Now what can I do about it? - that is the nature of things. If water evaporates at one hundred degrees heat, what can I do? I cannot persuade it to evaporate at ninety-nine degrees. It is the nature of things. And this is the hierarchy: bodily needs first, then psychological needs second, and only then spiritual needs. What I can give to you concerns your hunger for spiritual growth. If it is not there, I cannot create it. If it is there, I can show you the path. You can see it. I have not been seeking out and going to the rich people. Those who have come to me have come on their own. Their thirst has brought them to me. I have not been giving any promises to anybody. I have not been going after anybody. Millions of people - those who have come to me - have come on their own. And now you can see for yourself. Those who have come have a certain richness of some kind or other; it is not only the money. I have around me people of all talents, people of different kinds of genius. Somehow my very approach prevents those people who will not be benefited from coming close to me. Even if they come accidentally, they disappear; they don't stay. They don't become part of my world. They don't share the vision with me. ..by some existential arrangement I can attract only those people who are very talented, immensely intelligent, very rich in some quality of life. Only from that angle of richness will they have a connection with me. And the yellow journalists go on saying sensational things to people, meaningless, false, ugly - because I am not a guru. If I have to define it I will say, "I am only a friend, a friend of all those who have talents, intelligence and some urge for spiritual growth." To me they are the rich people.

The opponent seemed to shift slightly in the seat. His index finger tapped a card, just a couple strokes. There it was the card that ruined his hand. Her hazel eyes release the player across from her to steal a glance registering the emotion of observers around the table then to her best friend. Sophie looks like a Nervous Nelly-she, always worries. She knows the girl will put too much emphasis on a lost hand. The striking man with his lusty brown eyes tries to draw Sophie closer. Now that he has folded and left the game, he is unnecessary, and the seasoned flirt easily escapes his reach. He leaves with a scowl; Sophie turns and issues knowing wink. Ell’s focus is now unfettered, freeing her again to bring down the last player. When she wins this hand, she will smile sweetly, thank the boys for their indulgence, and walk away $700 ahead. The men never suspected her; she’s no high roller. She realizes she and Sophie will have to stay just a bit. Mill around and pay homage to the boy’s egos. The real trick will be leaving this joint alone without one of them trying to tag along. Her opponent is taking his time; he is still undecided as to what card to keep—tap, tap. He may not know, but she has an idea which one he will choose. He attempts to appear nonchalant, but she knows she has him cornered. She makes a quick glance for Mr. Lusty Brown-eyes; he has found a new dame who is much more receptive than Sophie had been. Good, that small problem resolved itself for them. She returns her focuses on the cards once more and notes, her opponent’s eyes have dilated a bit. She has him, but she cannot let the gathering of onlookers know. She wants them to believe this was just a lucky night for a pretty girl. Her mirth finds her eyes as she accepts his bid. From a back table, there is a ruckus indicating the crowd’s appreciation of a well-played game as it ends. Reggie knew a table was freeing up, and just in time, he did not want to waste this evening on the painted and perfumed blonde dish vying for his attention. He glances the way of the table that slowly broke up. He recognizes most of the players and searches out the winner amongst them. He likes to take on the victor, and through the crowd, he catches a glimpse of his goal, surprised that he had not noticed her before. The women who frequent the back poker rooms in speakeasies all dress to compete – loud colors, low bodices, jewelry which flashes in the low light. This dame faded into the backdrop nicely, wearing a deep gray understated yet flirty gown. The minx deliberately blended into the room filled with dark men’s suits. He chuckles, thinking she is just as unassuming as can be playing the room as she just played those patsies at the table. He bet she had sat down all wide-eyed with some story about how she always wanted to play cards. He imagined she offered up a stake that wouldn’t be large but at the same time, substantial enough. Gauging her demeanor, she would have been bold enough to have the money tucked in her bodice. Those boys would be eager after she teased them by retrieving her stake. He smiled a slow smile; he would not mind watching that himself. He knew gamblers; this one was careful not to call in the hard players, just a couple of marks, which would keep the pit bosses off her. He wants to play her; however, before he can reach his goal, the skirt slips away again, using her gray camouflage to aid her. Hell, it is just as well, Reggie considered she would only serve as a distraction and what he really needs is the mental challenge of the game not the hot release of some dame–good or not. Off in a corner, the pit boss takes out a worn notepad, his meaty hands deftly use a stub of a pencil to enter the notation. The date and short description of the two broads quickly jotted down for his boss Mr. Deluca. He has seen the pair before, and they are winning too often for it to be accidental or to be healthy.

As the most perfect subject for painting I have already specified inwardly satisfied [reconciled and peaceful] love, the object of which is not a purely spiritual ‘beyond’ but is present, so that we can see love itself before us in what is loved. The supreme and unique form of this love is Mary’s love for the Christ-child, the love of the one mother who has borne the Saviour of the world and carries him in her arms. This is the most beautiful subject to which Christian art in general, and especially painting in its religious sphere, has risen. The love of God, and in particular the love of Christ who sits at’ the right hand of God, is of a purely spiritual kind. The object of this love is visible only to the eye of the soul, so that here there is strictly no question of that duality which love implies, nor is any natural bond established between the lovers or any linking them together from the start. On the other hand, any other love is accidental in the inclination of one lover for another, or,’ alternatively, the lovers, e.g. brothers and sisters or a father in his love for his children, have outside this relation other conceI1l8 with an essential claim on them. Fathers or brothers have to apply themselves to the world, to the state, business, war, or, in short, to general purposes, while sisters become wives, mothers, and so forth. But in the case of maternal love it is generally true that a mother’s love for her child is neither something accidental just a single feature in her life, but, on the contrary, it is her supreme vocation on earth, and her natural character and most sacred calling directly coincide. But while other loving mothers see and feel in their child their husband and their inmost union with him, in Mary’s relation to her child this aspect is always absent. For her feeling has nothing in common with a wife’s love for her husband; on the contrary, her relation to Joseph is more like a sister’s to a brother, while on Joseph’s side there is a secret awe of the child who is God’s and Mary’s. Thus religious love in its fullest and most intimate human form we contemplate not in the suffering and risen Christ or in his lingering amongst his friends but in the person of Mary with her womanly feeling. Her whole heart and being is human love for the child that she calls her own, and at the same time adoration, worship, and love of God with whom she feels herself at one. She is humble in God’s sight and yet has an infinite sense of being the one woman who is blessed above all other virgins. She is not self-subsistent on her own account, but is perfect only in her child, in God, but in him she is satisfied and blessed, whether. at the manger or as the Queen of Heaven, without passion or longing, without any further need, without any aim other than to have and to hold what she has. In its religious subject-matter the portrayal of this love has a wide series of events, including, for example, the Annunciation, the Visitation, the Birth, the Flight into Egypt, etc. And then there are, added to this, other subjects from the later life of Christ, i.e. the Disciples and the women who follow him and in whom the love of God becomes more or less a personal relation of love for a living and present Saviour who walks amongst them as an actual man; there is also the love of the angels who hover over the birth of Christ and many other scenes in his life, in serious worship or innocent joy. In all these subjects it is painting especially which presents the peace and full satisfaction of love. But nevertheless this peace is followed by the deepest suffering. Mary sees Christ carry his cross, she sees him suffer and die on the cross, taken down from the cross and buried, and no grief of others is so profound as hers. Mary’s grief is of a totally different kind. She is emotional, she feels the thrust of the dagger into the centre of her soul, her heart breaks, but she does not turn into stone.

But as the daylight began to come through the curtains, I knew I was facing something for which I had not been prepared. It was a curious sensation, like suddenly feeling cold water round your feet, then feeling it slowly rising up your legs. It took me some time to realize that they were attacking from some part of my mind of whose existence I was unaware. I had been strong because I was fighting them out of knowledge, but I should have known that my knowledge of mind was pitifully small. I was like an astronomer who knows the solar system, and thinks he knows the universe. What the parasites were doing was to attack me from below my knowledge of myself. It is true that I had given some small thought to the matter; but I had—rightly—postponed it as a study for a more advanced period. I had reflected often enough that our human life is based completely on ‘premises’ that we take for granted. A child takes its parents and its home for granted; later, it comes to take its country and its society for granted. We need these supports to begin with. A child without parents and a regular home grows up feeling insecure. A child that has had a good home may later learn to criticize its parents, or even reject them altogether (although this is unlikely); but it only does so when it is strong enough to stand alone. All original thinkers develop by kicking away these ‘supports’ one by one. They may continue to love their parents and their country, but they love from a position of strength—a strength that began in rejection. In fact, though, human beings never really learn to stand alone. They are lazy, and prefer supports. A man may be a fearlessly original mathematician, and yet be slavishly dependent on his wife. He may be a powerful free thinker, yet derive a great deal more comfort than he would admit from the admiration of a few friends and disciples. In short, human beings never question all their supports; they question a few, and continue to take the rest for granted. Now I had been so absorbed in the adventure of entering new mental continents, rejecting my old personality and its assumptions, that I had been quite unaware that I was still leaning heavily on dozens of ordinary assumptions. For example, although I felt my identity had changed, I still had a strong feeling of identity. And our most fundamental sense of identity comes from an anchor that lies at the bottom of a very deep sea. I still looked upon myself as a member of the human race. I still looked upon myself as an inhabitant of the solar system and the universe in space and time. I took space and time for granted. I did not ask where I had been before my birth or after my death. I did not even recognize the problem of my own death; it was something I left ‘to be explored later’. What the parasites now did was to go to these deep moorings of my identity, and proceed to shake them. I cannot express it more clearly than this. They did not actually, so to speak, pull up the anchors. That was beyond their powers. But they shook the chains, so that I suddenly became aware of an insecurity on a level I had taken completely for granted. I found myself asking: Who am I? In the deepest sense. Just as a bold thinker dismisses patriotism and religion, so I dismissed all the usual things that gave me an ‘identity’: the accident of my time and place of birth, the accident of my being a human being rather than a dog or a fish, the accident of my powerful instinct to cling to life. Having thrown off all these accidental ‘trappings’, I stood naked as pure consciousness confronting the universe. But here I became aware that this so-called ‘pure consciousness’ was as arbitrary as my name. It could not confront the universe without sticking labels on it. How could it be ‘pure consciousness’ when I saw that object as a book, that one as a table? It was still my tiny human identity looking out of my eyes. And if I tried to get beyond it, everything went blank.

Best friends are supposed to be affectionate to the point of annoying—else what good are they?

When we return, I will put you forward for Ascension,” Charlotte finished. “I will speak out for her case as well,” Gideon said. “After all, I have my father’s place on the Council—his friends will listen to me; they still owe loyalty to our family—and besides, how else can we be married?” “What?” said Gabriel with a wild hand gesture that accidentally flipped the nearest plate onto the floor, where it shattered.

Along with his writing career, Hotch’s accidental business venture with his longtime friend Paul Newman (whose first starring role was in The Battler, Hotchner’s first television play) has turned into one of the country’s surprising success stories.

A friend of mine once described parenthood as “basically just following around a kid for a couple decades and making sure he doesn’t accidentally kill himself—and you’d be amazed how many ways a kid can find to accidentally kill himself.

All I know, because I’m dating one, is that women in their twenties are talking about husbands and babies at all hours of the fucking day. You want to stick your dick in something wet first thing in the morning, she wants to open a HomeGoods credit card.” I squinted. “Did you open a HomeGoods credit card?” “That’s not the fucking point.” Mateo took an aggressive gulp of his beer. “Ophelia and Natalia are best friends, which means their brains are full of the same twisted, nonsensical DIY projects and seasonal candle scents. Ophelia is looking for someone to settle down with, the same way Tally is ‘accidentally’ leaving her laptop open to all-inclusive honeymoon destinations.

I think after she tore it up, Sunny thought the song was lost for good. But some things are forever . . . like the story about that time in kindergarten when you got caught eating a glue stick . . . or that permanent marker stain you accidentally put on your teacher’s dry-erase board . . . or your red-haired best friend and the lyrics she inspired.

I think a bunch of my friends will be there and Benny from my class told me there’s a new fruit called the sound fruit in BlocksFruit and he was going to try to get it. I want to know if he did or not!

Gillian looked affronted. “Why, do not thank me. We are sisters and friends.” She waggled her eyebrows. “And if you need me to quite accidentally drop my white soup on him, then I am happy to oblige.” A laugh spilled past Genevieve’s lips and the servant stuck his head inside the carriage. With a cheerful thanks, her younger sister accepted the young man’s assistance.

Maybe I had been a human—flawed and still growing but full of light nonetheless. All this time, I had received plenty of love, but I’d given it, too. Unbeknownst to me, I had been scattering goodness all around like fun-size chocolates accidentally falling out of my purse as I moved through the world. Perhaps the only real thing that was broken was the image I had of myself—punishing and unfair, narrow and hypercritical. Perhaps what was really happening was that, along with all of my flaws, I was a fucking wonder. And I continue to be a fucking wonder. A fun, dependable friend who will always call you back, cook for you, and fiercely defend your honor. A devoted sister and daughter who prioritizes and appreciates family in ways less-traumatized people can never quite understand. A hardworking, capable employee who brings levity and mischievousness to the offices I inhabit. I am a person who is generous with her love, who is present in texts and calls and affirmations, because I know so intimately how powerful that love can be.

It was true that she didn’t have many friends, not of the flesh-and-blood variety, but the fact did not upset her. It was tiring, all that smiling and sharing and speculating about the weather, and she always left a gathering, no matter how intimate, feeling depleted, as if she’d accidentally left behind some vital layers of herself she’d never get back.

Reena’s heart was safe. But she felt fine about their meddling. Truly. Friends who cared enough to meddle were hardly something to complain about.

This family was a walking list of romance tropes! You had royalty, sports, accidental pregnancy, marriage of convenience, grumpy sunshine, forced proximity, enemies to lovers, brother’s best friend, secret baby, and forbidden romance. I could easily write five or six from inspiration gathered in the last fifteen minutes. That begged the question. What trope would Braxton and I be? Obviously, sports, but it had to be more than that. Virgin, you dummy.

Resist your friends’ irrational opinions. But remind yourself to check in on them regularly in case reason has accidentally influenced them in the meantime.

During the last pre-deployment validation, he’d even arranged an exercise in a way that had accidentally created a Polish Ambush, a setup that involved two friendly elements shooting directly at each other.

In the course of the 1960s, the left adopted almost wholesale the arguments of the right,” observed Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a domestic policy adviser to all three of the decade’s presidents. “This was not a rude act of usurpation, but rather a symmetrical, almost elegant, process of transfer.” Exaggerating for effect—but not to the point of inaccuracy—Moynihan remembered that by decade’s end, “an advanced student at an elite eastern college could be depended on to avow many of the more striking views of the Liberty League and its equivalents in the hate-Roosevelt era; for example that the growth of federal power was the greatest threat to democracy, that foreign entanglements were the work of demented plutocrats, that government snooping (by the Social Security Administration or the United States Continental Army Command) was destroying freedom, that the largest number of functions should be entrusted to the smallest jurisdictions, and so across the spectrum of this viewpoint.”2 Driven primarily by the expanding war in Vietnam, this new current on the left took up individualistic and anti-statist themes that were once the province of the right. Another part of this convergence was the rise of the economics profession. The new economics appeared a success on its own terms; growth had picked up across the Kennedy years. By 1965, GNP had increased for five straight years. Unemployment was down to 4.9 percent, and would soon drop below the 4 percent goal of full employment. As James Tobin reflected, “economists were riding the crest of a wave of enthusiasm and self-confidence. They seemed, after all, to have some tools of analysis and policy other people didn’t have, and their policy seemed to be working.”3 With institutional economics a vanquished force, most economists accepted the tenets of the neoclassical revolution: individuals making rational choices subject to the incentives created by supply and demand. Approaching policy with an economic lens cut across established political lines, which were often the creation of brokered coalitions, habit, or historical precedent. Economic analysis was at once disruptive, since it failed to honor these accidental accretions, and familiar, since it spoke a market language resonant with business-friendly political culture.4 Amid this ideological confluence, Friedman continued his dour rumblings and warnings. Ignoring the positive trends in basic indicators of economic health, from inflation to unemployment to GDP, he argued fiscal demand management was misguided, warned Bretton Woods was about to collapse, predicted imminent inflation, and castigated the Federal Reserve’s basic approach. Friedman’s quixotic quest—and the media attention it generated—infuriated many of his peers. Friedman, it seemed, was bent on fixing economic theories and institutions that were not broken.

Okay. Just… Give us some time, love. We’ll find our way back to each other.” “How do you know?” His thumb brushed over my cheek. “Because we’re friends, Piper. And I kind of love you, remember? That doesn’t just go away because Carter found his sack.

Roman and a couple of his stoner friends wandering past the bleachers. Roman had his trademark skateboard in one hand and a cigarette in his other. He was everything Mason wasn’t; right down to his almost black hair and those eyes like two black holes. And, of course he was probably something ridiculous like at least six-foot-five. He was conceited, obnoxious, annoying, rude, and all that detracted massively from the unequivocal fact that he was gorgeous. Or

looked after him, the realisation dawning on me that every person you met was deeper than you ever gave them credit for. Especially when people they cared about were involved. My friends

I expect to spend every day with my best friend. I expect to sit in good moods and bad moods and comfort the only person who’s ever truly accepted me for me. I expect to be able to tell everyone that this beautiful, intelligent, amazing girl is mine and I’m hers. I expect to watch cheesy Rom-Coms with you, to sit through hours of your stupid John Cusack movies, to always wonder if you could ever love me as much as you love him–” “I

We got this!” Kate said. “Sure, they’ve been tough, but we prepared well, and between us all they have barely even hurt us.” She bent down smooching on one of her wolves’ faces, squishing the fur all up. “Isn’t that right my sweet widdle Wolfie?”  Jack rolled his eyes. “Yuck! Don't dogs eat poop?”  “Not in Minecraft!” Kate said.  “Cats are better.” “No they aren't! You can't teach a cat tricks!”  “GUYS!” Dad yelled. “Can we maybe argue when there ISN’T an enemy coming to destroy our friends?”  Bruce jumped up on Jack’s head. “Purr.”  “Sorry, Dad,” Jack and Kate said together.  “JINX!” They said at the same time, then “JINX! JINX! JINX!” They kept yelling trying to beat each other.  “GUYS!” Dad yelled again, throwing his arms in the air.

To Instagram, then; she needed visual candy: oh look, a new post from Rachel, a car-fie, a caption about the golden hour, a Louis Vuitton duffel in the background. God, she was so self-obsessed; had she aged even a day since they’d graduated? Had she done something to her lips, or was it just a filter? Anjali scrolled back through Rachel’s older posts, even though she had seen and summarily judged them all before, shifting in her seat, attempting to ignore the sensation in her bladder. Oh no—had she accidentally liked one? She tapped again. The heart disappeared, then reappeared. Had she tapped twice? Thrice? Was the Wi-Fi even working? Had she ever responded to that text from Rachel? She had to have, right? The things you did, the places your mind went, when you needed to pee. She swore her brain

After I accidentally killed a goldfish when I was six, my parents got me a plant when I wanted another pet. They told me to take care of the plant to prove I could handle more. But I became obsessed with caring for the plant, and then another, and another. And soon I had a little garden under my windowsill, and they were my friends

This story, well . . . it exposes me as the man that I am. The man I feel to my very core. This is the story of how I wear the title “Ultimate Fuckup,” because not only did I accidentally get the girl in the hot pink dress pregnant . . . But I broke bro code. Because the girl in the hot pink dress is the sister of my teammate . . . and best friend.

You want to know how I’m feeling? Leda thought furiously. For starters, she’d been betrayed by her best friend and the only boy she’d ever really cared about, the boy she’d lost her virginity to. Now the two of them were together even though they were adopted siblings. On top of that, she’d caught her dad cheating on her mom with one of her classmates—Leda couldn’t bring herself to call Eris a friend. Oh, and then Eris had died, because Leda had accidentally pushed her from the roof of the Tower. “I’m fine,” she said briskly.

Often when people react to new information about autism they end up accidentally correctly pointing out evidence of autism as opposed to evidence of its absence. They end up like someone throwing up their arms in frustration and saying, ‘Oh! So I suppose this means everyone at the Trainspotters’ Guild could be autistic? Next, you’ll be telling me that all my shy friends in the university maths department are autistic too!’ My friend, the odds are good.

As a young man, the Count had prided himself on being one step ahead. The timely appearance, the apt expression, the anticipation of a need, to the Count these had been the very hallmarks of the well-bred man. But under the circumstances, he discovered that being a step behind had merits of its own. For one, it was so much more relaxing. To be a step ahead in matters of romance requires constant vigilance. If one hopes to make a successful advance, one must be mindful of every utterance, attend to every gesture, and take note of every look. In other words, to be a step ahead in romance is exhausting. But to be a step behind? To be seduced? Why, that was a matter of leaning back in one’s chair, sipping one’s wine, and responding to a query with the very first thought that has popped into one’s head. And yet, paradoxically, if being a step behind was more relaxing than being a step ahead, it was also more exciting. From his relaxed position, the one-step-behinder imagines that his evening with a new acquaintance will transpire like any other—with a little chit, a little chat, and a friendly goodnight at the door. But halfway through dinner there is an unexpected compliment and an accidental brushing of fingers against one’s hand; there is a tender admission and a self-effacing laugh; then suddenly a kiss.

It was true that she didn't have many friends, not of the flesh-and-blood variety, but the fact did not upset her. It was tiring, all that smiling and sharing and speculating about the weather, and she always left a gathering, no matter how intimate, feeling depleted, as if she'd accidentally left behind some vital layers of herself she'd never get back.

The result of my not caring so much about what I say allows me to care more about how I say it. I think it makes my writing more personal and more enjoyable. If you’re reading this, you’re probably a woman. Or perhaps you’re a gay man getting a present for your even gayer friend. Maybe you accidentally bought this thinking it was the Malala book. However this book made its way from the “Female Humor/Brave Minority Voices/Stress-free Summer Reads!” section of your bookstore to your hands, it doesn’t matter. The important thing is you are here now. Welcome. I’m excited to share my stories with you, so you can see what I’m really like. If my childhood, teens, and twenties were about wanting people to like me, now I want people to know me.

Next Day Moving from Cheer to Joy, from Joy to All, I take a box And add it to my wild rice, my Cornish game hens. The slacked or shorted, basketed, identical Food-gathering flocks Are selves I overlook. Wisdom, said William James, Is learning what to overlook. And I am wise If that is wisdom. Yet somehow, as I buy All from these shelves And the boy takes it to my station wagon, What I’ve become Troubles me even if I shut my eyes. When I was young and miserable and pretty And poor, I’d wish What all girls wish: to have a husband, A house and children. Now that I’m old, my wish Is womanish: That the boy putting groceries in my car See me. It bewilders me he doesn’t see me. For so many years I was good enough to eat: the world looked at me And its mouth watered. How often they have undressed me, The eyes of strangers! And, holding their flesh within my flesh, their vile Imaginings within my imagining, I too have taken The chance of life. Now the boy pats my dog And we start home. Now I am good. The last mistaken, Ecstatic, accidental bliss, the blind Happiness that, bursting, leaves upon the palm Some soap and water-- It was so long ago, back in some Gay Twenties, Nineties, I don’t know . . . Today I miss My lovely daughter Away at school, my sons away at school, My husband away at work--I wish for them. The dog, the maid, And I go through the sure unvarying days At home in them. As I look at my life, I am afraid Only that it will change, as I am changing: I am afraid, this morning, of my face. It looks at me From the rear-view mirror, with the eyes I hate, The smile I hate. Its plain, lined look Of gray discovery Repeats to me: “You’re old.” That’s all, I’m old. And yet I’m afraid, as I was at the funeral I went to yesterday. My friend’s cold made-up face, granite among its flowers, Her undressed, operated-on, dressed body Were my face and body. As I think of her I hear her telling me How young I seem; I am exceptional; I think of all I have. But really no one is exceptional, No one has anything, I’m anybody, I stand beside my grave Confused with my life, that is commonplace and solitary.

When at last he sprang to his feet, she retreated a step, lifting her chin so the lapping water couldn’t reach her mouth. He bent to retrieve the buffalo robe and beckoned for her. “Keemah.” She knew by now that the word meant “come.” She shuddered and looked longingly at the fur he held. “Keemah,” he repeated. When she made no move to obey, he sighed. Sinking lower into the water, Loretta accidentally took a mouthful and choked. He glanced skyward, clearly exasperated. “This Comanche is not stupid. You would run like the wind if I took my eyes from you.” She shook her head. Frowning, he studied her for a long moment. “This is not pe-nan-de taquoip, the honey talk. It is a promise you make?” She nodded, her teeth chattering. “And you will not make a lie of it?” When he assured him she wouldn’t with another shake of her head, he dropped the fur to the ground and pivoted on one foot. She could scarcely believe he truly meant to keep his back to her. She stared at the broad expanse of his shoulders, at the curve of his spine, at his long, leather-clad legs. Like the wild animals he hunted, he was lithe and lean, his large frame padded with sleek, powerful muscle. If she tried to run, he would be upon her before she had gone more than a few steps. Plowing her way through the water to shore, she kept her eyes riveted to his back. A small rock cut into the sole of her foot as she scrambled up the bank. She bit her lip and kept going, afraid to hesitate even for a second. By the time she reached him, her heart was slamming. She grabbed up the fur and slung it around her shoulders, clasping the edges tightly to her chest. Standing this close to him, she could see the sheen of oil on his skin, the dark hair that dusted the crease of his armpits. She didn’t want to touch him. The seconds ticked past. Was his hearing so keen that he knew she was still behind him? She sensed he was waiting her out, testing her in some way she couldn’t fathom, proving his mastery over her. She worked one hand free from the heavy robe. So fast that she scarcely felt her fingertips graze his skin, she tapped his shoulder and snatched her hand back. He turned to look at her, his gaze lingering a moment on her bare feet and legs. Humiliation scorched her cheeks. He stepped toward her, stooping as he did to catch her behind the knees and toss her over his shoulder. As Loretta grabbed his belt for support, she realized two things: the cold water had eased her headache, and the hilt of the Comanche’s knife was within her reach… Without stopping to think of the possible consequences, she reached out, imagining how it would feel to bury the blade into his back, to be free of him. Just as her fingers curled around the knife handle, he spoke. “Kill me, Yellow Hair, and my friends will avenge me. The blood of your loved ones will be spilled as slowly as sap drips from a wounded tree.” He kept walking and made no move to grab her hand. “My friends know the way to your wooden walls, eh? Make no grief behind you. It is wisdom.

At the zoo, I stood in front of the primate cage listening to a woman marvel at how “presidential” the four-hundred-pound gorilla looked sitting astride a shorn oaken limb, keeping a watchful eye over his caged brood. When her boyfriend, his finger tapping the informational placard, pointed out the “presidential” silverback’s name coincidentally was Baraka, the woman laughed aloud, until she saw me, the other four-hundred-pound gorilla in the room, stuffing something that might have been the last of a Big Stick Popsicle or a Chiquita banana in my mouth. Then she became disconsolate, crying and apologizing for having spoken her mind and my having been born. “Some of my best friends are monkeys,” she said accidentally. It was my turn to laugh. I understood where she was coming from. This whole city’s a Freudian slip of the tongue, a concrete hard-on for America’s deeds and misdeeds. Slavery? Manifest Destiny? Laverne & Shirley? Standing by idly while Germany tried to kill every Jew in Europe? Why some of my best friends are the Museum of African Art, the Holocaust Museum, the Museum of the American Indian, the National Museum of Women in the Arts. And furthermore, I’ll have you know, my sister’s daughter is married to an orangutan.

I was talking to a friend and they told me that they’d recently accidentally stepped on their dog’s tail, and how sorry they were, how crushed they felt at the look of fear and betrayal in their pet’s eyes. As she told me this story, she was biting into a chicken sandwich, and I thought about the fear in the eyes of that chicken every day of its life before it became her meal.” -Shenita Etwaroo

When the time came for the session, I headed downstairs to the foyer only to find the security guards blocking the way out—two medieval knights I’d nicknamed Frank and Igor. They weren’t actual people but rather animated suits of armor as hollow on the inside as a chocolate Easter bunny. They turned their masked faces toward me, swords pointed. “Whoa, hey guys,” I said, coming to a stop. “I’ve got a dream-feeding session. Um … may I pass?” This wasn’t something I normally had to ask. They kept staring for a moment. It was a little creepy to sense they were staring even though they didn’t have eyes, just black slits in their helmets. Finally, they moved aside, and I hurried past them with a friendly wave. I always tried to be as nice to the knights as possible. As a Nightmare, I thought it a good idea to make sure they liked me so as to avoid any accidental maiming when I came and went for dream-feeding sessions. Of course, I was working under the assumption that empty suits of armor were capable of such feelings as liking.

Bruce watched his friend go. Then he glanced at Alfred. "We need to make a pit stop." "Where?" "WayneTech." Alfred shot him a wary glance. "Lucius would warn you none of those prototypes are ready for use." "Says the man driving this car. Lucius is currently being held at gunpoint at the concert hall," Bruce replied. "I think he'll forgive us." "Not if you don't make it out there alive." "Come on, Alfred." Bruce cast his guardian a fleeting smile. "What's the point of being a billionaire if I can't have a little fun?" At the withering look on Alfred's face, he added, "I have to do this. I will do it with or without your help. But with your help, I'll have a better chance." Alfred shook his head. "I first realized you'd be a handful when you accidentally set that old garden toolshed on fire with a blowtorch," he replied. "Do you remember that? You were thirteen. Five years later, here we are, aiding and abetting you as a fugitive." His voice lowered. "My job is to keep you safe, Master Wayne. But if that means making sure you don't try something absurd behind my back, then so be it.

The week that the gospel text was that awesomely weird story of Jesus casting a legion of demons out of a naked dude and into a herd of pigs, pigs who then threw themselves over a cliff and drowned in a lake? My pastor friend Heather posted the following question on my Facebook wall: Dear Pastor Nadia: how can I get on board with Jesus when so much pork was wasted in the lake? Signed: a bacon-loving Christian.

while working for Dr Singh, I discovered that misleadingly friendly smile was especially reserved for his critics and opponents.

My best friend looks at me and downs the shot of bourbon in his glass. His eyes are red and rheumy, a look of misery etched upon his face. Trey sniffs loudly and slams his glass down on the bar, drawing the attention of a few of the people sitting around us. “I loved her, man,” he says. I nod and pat him on the shoulder. “I know you did, man.” We're sitting at the bar in the Yellow Rose Lounge, a quiet place where people can go to have a drink and conversation. Furnished in dark woods, with soft, dim lighting, it's more peaceful than your average watering hole. The music is kept low enough that you don't have to shout to be heard, and the flat panel televisions showing highlights from various games are kept on mute. The Yellow Rose is a lounge that caters to business professionals and people who want to have a quiet drink, a mellow conversation, or be alone with their thoughts. There are plenty of bars in Austin that cater to the hellraisers and I've been known to patronize those places now and then. But, it's also nice to have a place like the Yellow Rose for times when I need some quiet solitude. Or, when I need help nursing a friend through a bad, bitter breakup. The bartender pours Trey another shot – which he immediately downs. “Might as well leave the bottle,” I say. The bartender pauses and gives me a considering look, knowing he shouldn't leave a bottle with customers. I think it's a law or something. Reaching into my pocket, I drop a couple of hundreds down on the bar, which seems to relieve him of his inner-conflict. He quickly scoops up the cash, sets the bottle down, and strolls down to the other end of the bar. I pour Trey another shot, which he downs almost instantly and then holds his glass up for another. Not wanting to see him pass out or die from alcohol poisoning, I know I need to pace him. I set the bottle back down on the bar in front of me and turn to my friend

Gabby is another teacher at the Gilmore Academy, the school I teach at. She has also been my best friend since our own days at prep school. She's a gorgeous woman – tall, blonde, thin. She looks like she could be doing spreads in Victoria's Secret catalogs or something. But more than that, she's intelligent. Fierce. And often, very outspoken.

My best friend looks at me and downs the shot of bourbon in his glass. His eyes are red and rheumy, a look of misery etched upon his face. Trey sniffs loudly and slams his glass down on the bar, drawing the attention of a few of the people sitting around us. “I loved her, man,”he says. I nod and pat him on the shoulder. “I know you did, man.”We're sitting at the bar in the Yellow Rose Lounge, a quiet place where people can go to have a drink and conversation. Furnished in dark woods, with soft, dim lighting, it's more peaceful than your average watering hole. The music is kept low enough that you don't have to shout to be heard, and the flat panel televisions showing highlights from various games are kept on mute. The Yellow Rose is a lounge that caters to business professionals and people who want to have a quiet drink, a mellow conversation, or be alone with their thoughts. There are plenty of bars in Austin that cater to the hellraisers and I've been known to patronize those places now and then. But, it's also nice to have a place like the Yellow Rose for times when I need some quiet solitude. Or, when I need help nursing a friend through a bad, bitter breakup. The bartender pours Trey another shot –which he immediately downs. “Might as well leave the bottle,”I say. The bartender pauses and gives me a considering look, knowing he shouldn't leave a bottle with customers. I think it's a law or something. Reaching into my pocket, I drop a couple of hundreds down on the bar, which seems to relieve him of his inner-conflict. He quickly scoops up the cash, sets the bottle down, and strolls down to the other end of the bar. I pour Trey another shot, which he downs almost instantly and then holds his glass up for another. Not wanting to see him pass out or die from alcohol poisoning, I know I need to pace him. I set the bottle back down on the bar in front of me and turn to my friend.

My best friend looks at me and downs the shot of bourbon in his glass. His eyes are red and rheumy, a look of misery etched upon his face. Trey sniffs loudly and slams his glass down on the bar, drawing the attention of a few of the people sitting around us. “I loved her, man,” he says. I nod and pat him on the shoulder. “I know you did, man.” We're sitting at the bar in the Yellow Rose Lounge , a quiet place where people can go to have a drink and conversation. Furnished in dark woods, with soft, dim lighting, it's more peaceful than your average watering hole. The music is kept low enough that you don't have to shout to be heard, and the flat panel televisions showing highlights from various games are kept on mute. The Yellow Rose is a lounge that caters to business professionals and people who want to have a quiet drink, a mellow conversation, or be alone with their thoughts. There are plenty of bars in Austin that cater to the hellraisers and I've been known to patronize those places now and then. But, it's also nice to have a place like the Yellow Rose for times when I need some quiet solitude. Or, when I need help nursing a friend through a bad, bitter breakup. The bartender pours Trey another shot –which he immediately downs. “Might as well leave the bottle,” I say. The bartender pauses and gives me a considering look, knowing he shouldn't leave a bottle with customers. I think it's a law or something. Reaching into my pocket, I drop a couple of hundreds down on the bar, which seems to relieve him of his inner-conflict. He quickly scoops up the cash, sets the bottle down, and strolls down to the other end of the bar. I pour Trey another shot, which he downs almost instantly and then holds his glass up for another. Not wanting to see him pass out or die from alcohol poisoning, I know I need to pace him. I set the bottle back down on the bar in front of me and turn to my friend.

I know you can't see it now, but this is a good thing, man,” I say. “You have your freedom back. You're young, good looking, have a great job – just think about how much pussy you're going to get.” “I don't want pussy,” he moans. “I want Stephanie back.” I groan inwardly. Stephanie is a terrible human being. I haven't liked her since they first started dating back when we were all going to Stanford together. She was always too pretentious and condescending for my liking. Always looked down on people and seemed to think that she was better than everyone else. No, Stephanie and I never got on well at all. I know that it’s always bugged Trey, but some people just don't click. I never went out of my way to be an asshole to her – at least, not usually. But, I was never overly-friendly to her either. I have a hard time making nice with somebody I despise. Truthfully, I want to do fucking cartwheels and throw a party now that she's out of Trey's life. I genuinely think he'll be better off without her. And that he'll find a much better woman. I pour out another shot – a smaller amount this time – and Trey pounds it down, slamming his shot glass onto the bar again. “I really thought she was the one, man,” he says, sniffing loudly. “Yeah, well, I don't want to be an asshole,” I say, “but you usually aren't going to find the ‘one’ down on her knees sucking some other guy off in your house.” I feel bad for slapping Trey with such a hard dose of reality, but he needs it. Stephanie is about as close to the one for him as I am. I tried telling him that back in college. I've always suspected she had a side piece, but I couldn't ever prove it. And mentioning it to Trey was as useful as talking to a brick wall about it. All he ever saw in Stephanie was the good. Or at least, what he perceived to be good. But really, there is

The first event, which looked back but also forward like a kind of historical hinge, was the centennial of the birth of Albert Hofmann, the Swiss chemist who, in 1943, accidentally found that he had discovered (five years earlier) the psychoactive molecule that came to be known as LSD. This was an unusual centennial in that the man being feted was very much in attendance. Entering his second century, Hofmann appeared in remarkably good shape, physically spry and mentally sharp, and he was able to take an active part in the festivities, which included a birthday ceremony followed by a three-day symposium. The symposium’s opening ceremony was on January 13, two days after Hofmann’s 100th birthday (he would live to be 102). Two thousand people packed the hall at the Basel Congress Center, rising to applaud as a stooped stick of a man in a dark suit and a necktie, barely five feet tall, slowly crossed the stage and took his seat. Two hundred journalists from around the world were in attendance, along with more than a thousand healers, seekers, mystics, psychiatrists, pharmacologists, consciousness researchers, and neuroscientists, most of them people whose lives had been profoundly altered by the remarkable molecule that this man had derived from a fungus half a century before. They had come to celebrate him and what his friend the Swiss poet and physician Walter Vogt called “the only joyous invention of the twentieth century.

I knew I would lose my job when I accidentally set fire to my best friend’s house.

Mantasy

Paeng leans back and rests his hand flat on the table. “Vince.” Blushing, he snaps at his friend. “I dropped the bra on the wet tarp and I guess I must have accidentally gotten paint on it and touched it to my cheek, okay?” Paeng is silent as Vince sighs. “I didn’t mean to take my upset out on you, sorry.” “No big. So, you fondled it. Was it good for you?” Paeng’s eyes glitter, making Vince’s anxiety flare. “I couldn’t help myself! The girl’s smoking hot and yet she doesn’t appear to own trashy underwear.” He feels all dreamy just thinking about it. “It’s simple and soft . . . it felt so nice. She’s not like any of the girls I’ve met before. She’s direct, feisty and artistic and I bet she’s really smart. She’s nothing like the usual MOM Girl and she’s not even my type. But her underwear is beautiful. She doesn’t wear slutty underwear because she doesn’t put on airs, and oh, God, that’s so attractive. What I wouldn’t give to see—” Paeng face palms Vince. “Dude. You are waxing poetic about cotton underwear like my sisters wear when they get their periods. It’s just underwear. It is not the key to Dani’s psyche. You are making the kind of assumptions about her that lead to expensive rings, one point two kids, and minivans. You are in trouble.

I have neither the talent nor the patience for the usual mating rituals—the stalking, the accidental encounters, the blind dates, the silly gifts, the awkward phone calls, the referrals from friends, the endless Internet chatting. Nor do I have the guts to go online and lie about myself to strange women. And, I fear I’m forever scorched and gun-shy from the Judith disaster. How can one human possess so much meanness? Naomi

While I may not have been a bastion of good mental health, many of these boys were on their way to becoming crazier than they already were. Most couldn’t relate to other people socially at all, because they only dealt inappropriately with other people or didn’t respond to overtures of friendship or even engage in basic conversations. Some became too familiar with you too fast, following their new, latest friend everywhere, including the showers, insisting on giving you items that were dear to them and sharing everything else. They also had the awful habit of touching other people, putting their hands on you as a sign of affection or friendship, and for people like myself, with my affliction and disdain for being touched unless I wanted to be touched, these guys were a nightmare. It was often difficult to get word in edgewise with these kids, and when I did, they interrupted me—not in some obnoxious way, but because they wanted to be included in every single aspect of everything you did. The other ones, the stone-cold silent ones, reacted with deep suspicion toward even the slightest attempt to befriend them or the smallest show of kindness. If you touched some of these children, even accidentally, they would warn you to back away. They didn’t care what others thought of them or anything else, and almost all their talk concerned punching and hurting and maiming. I noticed that most of these kids, the ones who were truly damaged, were eventually filtered out of St. John’s to who knows where. Institutions have a way of protecting themselves from future problems.

Just then Patrick finally came out of his rock. He looked around, but SpongeBob and the bubble were gone. “I knew I was dreaming!” SpongeBob was still chasing the bubble. “Bubble, stop! You have to go back and let my friend Patrick see you!” As he passed Shady Shoals Retirement Home, he accidentally dropped his bubble-blowing wand. But SpongeBob didn’t stop to pick it up. He chased the bubble all the way to Jellyfish Fields. While trying to grab the bubble, SpongeBob accidentally dropped his bottle of bubbles. He kept chasing it until he was miles away from Bikini Bottom. BAM! Suddenly, SpongeBob found himself facedown on

Gemini took a step forward. “Aric, just ask her,” he said quietly. My sisters and friends gathered around us as Aric slowly fell to one knee. For a moment, he simply stared. But when he spoke, I could sense his devotion in every word. “Celia, you have been my princess since the first time I saw you. Now, I’d like you to be my queen for the rest of our lives. Will you marry me?” Big giant tears rolled down my long, fuzzy face. “Scratch once for yes, twice for no!” Bren yelled. I thought I’d always be ready to hear those words. And there I was, a damn horse. So instead of allowing this moment to be robbed from me, I closed my eyes and took in everything that was Aric—his scent, warmth, love, and all that had brought us together. Someone threw the quilt around me as I felt my body shrink and my bare feet slide along the sandy beach. For the first time, I’d managed to reclaim my human form following an accidental change, and I welcomed it for everything it allowed. Aric tucked the quilt around my naked skin and drew me to him, waiting patiently for me to answer. The lump in my throat tightened. After all the times I thought I’d lost him, was this really happening? It took the soft graze of his knuckles against my cheek to assure me this was more than a dream. My body trembled and so did my voice. “Yes,” I managed. Everyone assembled cheered when Aric kissed me, including Heidi, who changed from her white wolf form to stand beside her mate, Danny. Unlike me and being were, Heidi didn’t mind

You have such a lovely, direct nature. You know the one where you just say whatever’s on your mind, with as many cuss words as you can cram into a sentence, and forget that people around you might find your potty mouth offensive?

I’ll see bald eagles swoop up from the water with wriggling little fish in their talons, and whenever they accidentally drop their catch, I like to imagine that fish trying to tell his friends about his own near-death experience, a perspective so unprecedented there are no words in the fish language to describe it:

Debbie is a mom from Uxbridge, Massachusetts. She was in the examination room when the pediatrician asked her five-year-old, “Does Daddy own a gun?”1 When the little girl said yes, the doctor began grilling her and her mom about the number and types of guns, how they are stored, etc. If the incident had ended there, it would have merely been annoying. But Debbie got mad when a friend in law enforcement told her that the doctor had filed a report with the police (about her family’s [entirely legal] gun ownership). Maybe this doctor should have asked about the family bathtubs instead of the family guns. Because, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), 346 children under age five drowned in bathtubs between 2006 and 2010.2 By contrast, only ninety-four children under five died from accidental gunshots over the same period.3 That is a difference of nearly a factor of four. In fact, more children under five died from drowning in bathtubs than children under ten or even under fifteen from accidental gun shots (167 and 291 respectively).

Religion answers directly to the problem of transference by expanding awe and terror to the cosmos where they belong. It also takes the problem of self-justification and removes it from the objects near at hand. We no longer have to please those around us, but the very source of creation-the powers that created us, not those into whose lives we accidentally fell. Our life ceases to be a reflexive dialogue with the standards of our wives, husbands, friends, and leaders and becomes instead measured by standards of the highest heroism, ideals truly fit to lead us on and beyond ourselves. In this way we fill ourselves with independent values, can make free decisions, and, most importantly, can lean on powers that really support us and do not oppose us. The personality can truly begin to emerge in religion because God, as an abstraction, does not oppose the individual as others do, but instead provides the individual with all the powers necessary for self-justification. What greater security than to lean confidently on God, on the Fount of creation, the most terrifying power of all? If God is hidden and intangible, all the better: that allows man to expand and develop by himself.

I gotta be honest with you, Joe. This isn't a really social job. We don't talk to each other much. We tried it once. A bunch of us all got together to have a party, maybe get to know each other better." "What happened?" I pause. Think how best to put it. "We accidentally triggered a civil war in Cambodia.

Hunter woke suddenly. A noise. It was a noise unlike anything he’d ever heard before. Close! Very close. Like it was on him. Like it was . . . Just in one ear. He twisted his head. It was full night. Black as black in the woods far from the starlight. He couldn’t see anything. But with his hands he could feel. The thing on his shoulder. His ear . . . gone! A terrible fear wrung a cry of horror from Hunter. He couldn’t feel it, his ear, or his shoulder, couldn’t feel with anything but his fingers and he felt, reached beneath his shirt, felt the flesh of his belly pulse and heave. Like something inside him. No, no, no, it wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair! He was Hunter. The hunter. He was doing his best. He cried. Tears rolled down his cheeks. Who would bring meat for all the kids? It wasn’t fair. The sound of munching, crunching started again. Just in one ear. Hunter had only one weapon: the heat-causing power in his hands. He had used it many, many times to take the life of prey. He had fed the kids with that power. And in a moment of fear and rage he had accidentally taken the life of his friend, Harry. Maybe he could kill the thing that was eating his ear. But it was too late for that to help. Could he kill himself? He saw Old Lion’s head, eyes closed, hanging where he’d hung him for skinning. If Old Lion could die, so could Hunter. Maybe they would meet again, up in the sky. Hunter pressed both palms against his head.

Love is not a feeling, which is, at most, merely an accidental attribute associated with it. We love our God, our spouses, our parents, our children, our friends, and our enemies, but we clearly do not have the same feelings toward our spouses as we have toward our friends or our enemies. Feelings vary; the love remains. Philosophically speaking, feelings are accidental; love is substantial.

Sage and I both ignored him. “Daddy tried to make a chicken pasta salad, but it smelled real bad, so I accidentally knocked the pan onto the floor like you taught us, and then we got takeout salads and pizza.

My biggest problem during the postwar period was the doom and gloom of its most celebrated thinkers. I didn’t share their negativity about the human condition. I had studied how primates resolve conflicts, sympathize with each other, and seek cooperation. Violence is not their default condition. Most of the time, they live in harmony. The same applies to our own species. I was shocked, therefore, in 1976 when Dawkins asserted in The Selfish Gene, “Be warned that if you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature.”6 I’d argue quite the contrary! Without our long evolution as intensely social beings, we’d be unlikely to care for our fellow humans. We have been programmed to pay attention to each other and offer help when needed. What else would be the point of living in groups? Many animals do, and they do so only because group life, which includes giving and receiving assistance, yields tremendous advantages over a solitary life. One time Dawkins and I politely disagreed in person. On a cold November morning, I took him and a cameraman up a tower at the Yerkes Field Station. It overlooked the chimps that I knew so well. I pointed out Peony, an old female. Her arthritis was so acute that we had seen younger females hurry to fetch water for her. Instead of letting Peony slowly trek to the water faucet, they’d run ahead of her to suck up a mouthful and return to spit it into her mouth, which she opened wide. They also sometimes placed their hands on her ample behind to push her up into the climbing frame so that she could join a cluster of grooming friends. Peony received this aid from individuals unrelated to her, who surely couldn’t expect any favors in return because she was not in a condition to deliver them. How to explain such behavior? And how to explain all the acts of kindness that we ourselves engage in every day, sometimes with complete strangers? Dawkins tried to salvage his theory by blaming genes, saying that they must be “misfiring.” Genes, however, are little strings of DNA devoid of intentions. They do what they do without any goals in mind, which means that they can’t be selfish or unselfish. They also can’t accidentally miss any goals.

sexual partners, she was either lying, or she’d had it for over a year. But Oliver’s chart didn’t show any symptoms and he hadn’t been prescribed.  Jamie mulled it over in her head then acted on a hunch, pulling open the top right-hand drawer. Inside was a wholesale box of condoms. She stared at it for a second. At least they were using protection. She wondered how many Mary gave out a week. Maybe there had been a third person in their relationship. A scorned ex-boyfriend who didn’t like Oliver? He obviously didn’t know about the rash — or hadn’t noticed. Grace was keeping it from him. Had he found out, confronted Grace’s other boyfriend? Or maybe the other way around. Surprised by the guy? Taken? Tied up and threatened? She had a feeling that the person hadn’t meant to kill him. If you’re going to kill someone, you don’t take their shoes and then dump them in a river. He’d either fallen in accidentally, or he’d jumped. Either way, if there wasn’t an ex — or not ex boyfriend — he was going to be someone Jamie wanted to speak to.  She held Grace’s picture up, looking past the matted hair and sunken eyes. She was young, pretty. She’d have a lot of attention out there on the streets.  Jamie closed the drawer and looked at the file again, searching for a name. She wanted to speak to the doctor. The signature just looked like a wavy line. She’d ask Mary. The chair squeaked as she pushed back from the desk and stood up, keeping the files in hand. Her watch told her it was nearly nine-thirty. Her stomach told her it was time for breakfast. Back in the main room, some of the people had cleared out, venturing back into the city. Looking for some way to get by.  Roper was still talking to Mary, who appeared to be in the middle of a speech about how these people needed more help than anyone was prepared to give, and that Oliver wouldn’t been the last. Jamie stepped around her, piqued. ‘Why do you say that?’ ‘Oh,’ she said, seeing Jamie. ‘Because people don’t want to help them and they let them hurt themselves and each other without paying them any mind.’ She narrowed her eyes. ‘Each other? Did someone have a problem with Oliver?’ ‘What?’ Mary looked sheepish all of a sudden, as if she’d dropped someone in something. ‘No, no — nothing like that. Not as far as I know, anyway,’ she added quickly. ‘Look, I just want you to find who did this — but for you to know that things are different with them. They don’t act the same — don’t believe in the same things, you know?’ She kept her voice low now. Jamie nodded. She’d worked the streets long enough to know what Mary meant. She’d seen more than she could have ever imagined. Seen people do crazy things. Things that people with something to lose would never think to do.  ‘Mrs Cartwright,’ she said after a second. ‘Grace Melver. She was friends with Oliver?’ ‘Grace?’ Mary’s eyes lit up a little and then tilted down in sadness. ‘What a sweet girl. She’ll be devastated. She’s been back every day to check whether Oliver has turned up. She’s been going out of her mind. Poor girl.’ ‘What was the nature of their relationship?’ Roper held his phone a little higher so the microphone could pick them up more easily. Mary thought for a second, aware of the recording. She chose her words carefully. ‘They were together, I suppose. As much as two people in their situation could be. They looked out for each other. Loved each other.’ ‘Did Grace have any other boyfriends?’ ‘No, no. She was sweet. She loved Oliver.’ ‘She was a heroin user, right?’ Mary looked like her face was about to droop and slip right off her head. ‘Horrible stuff. Though they

Much of the negation poisoning the democratic process has stemmed from a confusion of the personal and the statistical. I may hold down an excellent job, but the failure of the stimulus to meet its targets infuriates me. I may live in peaceful Vienna, Virginia, safe from harm—but a report that several Americans have died violently in Kabul appears like a fatal failure of authority. By dwelling on the plane of gross statistics, I become vulnerable to grandiose personal illusions: that if I compel the government to move in this direction or that, I can save the Constitution, say, or the earth, or stop the war, or end poverty now. Though my personal sphere overflows with potentiality, I join the mutinous public and demand the abolition of the established order. This type of moral and political displacement is nothing new. The best character in the best novel by Dickens, to my taste, is Mrs. Jellyby of Bleak House, who spent long days working to improve “the natives of Borrioboola-Gha, on the left bank of the Niger,” while, in her London home, her small children ran wild and neglected. Dickens termed this “telescopic philanthropy”—the trampling of the personal sphere for the sake of a heroic illusion. Mrs. Jellyby, sitting in quite a nest of waste paper, drank coffee all the evening and dictated at intervals to her eldest daughter. She also held a discussion with Mr. Quale, the subject of which seemed to be—if I understood it—the brotherhood of humanity, and gave utterance to some beautiful sentiments. I was not so attentive an auditor as I might have wished to be, however, for Peepy and the other children came flocking about Ada and me in a corner of the drawing-room to ask for another story; so we sat down among them and told them in whispers “Puss in Boots” and I don’t know what else until Mrs. Jellyby, accidentally remembering them, sent them to bed.3 The revolt of the public has had a telescopic and Jellybyan aspect to it. Though they never descended to details, insurgents assumed that, by symbolic gestures and sheer force of desire, they could refashion the complex systems of democracy and capitalism into a personalized utopia. Instead, unknowingly, they crossed into N. N. Taleb’s wild “Extremistan,” where “we are subjected to the tyranny of the singular, the accidental, the unseen, and the unpredicted.” In that unstable country, “you should always be suspicious of the knowledge you derive from data.”4 I can’t command a complex social system like the United States, but I can control my political expectations of it: I can choose to align them with reality. To seize this alternative, I must redirect the demands I make on the world from the telescopic to the personal, because actionable reality resides in the personal sphere. I can do something about losing my job, for example, but I have no clue what could or should be done about the unemployment rate. I know directly whether a law affects my business for better or worse, but I have no idea of its effect on the gross domestic product. I can assist a friend in need, but I have little influence over the natives of Borrioboola-Gha, on the left bank of the Niger. Control, however tenuous, and satisfaction, however fleeting, can only be found in the personal sphere, not in telescopic numbers reported by government. A

Afterward, she'd cautiously open the box and peek inside, inhaling deeply as she did so through her nose. "Cinnamon," she'd say. "And salt. Too much wind in the spell." And she write that down. Or: " Methane. No good. She'll accidentally fly away. Plus she'll be flammable. Even more than usual. " Or: " Is that sulfur? Great heavens. What are you trying to do, women? Kill the poor child?" She crossed several things off her list. "Has Auntie Xan gone mad?" Fyrian asked. "No, my friend," Glerk told him."But she has found herself in deeper water than she expected.

The last day of a man’s life doesn’t exist. Outside of storybooks, there’s no hope, nothing but soap bubbles bursting. That’s the best proof of our absurd existence, my dear friend: Nobody’s granted a final day, just an accidental interruption in his life.

You dare to keep staring at me, servant?” The offended young heir (whatever that title meant) roared. “I think I should teach you a lesson…” Hadjar bowed sharply at the waist and saluted in the manner of the Empire — he struck his chest twice with his fist, “My apologies, young heir of the great Predatory Blades clan. I, an unworthy ant, dared to accidentally stain your clothes. Let me take them and return them to you in their purest form.” For a moment, there was utter silence in the hall. Hadjar didn’t look like a man who could apologize to anyone. There was far too much confidence and pride in his eyes, in his gestures and posture, in his whole appearance. “I beg your pardon, most worthy heir,” Einen also bowed. Both friends maintained serious expressions on their faces, but in fact, they could hardly keep from laughing out loud. If a teenager endowed with the terrifying power of a true cultivator considered soiled clothing a reason to get insulted, then the thirty-year-old warriors who’d witnessed the horrors of piracy, wars, and the Sea of Sand…

the knowledge that we’d never be friends hit me. We were sisters, but we would never be anything else. We were too different, unable to understand one another.

Imagine a world full of strangers who all have a tiny little razor in their hands and they can randomly, mostly accidentally, shave a tiny piece of your soul off you while they sell you a newspaper or pass you the key to the bathroom at the gas station. Now imagine your classmates and co-workers have an even bigger blade, and can cut deeper. Imagine your friends and family members wield a really big knife. Imagine that all of these cuts can whittle away at the flesh of you, day after day after day, rendering the truth of you into a sliver, almost invisible, unrecognizable. Imagine that these cuts sting for hours afterwards, sometimes days, and that they tend to fester. Imagine that you have to get through every day, bleeding from hundreds of wounds, some little and some deep, all the while pretending that nothing hurts.

Mom was excited to get back to the island, watching as it appeared in the distance. Her anticipation turned to dread, and she gasped, her hands on her mouth, when she saw the dock they had worked so hard on before gone. “What happened?” she asked, breaking her silence for the first time. “I’m pretty sure this was Ortho's work. He seemed to really hate villagers and destroyed every village he came across,” Dad said with a frown. Mom’s face softened. “I’m glad he can't do that anymore. This is so sad.” They pulled up to the island, stretching as they stepped from their boats. “We should probably fix up a shelter,” Dad said. “We’ll need a place for when it gets dark. Then I think we should strategize for this ocean monument trip we have to make.” “Oooh!” Kate said. “We should have turtle shell helmets!” Mom gasped. “Kate! Why would you do that to the poor turtles?” Kate giggled. “No Mom, baby turtles drop scute when they grow into big turtles, then you can collect it and make turtle shell helmets. They’re cool because they let you breathe underwater a bit longer. Plus, you can enchant them with...um. I forgot the name. But there’s an enchantment that helps you breathe longer, too.” “And one for mining underwater,” Jack added. “Why would you need that?” Dad asked. “Can’t you just mine like normal?” Jack shook his head. “Have you ever tried to swing a pickaxe underwater?” Dad blinked. “Oh. Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Sorry to dredge that up.” He wiggled his eyebrows. Mom was about to give Dad ‘The Look’ but Kate beat her to it. “No Dad, Jack already did a bunch of jokes.” “What?” Dad looked offended. “I’m supposed to do the Dad jokes!” “You are,” Jack said. “That’s why I did Jack Jokes.” Dad snorted out a laugh. “Were they punny?” Jack grinned. “Definitely. They worked great for our new villager friends when they helped us on the farm. They were real ice-breakers.” Dad laughed extra loud. “That’s it, I’m done!” Kate said. “Come on Mom, let’s go get some turtle scute.” “I’m right there with you girl. Let’s go.” Dad waved. “We’ll make sure we have shelter, and we’ll give it a nice outfit.” Dad winked. Jack cocked his head. “What does a house wear?” Dad grinned. “Address!” Jack laughed, and the girls rolled their eyes. “We’ll make sure not to build a house like a penguin though. They just igloo them together.” Kate and Mom groaned and hurried off towards the turtles. “Don’t run in front of a car!” Jack yelled. “You might get tired!” “Run faster, Mom,” Kate yelled. Dad and Jack laughed at their fleeing forms. Chapter 18 By the time Mom and Kate came back from their turtle excursion, Dad and Jack had fixed up a house

Imagine that as soon as you stop, or give up, they begin to prepare your coffin, hammer, and nails, and measure the size. As soon as you run, they stop for a break and they leave the coffin alone. If you stop, or accidentally stumble, the coffin is ready for you, my friend

Books on the shelves were portals waiting to transport me somewhere and with one turn of the first page I could be pulled into another realm where I could make new friends and have adventures.

But it was a very different experience with Fitz. Especially when his finger accidentally grazed the edge of her lips. Not that he seemed to notice. He didn’t blush the tiniest bit—which was extra annoying, since she was certain her cheeks were neon red. “You’re helping me so you don’t have to take your own medicine, huh?” Sophie teased, ordering her head and heart to get their act together. This was one friend helping another—nothing more. Fitz confirmed it when he winked and added, “Also letting you test them all, so I know which ones are the grossest. Want this one next?” He pointed to a thick brown elixir. “I’m guessing it’s all kinds of wrong.” “Actually, that’s one of the good ones,” Elwin corrected. “It’s the shimmery pink one you should be afraid of. In fact, you’re probably going to need a chaser for that.” He reached into his pocket and pulled a handful of the silver-wrapped squishy candies he’d given Sophie before, setting them on the tray next to the vial in question. The elixir looked like melting sugar swirled with strawberry syrup—but when Fitz twisted off the lid, it smelled like a bathroom after someone had eaten a whole lot of asparagus. “Drink it fast,” Elwin recommended. “And hold your breath.” Sophie nodded, using her free hand to plug her nose as Fitz counted to three and tipped the medicine into her mouth—but her taste buds still immediately tried to convince her that she should spit the rotten sludge back out as fast as she possibly could.

I have not in this book discussed homoerotic behaviour, and that particular form of male bonding and female bonding loosely called ‘the homosexual community’. These large subjects require extensive treatment. But, very briefly, it should be said here that there may be analytic and practical profit in seeing male homosexuality as a specific feature of the more general phenomenon of male bonding. For a variety of obvious and more subtle reasons, male homoeroticism is socially organized differently and occurs more frequently than the female variety. There are a host of other differences which, in part, reflect the biologically based patterns which must accompany such a profound matter as seeking erotic contact, establishing sexual identity, and defining sexual role. The effect of homoerotic relationships in work, political, and other groups is of considerable interest in terms of many of the questions I have raised in this book. From a strictly biological viewpoint, there is no good reason for forbidding or even discouraging homoerotic activity, though in terms of Euro-American family structure and sexual attitudes there may be sociological reasons. As I have tried to indicate, there are important inhibitions in much of Euro-American culture – if not elsewhere too – against expressing affection between men, and one result of this inhibition of tenderness and warmth is an insistence on corporate hardness and forcefulness which has contributed to a variety of ‘tough-minded’ military, economic, political, and police enterprises and engagements. Of course, a fear of homoeroticism is not the only reason for this – a number of others have been described here too. But homoerotic activity has been widely and powerfully defined as aberrant (though as Kinsey has suggested, about half American males have had homosexual activity, while at least a third have had experiences culminating in orgasm). Much guilt and uncertainty must plague many of the participants in these relationships. So must the insecurity about possibly being or becoming ‘queer’ or ‘bent’ among other men who may feel drawn to their colleagues and friends in ways I have described but whose repertoire of explanations of their feelings is overwhelmed by their community’s assertion that men tender with each other are unmanly and unreliable. It remains a worthy subject of exploration to learn more about the dynamics of tender male interchanges, both for the sake of scientific understanding, and perhaps for providing information on the basis of which greater sympathy and opportunity may confront persons often harassed and disdained by themselves as well as others. That this may accompany a changed ideal of manhood, of corporate structure, of political acumen, and of the role of hard dominance, is not accidental but intrinsic to the whole argument of this book.

I think the last meeting I went to with biscuits was sometime back in 2012. My friends who work in the private sector often enjoy telling me about the latest jaunt their company has put on – gig tickets for the O2, a boozy day out at the seaside or whatnot. Occasionally, I’ll accidentally bring home a biro from work that I decide to keep.

Dad smirked. “Well, if it doesn’t get out of there it might find itself on a ride to the furnace.” He licked his lips. “Barrrrbeeeecuuuuueeeee.”  “Don’t you DARE! He’s obviously a very friendly pig!” Mom gave him ‘The Look.’ Dad sighed. “Yes, dear.” He peeked

Imagine a world full of strangers who all have a tiny little razor in their hands and they can randomly, mostly accidentally, shave a tiny piece of your soul off you while they sell you a newspaper or pass you the key to the bathroom at the gass station. Now imagine your classmates and co-workers have an even bigger blade, and can cut deeper. Imagine your friends and family members wield a really big knife. Imagine that all of these cuts can whittle away at the flesh of you, day after day after day, rendering the truth of you into a silver, almost invisible, unrecognizable. Imagine that these cuts sting for hours afterwards, sometimes days, and that they tend to fester. Imagine that you have to get through every day, bleeding from hundreds of wounds, some little and some deep, all the while pretending that nothing hurts.

The last story he looked at told of a talking enderman who could build with the snap of her fingers, and had a friend named Steve who LOVED cake.

his hardest cases, where parents, upstanding people, had reported children missing but were later proven to have lied to cover up abuse, an accidental death or a homicide. He had looked into the eyes of mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles and friends as they lied, watched their tears, even believed that they were convinced in the truth of their own lies until the facts, the evidence, emerged and the incontrovertible truth was revealed.

I never thought I would see the day we do more than what we always do. I never thought I would stand here, even as a joke, with you by my side. Whatever feelings might be coiling in my stomach, should stay exactly where they are because I will forever be happy to be your friend. You mean to me more than you could ever know.

This is the story of how I wear the title “Ultimate Fuckup,” because not only did I accidentally get the girl in the hot pink dress pregnant . . . But I broke bro code. Because the girl in the hot pink dress is the sister of my teammate . . . and best friend.

watched him make his way through the crowd, feeling proud I could call him mine. My boyfriend, my Jeremiah. The first boy I had ever fallen asleep next to. The first boy I ever told about the time I accidentally walked in on my parents doing it when I was eight. The first boy to go out and buy me Midol because my cramps were so bad, the first boy to paint my toenails, to hold my hair back when I threw up that time I got really drunk in front of all his friends, the first boy to write me a love note on the whiteboard hanging outside my dorm room.

It’s often said that proximity doesn’t matter so much now—that we have virtual offices and online communities and social networks, so it doesn’t matter where we are physically. But I’m skeptical. I think online communities tend to group like with like, which is fine and perfect for some tasks, but sometimes inspiration comes from accidental meetings and encounters with people outside one’s own demographic, and that’s less likely if you only communicate with your “friends.

With Dad’s rear end wiggling toward them as he fought their friend, his butt made quite the target. Jack chuckled. “I finally know your nickname! It should be Magnetbutt!

A little boy and his friends are being called bastards and bitches by bullies at school. The boy goes home and asks, "Dad, what are bastards and bitches?" And his dad replies, "Bitches are ladies and bastards are gentlemen." Then the boy goes upstairs to see his mom. As he enters the room, he accidentally drops a perfume bottle, and his mom says, "Shit!" "Mom, what is shit?" and she says, "Perfume." So he goes to see

Date: 10/03/2022 So, this is the book that she's been hiding all this time? How disappointing. I was expecting more... Anyways, my name is Gemma. I am a Minecraft player who loves a challenge. Aaaand I think before I act...I really didn't want to admit it! But ya, this is me. Sorry for the weird intro. My friend Lizzy has become really strange recently. I figured that there was something wrong with her. She was hiding something from me, but I never knew what. I decided to find out the truth. So, one day, after she logged off from Minecraft, I crept into her house and peeked into her chest. I found a book named Codex of Seeds. It wasn't there before. Naturally curious, I took the book and started to read it. I found out that my best friend was keeping a diary for more than a month! She had met Herobrine, the white-eyed ghost, and he gave Lizzy the Codex. He told him to safekeep the Codex and not let anyone else know about it, or else he would hack her. My friend agreed, but she didn't really do a very good job about keeping a secret. I then flipped through the book and found many amazing stories. This is the same book that you are reading right now. Wait, what? Why are my hearts dropping...oh no. He is here. Run for your life. It is too late. He killed me. He shook his head, picked up the Codex and teleported away. THE END

Name: Pikachu Time: ? Trainer: Ash Yay I finally have a trainer he can be kinda annoying sometimes but he's a good friend! So my name is Pikachu and well I live a pretty good life. I have a friend named Charizard who likes to burn everything down Lol. Bye. 

Crushing on a straight friend is one thing. Admitting you’re interested in them romantically? That you want…more? In what world does that possibly end well?

A famous preacher had a friend who was well known for his short temper. One day, at a party, he asked this friend to help him serve some drinks. The preacher himself poured the drinks, deliberately filling several of the glasses a bit too full. He then passed the tray to his friend. As they walked into the room to distribute the drinks, he accidentally-on-purpose bumped into the friend, causing the tray to jiggle and some of the drinks to slosh over the brim and spill. “There you are, you see,” said the preacher. “When you’re jolted, what spills out is whatever is filling you.” When you’re suddenly put to the test and don’t have time to think about how you’re coming across, your real nature will come out. That’s why character needs to go all the way through: whatever fills you will spill out. And it’s up to you to do something about it.

You are invited to see the Earth turn, in the Meridian Room of the Paris Observatory, tomorrow, from 2pm to 3pm,” read a notice he sent out in February. A journalist who attended the performance wrote in Le National newspaper: “At the appointed hour, I was there, in the Meridian Room, and I saw the Earth turn.” Of course, the journalist and his friends did not see the Earth turn. Nor did they feel the Earth turn. Nor did they hear the Earth turn. The turning of the Earth was invisible, and it was silent. It was, in fact, completely hidden to human sensory perceptions. The spectators were informed of this profound but invisible aspect of the world through Foucault’s pendulum and their intellectual deductions. Foucault’s pendulum, along with the first microscope two hundred years earlier, marked the beginning of a new era in the history of human civilization, in which our knowledge of nature arises not from our own sensory experience but from instruments and calculations. Since Foucault, more and more of what we know about the universe is undetected and undetectable by our bodies. What we see with our eyes, what we hear with our ears, what we feel with our fingertips, is only a tiny sliver of reality. Little by little, using artificial devices, we have uncovered a hidden reality. It is often a reality that violates common sense. It is often a reality strange to our bodies. It is a reality that forces us to re-examine our most basic concepts of how the world works. And it is a reality that discounts the present moment and our immediate experience of the world.

I wouldn’t know, though, about this supposed gallantry, because I’m not your lady friend.” “You could be.” He gave her another chance. She truly did draw him in with the roundness of her figure, hugged by faded denim and topped with a baggy sweatshirt that drooped enticingly off a shoulder, baring a black strap. Lace or cotton? A feline mind wanted to know. But apparently he wouldn’t know today, as she, yet again, managed to resist him. “Date you? Not likely.” Again words emerged from him without volition. “Why not?” “Oh please. I’ve seen enough to know you’re not my type.” Such a liar. Apparently he wasn’t the only one aroused by their repartee. The musky scent of her arousal tickled his senses. It made him bolder. “I guarantee when I’m between your thighs and you’re clawing my back, you’ll be screaming a different tune.” So he might have come on a tad strong with that last statement. That was still no excuse for what happened next. “Pig.” However it wasn’t the animal insult that was her most grievous crime. It was the gigantic hunk of hair she snipped off! An irreplaceable, thick chunk of his hair permanently removed. Accidental or intentional, it didn’t matter. Ack! My mane. My beautiful, precious mane. He couldn’t help a low rumbling growl. His eyes glinted in the mirror, the gold catching the light and reflecting it, along with his fury. “You. Did. Not. Just. Do. That.” And yes, he might have growled the last bit. “Oops? Did I do that? Sorry.” Said with no repentance at all. With a smirk and a blown kiss, she let her crime rain down over him in a golden, threaded shower. And then, she ran.

Tell us more about the werestag,” Portia called to Denny. It took Cecily a moment to understand what her friend meant, and to recall that they were not hunting Luke in the undergrowth. “Is the legend centuries old?” Portia asked, stepping over a fallen branch. “Not at all,” Denny answered. “Mere decades. If you believe the locals, these woods have been cursed for generations, but the man-beast is only one of the more recent victims.” “Oh, come now.” Brooke swatted an insect against his neck, then squinted at his hand before wiping it against his trousers. “What evidence is there for this supposed curse? Unless by ‘cursed’ you mean plagued by midges, in which case I readily capitulate.” “People have died here,” Cecily said. “People die everywhere.” “Yes, but this forest claims more than its share,” Denny said, pausing and raising his torch high. “And it has a taste for the young and foolhardy.” “Of course it does,” Brooke argued. “Most people who die of accidental causes are young and foolhardy.

I missed you most of all, you know,” he said. “You were my best friend.

Whether he killed her or scavenged her remains, he’s a man-eater now, so he can’t stay. I just don’t want to jump to the conclusion he’s the killer and overlook the possibility she was--” Daniel’s arm nudged mine. A subtle gesture that could be accidental, but when you’ve been friends this long, you know when you’re being told to shut up.

The Lord my God lightens my darkness. —Psalm 18:28 (RSV) Nursing a grouchy mood, it was with leaden feet I trudged up the hill that morning to check the newborn calves on our family ranch. I determined that nothing could cheer me up, but in an instant my sour grapes were forgotten. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I first saw the calf with her mother standing over her proudly. Normally our calves are around seventy to ninety pounds. We weighed Mini, just to be sure. Full term and full of life…and only twenty pounds. As a precaution, Mini is spending the first few weeks of her life living in an insulated, heated room in the barn, breathing warm air and where her mother won’t accidentally squish her. Twice a day we carry her out to nurse the cow. She can just reach if she stands on her toes. Plus, we bottle-feed her periodically throughout the day and night.  We took pictures of Mini next to the cats, and they’re the same size! I told a friend that I don’t know why Mini is that size; all of the cow’s other calves were normal. “Every now and then,” she replied, “God sends us a present that will always make us smile.” She’s right. No matter what misery I’m dwelling on, whenever I see Mini, it all goes away and I can’t help but grin. There are times when I get caught up in negativity, Lord. Please don’t let me forget Your big blessings in however small a package. —Erika Bentsen Digging Deeper: Ps 21:6; Eph 3:20–21

But, it's also nice to have a place like the Yellow Rose for times when I need some quiet solitude. Or, when I need help nursing a friend through a bad, bitter breakup. The bartender pours

Another frigging sandbox.” “What does a sandbox have to do with scheming and backstabbing deities?” asked the surprised Viracocha. “It’s a reference to an ongoing war back in the First World where one’s friend today ends up being an enemy tomorrow. A war with a lot of sides and no clear delineation between factions. Temporary allies, permanent interests.

I wasn’t sure what to say, so I asked my congregation. There was passion in their replies, and none of  it had to do with how much they appreciate their preacher being such an amazing role model for them. Not one of them said they love all the real-life applications they receive in the sermons for how to have a more victorious marriage. Almost all of them said they love that their preacher is so obviously preaching to herself and just allowing them to overhear it. My friend Tullian put it this way: “Those most qualified to speak the gospel are those who truly know how unqualified they are to speak the gospel.” Never once did Jesus scan the room for the best example of  holy living and send that person out to tell others about him. He always sent stumblers and sinners.

Things I'll Neva Forget I'll never Forget my mother The one who loves me most her pretty,priceless smile will forever be kept my life "so called" file her motherly touch had no comparison nor equal it could never be replaced,stopped or re-enacted into a sequel i felt as if her life was all but drawn up without perfection it was done wrong Now she's gone But I'll never Forget my MOTHER I'll never forget father The one who changed my life thanks to him I'll know how to treat my own wife the ultimate villein on my hoodlum chart he's at the top......Wonder Y?........ my daddy es a Flop thus he did lie,cheat & steal in my heart I denounce I'll never forget my FATHER I'll never forget my Family 'My People" The Mohasoa Pride & that 2% Bopape Tribe Our individual ups & downs made it one hell of a roller coaster ride jokes aside "we miss you" the one who died like my mom she was our escutcheon against the dark what a tragic lose of our artery of traffic see throw mi eyes "divided we'll fall....together we shall rise" I'll never forget my FAMILY I'll never forget You Guys "My Friends" Mmmm aaargh "writers block" over-loading there's just too many of y'all BUT I never forget " My Friends" I'll never forget......Who I Am Me the man of my dreams "Lebogang Bopape" The boy who never knew his abilities till he was 7 fucked up everything by the time he turned 11 my 1st day at school "quite funny" didn't talk to anyone for like a week or so till I fell cried so hard I accidentally ran into my very own Jezebel so wrong was I thinking she's the one my feelings weren't intact I had none Uncle said "you'll get them when you turn into a man SON" What happened next an emotional recession the leading cause factor 4 this deception............LIES! call them what y'all want black or white they'er still LIES! all you'll get trouble Shit I'm seeing double losing sight of what is right got my life blue,black,cherry.......Bleary Time will tell I am a bit blind but look behind you Deep in the back of your mind you are who you are I'll never forget ME! Lebogang Yep thats Me Baby!

A complacent satisfaction in God may cause you to accidentally outwork all your religious friends.

My best friend looks at me and downs the shot of bourbon in his glass. His eyes are red and rheumy, a look of misery etched upon his face. Trey sniffs loudly and slams his glass down on the bar, drawing the attention of a few of the people sitting around us.

There is something unbearably selfish about the two person romance - about Romeo and Juliet or Heathcliff and Catherine. Austen’s novels do not belong to this species of love story. They are ensemble affairs not duos against the world. And they’re far more concerned with the question of how to live among our fellow beings than how to marry your best friend. The books end in weddings but that doesn’t make them love stories - it just makes them comedies.

There was a pond right next to the house I grew up in. One afternoon while playing by the pond, I accidentally fell in it. There was nobody around at that time as it was afternoon and everybody was sleeping, and I was yet to learn swimming. So, I prayed to all the gods and goddesses like all the adult kids did in that culture. But no god or deity came to my rescue. So, I struggled under the murky water and finally managed to survive by pulling myself to the bank. Perhaps that was the first sign I received from Nature about the true helplessness of life. While you are drowning, no god is going to come to your rescue, so learn to swim my friend, because it is only you, the living god on earth, who can save yourself and nobody else. The only god there is, is your will to live - so, be aware of that Himalayan will and make it as conscientious as possible, for then only, can your godliness have any impact upon your life as well as the lives of others.

Gabby is another teacher at the Gilmore Academy, the school I teach at. She has also been my best friend since our own days at prep school. She's a gorgeous woman –tall, blonde, thin. She looks like she could be doing spreads in Victoria's Secret catalogs or something. But more than that, she's intelligent. Fierce. And often, very outspoken.

Look, man,” I say, “in the long run, you're going to be better off. She wasn't good for you, Trey.” My best friend looks at me and downs the shot of bourbon in his glass. His eyes are red and rheumy, a look of misery etched upon his face. Trey sniffs loudly and slams his glass down on the bar, drawing the attention of a few of the people sitting around us. “I loved her, man,” he says. I nod and pat him on the shoulder. “I know you did, man.” We're sitting at the bar in the Yellow Rose Lounge, a quiet place where people can go to have a drink and conversation. Furnished in dark woods, with soft, dim lighting, it's more peaceful than your average watering hole. The music is kept low enough that you don't have to shout to be heard, and the flat panel televisions showing highlights from various games are kept on mute. The Yellow Rose is a lounge that caters to business professionals and people who want to have a quiet drink, a mellow conversation, or be alone with their thoughts. There are plenty of bars in Austin that cater

If you want a friend in Washington,” Harry Truman once said, “get a dog.