Beyond Grateful Quotes

Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

This being human is a guest house. Every morning is a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor...Welcome and entertain them all. Treat each guest honorably. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

I didn't expect to recover from my second operation but since I did, I consider that I'm living on borrowed time. Every day that dawns is a gift to me and I take it in that way. I accept it gratefully without looking beyond it. I completely forget my physical suffering and all the unpleasantness of my present condition and I think only of the joy of seeing the sun rise once more and of being able to work a little bit, even under difficult conditions.

Once we have tasted far streams, touched the gold, found some limit beyond the waterfall, a season changes and we come back changed but safe, quiet, grateful.

Privilege is something to be aware of, to fight to see beyond, but ultimately to be grateful for. It’s like a bulletproof vest; it makes you harder to kill.

She remembered a time when it had mattered so much. Sometimes she wished she knew how to get back to the girl who'd cared about such things. Other times, she was grateful beyond words that she couldn't.

Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond

Alice watched and listened and focused beyond the words the actress spoke. She saw her eyes become desperate, searching, pleading for truth. She saw them land softly and gratefully on it. Her voice felt at first tentative and scared. Slowly, and without getting louder, it grew more confident and then joyful, playing sometimes like a song. Her eyebrows and shoulders and hands softened and opened, asking for acceptance and offering forgiveness. Her voice and body created an energy that filled Alice and moved her to tears. She squeezed the beautiful baby in her lap and kissed his sweet-smelling head. The actress stopped and came back into herself. She looked at Alice and waited. “Okay, what do you feel?” “I feel love. It’s about love.

This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

It’s up to us to make the choice to be grateful even when things aren’t going well. Nouwen calls that the “discipline of gratitude.” To me, it means not just being grateful for the good things, because that’s easy, but also to be grateful for the hard things too. To be grateful even for our flaws, because in the end, they make us stronger by giving us a chance to reach beyond our grasp.

By being grateful, appreciating all we have instead of focusing on what is lacking, we allow more of the same to flow toward us.

He remembers a verse from the mystic poet, Rumi, Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

Every day, I am grateful for your love and the countless ways you lift me up.

Love cannot be a means to any end. Love does not promise success, power, achievement, health, recovery, satisfaction, peace of mind, fulfillment, or any other prizes. Love is an end in itself, a beginning in itself. Love exists only for love. The invitation of love is not a proposal for self-improvement or any other kind of achievement. Love is beyond success and failure, doing well or doing poorly. There is not even a right and wrong way. Love is a gift. One can never be proud of being in love. One can only be grateful.

What do you do when strength is called for and you have no strength? You evoke a power beyond your own and use stamina you did not know you had. You open your eyes in the morning grateful that you can see the sunlight of yet another day. You draw yourself to the edge of the bed and then put one foot in front of the other and keep going. You weep with those who gently close the eyes of the dead, and somehow, from the salt of your tears, comes endurance for them and for you. You pour out that resurgence to minister to the living.

204. "This being human is a guest house. Every morning is a new arrival. Be grateful for ever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

I appreciate every little thing and detail that this mother Earth has. I am beyond grateful. I thank God, the creator.

She who reconciles the ill-matched threads of her life, and weaves them gratefully into a single cloth— it’s she who drives the loudmouths from the hall and clears it for a different celebration   where the one guest is you. In the softness of evening it’s you she receives.   You are the partner of her loneliness, the unspeaking center of her monologues. With each disclosure you encompass more and she stretches beyond what limits her, to hold you.

She allowed herself to look his way, pretending she was glancing at the clock on the wall above the door. He was meticulously lost in the lesson, taking notes well beyond the scope of what was written on the board. She was grateful that at least one of them was listening, because she knew he was going to have to explain it all to her later. And he would, without every knowing that he was the reason she hadn’t heard a word of the lesson.

THE GUEST HOUSE This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

Sweet Grace amazes me The way that she can see Beyond the man I am To the man that I could be She's bringing out my best While she covers all the rest Some say her love is blind But I say her love forgets She don't like it when I try so hard to impress her ‘Cause when I do that, it's a lie that makes her love look the lesser The truth is I know I'll never be, I'll never be good enough I'll never deserve her love I'll never be, I'll never be good enough for Grace But she takes me anyway I am the cheatin' kind But she's changing my mind The way she takes me back Though I fail her every time She's got friends who tell her that she Is much too good for me Well, I've told her that myself But she refuses to leave I'd like to think my strength won her affection But the truth is it was my weakness that caught her attention I'm grateful to know When my tears fall down like rain She wipes them from my face She tells me that I'm lovely And if I am, it's all because of Grace This love turns my inside out And my world upside down Grace is changing me

There is nothing that makes a man grow beyond his stature than a woman telling him she loves him. and however much she might have lied to him, there will always be a part of him that is grateful to her for this, and that will harbour some love for her.

Whether our families come from Guatemala, Afghanistan, or South Korea, the immigrants since 1965 have shared histories that extend beyond this nation, to our countries of origin, where our lineage has been decimated by Western imperialism, war, and dictatorships orchestrated or supported by the United States. In our efforts to belong in America, we act grateful, as if we’ve been given a second chance at life. But our shared root is not the opportunity this nation has given us but how the capitalist accumulation of white supremacy has enriched itself off the blood of our countries. We cannot forget this.

I’ve lived on borrowed time. More than any man deserves. I’ve seen wonders beyond my wildest imaginings. Through these centuries, against the impossibility that we’d find each other, we did. And I am most grateful for it.

To reach BIG objectives; we must first be grateful for the SMALL achievements we attained in the past.

Find things to be grateful for. It is easy. You're alive; that's a good thing to start being grateful for right away.

The people who believed in me, inspired me. The people who supported me, strengthened me. The people who attacked me, kept me on my toes. The people who knocked me down, kept me humble. The people who gossiped about me, revealed my power over them. The people who loved me, breathed hope into my heart. The people who bet against me, were wrong. I’m grateful beyond words for all of those people. As the days of this precious life continue onward… If you love me, it only gets better. If you hate me, it only gets worse. I’ll continue to be me… a work in progress… unapologetically.

Grief is a stern teacher, but I am confident I could not have learned some lessons in any other way. For that, I am grateful. Grateful to God for loving me enough to stretch me and push me and crush me, to refine me in the furnace of affliction, to force me to stretch my faith beyond what I could see. God loves me more than I can possible comprehend. He watches over me. He watches over all of us. But if the way were easy, how could we grow into who He wants us to be? How could our faith become unshakable?

This being human is a guest house. Every morning is a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. . . . Welcome and entertain them all. Treat each guest honorably. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond. —Rumi A man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him. —William James, The Principles of Psychology

The noise is like a tide, and Olivia lets it wash over her, grateful for the sound after so much silence, even if none of them are talking about what she saw, about the fact there is another world beyond the wall.

You are weak, Savannah. I can feel it when our minds merge." "Stay out of my mind. You certainly weren't invited." Her hands went to her hips. "And just for the record, your mind needs to be washed out with soap! Half the things you think we're going to do are never going to happen. I could never look at you again." He laughed. Aloud.An actual, real laugh. It welled up unexpectedly and emerged low and husky, with genuine amusement. Gregori nearly leapt the distance between them and dragged her into his arms, grateful beyond imagining. She flung a pillow at his head. "Go ahead and laugh, you arrogant jerk." She wished she had a two-by-four handy.

Nu and Tina were not happy. The terrors that we tasted every day were theirs. [...] We imagined the dark corners, the feelings repressed but always close to exploding. And to those shadowy mouths, the caverns that opened beyond them under the buildings, we attributed everything that frightened us in the light of day. [...] Lila knew that I had that fear, my doll talked about it out loud. And so, on the day we exchanged our dolls for the first time, with no discussion, only looks and gestures, as soon as she had Tina, she pushed her through the grate and let her fall into the darkness.

This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, Some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! … The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond. Rumi

And gratitude is the solution. Being grateful for what we have today doesn’t mean we have to have that forever. It means we acknowledge that what we have today is what we’re supposed to have today. There is enough, we’re enough, and all we need will come to us. We don’t have to be desperate, fearful, jealous, resentful, or miserly. We don’t have to worry about what someone else has; they don’t have ours. All we need to do is appreciate and take care of what we have today. The trick is, we need to be grateful first—before we get anything else, not afterward.

THERE’D BEEN A few times—probably more than normal—when I’d wished I wasn’t a girl. I’d wished I was a boy the night Mr. Kewet asked me to dance and strangled me. I’d wished I was a boy the evening I was auctioned and men laughed in my face when I offered to buy myself. I’d wished I was a boy every day of my life that I belonged to that bastard who I would never name again. But that wish had ended with Elder. I’d finally come to enjoy being a girl—a woman. Every time Elder looked at me, every hour his feelings evolved from wariness to interest to love, I was beyond grateful I’d been born a girl.

I received a letter from a prisoner requesting a book because stories are his only way of traveling beyond a barbed wire fence and armed guards. Reading is a vacation for many people and an escape for others. Whether someone likes to read my stories or needs to read them, I am happy and grateful to help.

to be grateful for the hard things too. To be grateful even for our flaws, because in the end, they make us stronger by giving us a chance to reach beyond our grasp.

Deprived thinking turns good things into less or nothing. Grateful thinking turns things into more.

I will take a long look at where I am today and be grateful for my place. It’s right for me now, and is preparing me for the adventure ahead. —FROM EACH DAY A NEW BEGINNING

I consider the name. It wasn’t on the list, but as I study the baby’s flawless features, I can’t deny it fits. My muse led me into this world in the first place, then gave me the power to rule it; Jeb’s muse repainted Wonderland so many years ago, then stayed here to bring peace between two realms. Even though Morpheus would never admit it aloud, this is his way of honoring Jeb’s contribution, my other side, and human flights of fancy. The sentiment affects me deeply, warms me all the way from my wing tips to my toes, and I’m grateful beyond words. But

Stay out of my mind.You certainly weren't invited." Her hands went to her hips. "And just for the record, your mind needs to be washed out with soap! Half the things you think we're going to do are never going to happen. I could never look at you again." He laughed. Aloud. An actual, real laugh. It welled up unexpectedly and emerged low and husky, with genuine amusement. Gregori nearly leapt the distance between them and dragged her into his arms, grateful beyond imagining. She flung a pillow at his head. "Go ahead and laugh, you arrogant jerk." She wished she had a two-by-four handy.

Gratitude is your best attitude. When you are grateful on a continuing, ongoing basis, you actually enter a state of grace, inviting goodness and power beyond measure into your precious, one-of-a-kind life.

She taught me to be grateful for my life regardless of what that entailed, and that’s directly related to the image of Christ on the cross and the example of sacrifice that he gave us.” But the Stephen Colbert who speaks

I am grateful that their unyielding passion is completely allowed to flow through their delicate fingers and wrists onto their lovely instruments, sharing this on a level which is beyond words, resonating with one's deepest soul.

Works of art are of an infinite solitude, and no means of approach is so useless as criticism. Only love can touch and hold them and be fair to them. — Always trust yourself and your own feeling, as opposed to argumentations, discussions, or introductions of that sort; if it turns out that you are wrong, then the natural growth of your inner life will eventually guide you to other insights. Allow your judgments their own silent, undisturbed development, which, like all progress, must come from deep within and cannot be forced or hastened. Everything is gestation and then birthing. To let each impression and each embryo of a feeling come to completion, entirely in itself, in the dark, in the unsayable, the unconscious, beyond the reach of one’s own understanding, and with deep humility and patience to wait for the hour when a new clarity is born: this alone is what it means to live as an artist: in understanding as in creating. Being an artist means: not numbering and counting, but ripening like a tree, which doesn’t force its sap, and stands confidently in the storms of spring, not afraid that afterward summer may not come. It does come. But it comes only to those who are patient, who are there as if eternity lay before them, so unconcernedly silent and vast. I learn it every day of my life, learn it with pain I am grateful for: patience is everything!

Man is naturally humble, naturally grateful, naturally guilty, naturally transcended, naturally a sufferer; he is small, pitiful, weak, a passive taker who tucks himself naturally in a beyond of superior, awesome, all-embracing power.

I probably coughed self-pityingly in response, little aware that I was about to cross a tremendous threshold beyond which there would be no return, that in my hands I held an object whose simple appearance belied its profound power. All true readers have a book, a moment, like the one I describe, and when Mum offered me that much-read library copy mine was upon me. For although I didn't know it then, after falling deep inside the world of the Mud Man, real life was never going to be able to compete with fiction again. I've been grateful to Miss Perry ever sense, for when she handed that novel over the counter and urged my harried mother to pass it on to me, she'd either confused me with a much older child or else she'd glimpsed deep inside my soul and perceived a hole that needed filling. I've always chosen to believe the latter. After all, it's the librarian's sworn purpose to bring books together with their one true reader.

The glow lasted through the night, beyond the bar's closing, when there were no cabs on the street. And so Mathilde and Lotto decided to walk home, her arm in his, chatting about nothing, about everything, the unpleasant, hot breath of the subway belching up from the grates. 'Chthonic', he said, booze letting loose the pretension at his core, which she still found sweet, an allowance from the glory. It was so late, there were few other people out, and it felt, just for this moment, that they had the city to themselves. She thought of all the life just underfoot, the teem of it that they were passing over, unknowing. She said, 'Did you know that the total weight of all the ants on Earth is the same as the total weight of all the humans on Earth.' She, who drank to excess, was a little bit drunk, it was true, there was so much relief in the evening. When the curtains closed against the backdrop, an enormous bolder blocking their future had rolled away. 'They'll still be here when we're gone,' he said. He was drinking from a flask. By the time they were home, he'd be sozzeled. 'The ants and the jellyfish and the cockroaches, they will be the kings of the Earth.'... 'They deserve this place more than we do,' she said. 'We've been reckless with our gifts.' He smiled and looked up. There were no stars, there was too much smog for them. 'Did you know,' he said, 'they just found out just a while ago that there are billions of worlds that can support life in our galaxy alone.' ...She felt a sting behind here eyes, but couldn't say why this thought touched her. He saw clear through and understood. He knew her. The things he didn't know about her would sink an ocean liner. He knew her. 'We're lonely down here,' he said, 'it's true, but we're not alone.' In the hazy space after he died, when she lived in a sort of timeless underground grief, she saw on the internet a video about what would happen to our galaxy in billions of years. We are in an immensely slow tango with the Andromeda galaxy, both galaxies shaped like spirals with outstretched arms, and we are moving toward each other like spinning bodies. The galaxies will gain speed as they draw near, casting off blue sparks, new stars until they spin past each other, and then the long arms of both galaxies will reach longingly out and grasp hands at the last moment and they will come spinning back in the opposite direction, their legs entwined, never hitting, until the second swirl becomes a clutch, a dip, a kiss, and then at the very center of things, when they are at their closest, there will open a supermassive black hole.

He was deeply grateful for the chemical hand and feet warmers, which kept his extremities from freezing. Beyond that, he was numb: heart-numb, mind-numb, soul-numb. And the, numbness, he realized, went a long way down, and a long way back.

Down through this verdant land Carter walked at evening, and saw twilight float up from the river to the marvelous golden spires of Thran. And just at the hour of dusk he came to the southern gate, and was stopped by a red-robed sentry till he had told three dreams beyond belief, and proved himself a dreamer worthy to walk up Thran's steep mysterious streets and linger in the bazaars where the wares of the ornate galleons were sold. Then into that incredible city he walked; through a wall so thick that the gate was a tunnel, and thereafter amidst curved and undulant ways winding deep and narrow between the heavenward towers. Lights shone through grated and balconied windows, and, the sound of lutes and pipes stole timid from inner courts where marble fountains bubbled. Carter knew his way, and edged down through darker streets to the river, where at an old sea tavern he found the captains and seamen he had known in myriad other dreams. There he bought his passage to Celephais on a great green galleon, and there he stopped for the night after speaking gravely to the venerable cat of that inn, who blinked dozing before an enormous hearth and dreamed of old wars and forgotten gods.

The Story Is Always There Sometimes you don't need to speak to someone to know how they are feeling. You don't need to ask what is their story - often people have it written on their faces and you just have to take the time out to read it.

I wasn't grateful. You want to talk cranky, coitus interruptus takes me well beyond cranky. My engorged labia felt like they were pressing on my brain—what there was of my brain—and if I didn't get to fuck someone, something, now—a vampire would do—I was going to fucking explode. My cunt ached like a bruise. Beyond cranky, rather fortunately, doesn't transmute into embarrassment. It transmutes into fury. As my blood pressure began to rearrange itself to a more standard unengorged pattern I was seething.

Gratitude is a “nice” habit to adopt, warming your heart and all, but the Kumbaya effect is just the beginning. Gratefulness goes wayyyyyyy beyond the momentary feeling good, offering plenty of long-term and “practical” benefits we may never have intuited.

Then yesterday, in the dim watches of the night a dream came to me. A voice spoke and said: 'Love beyond price is yours. Take and cherish it, lest this priceless gift be withdrawn!' I awoke, happy, myself once more, grateful that life could come to me again.

And so this is the long road the nation traveled to get to Earthday, 1970, and beyond. Those who lead us down it… did not leave us a bad legacy considering the mood in which the continent was settled, and the amount we had to learn, we can be grateful that those battles do not have to be fought, at least not on the same fields, again. We can be just as certain that others will have to be. Environmentalism or conservation or preservation, or whatever it should be called, is not a fact, and never has been. It is a job.

I believe that none of us can conceive the full import of what Christ did for us in Gethsemane, but I am grateful every day of my life for His atoning sacrifice in our behalf. At the last moment, He could have turned back. But He did not. He passed beneath all things that He might save all things. In doing so, He gave us life beyond this mortal existence. He reclaimed us from the Fall of Adam. To the depths of my very soul, I am grateful to Him. He taught us how to live. He taught us how to die. He secured our salvation.

This being human is a guest house Every morning a new arrival A joy, a depression, a meanness Some momentary awareness Comes as an unexpected visitor Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows Who violently sweep your house Empty of its furniture Still treat each guest honorably He may be cleaning you out For some new delight!   The dark thought, the shame, the malice Meet them at the door laughing And invite them in Be grateful for whoever comes Because each has been sent As a guide from the beyond.

I’ve come to recognize this as something of a local custom—to express enthusiasm and agreement without real interest. A kind of polite but unyielding distance that saturates so many interactions. But now, their raised eyebrows and tight-lipped smiles fill me with a new sadness, clarifying where I stand in their eyes. Theirs isn’t the gaze of a mentor upon a student but a fixed asymmetry. They look at me as though I am a child whom they can tolerate at the table as long as I know my place. For years, I’ve sensed this violent but hidden truth—that beyond the welcome smiles of this country lies a vast and impenetrable wall: a national self-regard that insists on a mythic goodness. This is a nation that gives and gives to the less fortunate and asks nothing in return. Nothing, that is, but our grateful acquiescence to their silent expectations.

Poverty looks grim to grown people; still more so to children: they have not much idea of industrious, working, respectable poverty; they think the world only as connected with ragged clothes, scanty food, fireless grates, rude manners, and debasing vices: poverty for me was synonymous with degradation.

Kestrel climbed down and studied the garden in the lamplight thrown from her sunroom. She chewed the inside of her cheek, and was wondering whether books stacked on the chair on top of the table would make a difference when she heard something. The grate of a heel against pebbles. It came from beyond the door, and the other side of the wall. Someone had been listening. Was listening still. As quietly as she could, Kestrel took the chair down from the table and went inside. Before Arin left for the mountain pass, during the coldest hours of the night, he found time to order that every piece of furniture light enough for Kestrel to move be taken from her suite.

Everyone should be very grateful radioactivity exists at all. It can kill you, yes, but without it you wouldn't have been born in the first place. On Earth, deep under your feet, our planet happens to contain many atoms that do decay, all the time. Less so now than in the past, but still, Earth's mantle is radioactive. When atoms decay there, the particles they emit bump into their neighbours and generate heat, the very heat that contributes to keeping our planet warm. Without radioactivity, there would be no seismic or volcanic activity. The surface of the Earth would have been dead cold billions of yeras ago. Life as we know it would probably not exist at all.

Osho was very generous with his genius. When I went to Poona in 1988, he answered a question of mine. “Rumi says, ‘I want burning, burning.’ What does this burning have to do with my own possible enlightenment?” “You have asked a very dangerous question, Coleman. Burning has nothing to do with your enlightenment. This work you have done with Rumi is beautiful. It has to be, because it is coming out of Rumi’s love. But for you these poems can become ecstatic self-hypnosis.” He pretty much nailed me to the floor with that one. Sufism is good, but end up with Zen. It was a fine hit he gave me. I am still drawn to the Sufi longing and love-madness, but clarity is coming up strong on the inside. I have not assimilated his wisdom yet, but I mean to. I am very grateful to him. But it is not wisdom for everyone. Osho crafted his words to suit the individual. Ecstatic self-hypnosis might be just the thing for someone else. He was showing me a daylight beyond any beloved darkness, an ecstatic sobriety beyond any drunkenness.

I had been granted unusual freedom and responsibility at an early age, for which I should have been grateful in the extreme, but I wasn’t. Instead, I felt oppressed by the old man’s expectations. It was drilled into me that anything less than winning was failure. In the impressionable way of sons, I did not consider this rhetorically; I took him at his word. And that’s why later, when long-held family secrets came to light, when I noticed that this deity who asked only for perfection was himself less than perfect, that he was in fact not a deity at all—well, I wasn’t able to shrug it off. I was consumed instead by a blinding rage. The revelation that he was merely human, and frightfully so, was beyond my power to forgive. Two

She wanted the Delilah hanging up there on the wall to be the real Delilah. Strong and resilient. Battered by the world and circumstances beyond her control, sure, but instead of resentful and angry, that woman was calm. Peaceful. Serene. Grateful. She belonged somewhere, despite years and years of emotional displacement. She’d found something. She’d been found by someone.

Every morning at breakfast, or whenever you have consistent time together, cultivate a family practice of gratitude. It can be simple: “Today, I’m grateful the sun is out.” “I’m grateful that I’m healthy.” “I’m grateful that I get to see my best friend tonight.” If you’re not together, text with her about it, or do it on the phone. A reminder of what she has can help mitigate the longing for what she doesn’t.

All I can say is that I’m grateful that in many ways they just let me be. They didn’t want my rough start to cast a shadow on my childhood. From my earliest days they allowed me the kind of independence that many of my peers didn’t have—whether it was my period of digging, or the times in early elementary school when I went solo camping in the mountains several miles above our home. In solitude, I felt more deeply immersed in my surroundings. It felt natural.

PRAYER FOR P- (excerpt) I’ll claim cartographer’s liberties. I’ll claim omissions for the greater good. I am grateful my imagination has been drafted for the greater good, especially since what I mean to do is direct. I want to be your guide. In those unknown parts, they drew danger- sea scorpions, enormous octopi, leviathan- but also wonders, rising suns. The open sea is just that, open. My dictionary has sixty-four definitions for the word open, none of them defining how I feel now, my heart a little more open because without her, not the memory of her, the knowledge, not the insubstantial decoys my mind sets up in lieu of her, but without the woman, friend, her embodied body, without her this space is a little more open…those old map makers wanted us to want, almost as much as they wanted us to fear, to get to the places beyond the places we know. This is the way, how we have always found more.

Is there a person in this world who is full of good virtues and is at the same time powerful, grateful, truthful, determined and also compassionate? Is there a person who displays exemplary conduct, ardently wishes and works for the good of all, is wise, competent beyond doubt and good-looking? Is there a person who is self-satisfied, who has control over his anger, whose beauty casts a spell over everyone, who is free from envy and whose courage never fails him?

Here at the creek mouth the fields run on to the river, the mud deltaed and baring out of its rich alluvial harbored bones and dread waste, a wrack of cratewood and condoms and fruitrinds. Old tins and jars and ruined household artifacts that rear from the fecal mire of the flats like landmarks in the trackless vales of dementia praecox. A world beyond all fantasy, malevolent and tactile and dissociate, the blown lightbulbs like shorn polyps semitranslucent and skullcolored bobbing blindly down and spectral eyes of oil and now and again the beached and stinking forms of foetal humans bloated like young birds mooneyed and bluish or stale gray. Beyond in the dark the river flows in a sluggard ooze toward southern seas, running down out of the rainflattened corn and petty crops and riverloam gardens of upcountry landkeepers, grating along like bonedust, afreight with the past, dreams dispersed in the water someway, nothing ever lost.

Anne went to the little Avonlea graveyard the next evening to put fresh flowers on Matthew’s grave and water the Scotch rosebush. She lingered there until dusk, liking the peace and calm of the little place, with its poplars whose rustle was like low, friendly speech, and its whispering grasses growing at will among the graves. When she finally left it and walked down the long hill that sloped to the Lake of Shining Waters it was past sunset and all Avonlea lay before her in a dreamlike afterlight— ‘a haunt of ancient peace.’ There was a freshness in the air as of a wind that had blown over honey-sweet fields of clover. Home lights twinkled out here and there among the homestead trees. Beyond lay the sea, misty and purple, with its haunting, unceasing murmur. The west was a glory of soft mingled hues, and the pond reflected them all in still softer shadings. The beauty of it all thrilled Anne’s heart, and she gratefully opened the gates of her soul to it.

This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they are a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice. Meet them at the door laughing and invite them in. Be grateful for whatever comes. because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.

This being human is a guest house, Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they are a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still treat each guest honourably, He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has sent as a guide from beyond.

This being human is a guest-house. Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor. Welcome and entertain them all! Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture, still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond. I recite it aloud three

The sounds of the thwacks seem very loud to my ears and I am grateful for the privacy of the royal box. I keep count in my mind until we’re beyond sixty strikes and then find myself becoming consumed with the burning warmth of my behind. I imagine the colour it must be already and know that Sir is far from done. I hear his exertion as he lays into my sore ass again and feel his hardness straining against the confines of his suit. I want to rub myself against it, but I don’t dare. Now is the time to take my punishment like a good girl.It’s what he wants and what I need.

I simply vowed to the universe that I would write forever, regardless of the result. I promised that I would try to be brave about it, and grateful, and as uncomplaining as I could possibly be. I also promised that I would never ask writing to take care of me financially, but that I would always take care of it - meaning that I would always support us both, by any means necessary. I did not ask for any external rewards for my devotion; I just wanted to spend the rest of my life as near to writing as possible - forever close to that source of all my curiosity and contentment.

Someone else’s idea of what constitutes a good life or “happily ever after” is not a one-size-fits-all. You can be someone for whom relationships are too complicated. You can be going through something in your life, processing trauma you may have denied for too long, or you can be going through physical changes in your body. Either way, you might not have the desires other people expect you to have. Maybe all you want right now is a friend. Friendship is the best foundation, anyway, for whatever may evolve beyond that. It boils down to this: Not everyone wants the same thing, and that’s okay.

Often, during times when I am in a state of absolute bliss and gratitude, those are the times that people will ask me, “Are you happy or are you sad?” It’s funny, because when you are happy in a way that most people are happy in, that is, when you are jumping up and down and laughing and smiling and giggling, people will recognize that as happiness. But when you go beyond that state and on into the state of blissfulness— nirvana— only a very few number of people are going to be able to recognize and understand that. Why? Because only very few people have gone beyond the level of obvious happiness, to experience actual nirvaana. Nirvana is what I describe as being in a state of worship; you see, you go beyond just feeling happy and grateful, and you enter into a state of mind that allows you to worship what you have been given or what you have attained or achieved, or whatever circumstance you are in that is making you happy. You stop and you worship the person, the place, the thing, the feeling. I’m easily flung into that state, so, I often find it strange that I can be in an absolute state of bliss, meanwhile, the other person can be asking me if I am either happy or sad. But I am worshipping.

Most of us get decked somewhere along the way in life, slammed to the ground, the world looking down on us. And when—not if, when—that happens, we have a choice. Do we get back up? And when it happens again, do we get back up again? And again, and again, and again, and again? When I’m feeling clobbered by events, pounded by setbacks, or just flat-out exhausted from dealing with my own mistakes, I think of Steve Jobs, Winston Churchill, and Tommy Caldwell. Not persisting in a grim manner, full of endless suffering, but joyfully and gratefully persisting, fueled by passionately pursuing purposeful work.

I have a hunch the world is darker than I could ever imagine and there is less reason for hope than I am able to see. It makes me grateful there is only so much I can see, and I am left mostly with questions. Grateful, also, that hope is not a reasonable thing. Though I have seen my share of darkness, I am spared perceiving much of it. And here is why I hope beyond a reasonable doubt: I think that as the darkness grows, it makes the dim lights that are left seem brighter. And the darker it gets, the brighter the light appears, until it is so luminous, eventually, even falling shadows are filled with it.

We’re not going to make it,” Baxian called as Lidia zoomed toward the guard station. “Lidia,” Athalar warned. “Get down!” Lidia barked, and Ruhn shut his eyes, sinking low as the grate lowered at an alarming rate. Metal screamed and exploded right above them, the car rocking, shuddering— Yet Lidia kept driving. She raced onto the open road beyond the city as the grate slammed shut behind them. “Cutting it a little close, don’t you think?” Hunt shouted to Lidia, and Ruhn opened his eyes to find that the gunner had been ripped clean off. Baxian was clinging for dear life to the back of the jeep, a manic grin on his face.

As for the world beyond my family—well, what they would see for most of my teenage years was not a budding leader but rather a lackadaisical student, a passionate basketball player of limited talent, and an incessant, dedicated partyer. No student government for me; no Eagle Scouts or interning at the local congressman’s office. Through high school, my friends and I didn’t discuss much beyond sports, girls, music, and plans for getting loaded. Three of these guys—Bobby Titcomb, Greg Orme, and Mike Ramos—remain some of my closest friends. To this day, we can laugh for hours over stories of our misspent youth. In later years, they would throw themselves into my campaigns with a loyalty for which I will always be grateful, becoming as skilled at defending my record as anyone on MSNBC. But there were also times during my presidency—after they had watched me speak to a big crowd, say, or receive a series of crisp salutes from young Marines during a base tour—when their faces would betray a certain bafflement, as if they were trying to reconcile the graying man in a suit and tie with the ill-defined man-child they’d once known. That guy? they must have said to themselves. How the hell did that happen? And if my friends had ever asked me directly, I’m not sure I’d have had a good answer.

When she...walked down the long hill that sloped to the Lake of Shining Waters it was past sunset and all Avonlea lay before her in a dreamlike afterlight- 'a haunt of ancient peace'. There was a freshness in the air as of a wind that had blown over honeysweet fields of clover. Home lights twinkled out here and there among the homestead trees. Beyond lay the sea, misty and purple, with its haunting, unceasing murmur. The west was a glory of soft mingled hues, and the pond reflected them all in still softer shadings. The beauty of it all thrilled Anne's heart, and she gratefully opened the gates of her soul to it. 'Dear old world,' she murmured, 'you are very lovely, and I am glad to be alive in you.

From the pleasure podium of Ali Qapu, beyond the enhanced enclosure, the city spread itself towards the horizon. Ugly buildings are prohibited in Esfahan. They go to Tehran or stay in Mashhad. Planters vie with planners to outnumber buildings with trees. Attracting nightingales, blackbirds and orioles is considered as important as attracting people. Maples line the canals, reaching towards each other with branches linked. Beneath them, people meander, stroll and promenade. The Safavids' high standards generated a kind of architectural pole-vaulting competition in which beauty is the bar, and ever since the Persians have been imbuing the most mundane objects with design. Turquoise tiles ennoble even power stations. In the meadow in the middle of Naghshe Jahan, as lovers strolled or rode in horse-drawn traps, I lay on my back picking four-leafed clovers and looking at the sky. There was an intimacy about its grandeur, like having someone famous in your family. The life of centuries past was more alive here than anywhere else, its physical dimensions unchanged. Even the brutal mountains, folded in light and shadows beyond the square, stood back in awe of it. At three o'clock, the tiled domes soaked up the sunshine, transforming its invisible colours to their own hue, and the gushing fountains ventilated the breeze and passed it on to grateful Esfahanis. But above all was the soaring sky, captured by this snare of arches.(p378)

Many times I have been grateful for the simple, military skill of being able to live with people in confined spaces. It has helped me so much over the years on expeditions and beyond. And I was especially glad to be with Neil. When we hang with good people, some of their goodness rubs off. I like that in life. The other thing the army had taught me was how, and when, to go that extra mile. And the time to do it is when it is tough--when all around you are slowing and quitting and complaining. It is about understanding that the moment to shine brightest is when all about you is dark. It is a simple lesson, but it is one of the keys to doing well in life. I see it in friends often. On Everest that quality is everything.

The great Persian Sufi poet Rumi beautifully describes the mind of befriending emotions in his famous poem, “Guest House”:         This being human is a guest house         Every morning a new arrival.         A joy, a depression, a meanness,         some momentary awareness comes         as an unexpected visitor.         Welcome and entertain them all!         Even if they are a crowd of sorrows,         who violently sweep your house         empty of its furniture,         still, treat each guest honorably.         He may be clearing you out         for some new delight.         The dark thought, the shame, the malice,         meet them at the door laughing,         and invite them in.         Be grateful for whoever comes,         because each has been sent         as a guide from beyond.

Here at the creek mouth the fields run on to the river, the mud deltaed and baring out of its rich alluvial harbored bones and dread waste, a wrack of cratewood and condoms and fruitrinds. Old tins and jars and ruined household artifacts that rear from the fecal mire of the flats like landmarks in the trackless vales of dementia praecox. A world beyond all fantasy, malevolent and tactile and dissociate, the blown lightbulbs like shorn polyps semitranslucent and skullcolored bobbing blindly down and spectral eyes of oil and now and again the beached and stinking forms of foetal humans bloated like young birds mooneyed and bluish or stale gray. Beyond in the dark the river flows in a sluggard ooze toward southern seas, running down out of the rain flattened corn and petty crops and riverloam gardens of upcountry land keepers, grating along like bonedust,

Religion, when restricted to these principles, is a form of gratitude. A man is grateful for his own existence; for this he must have a God. — Such a God must be able to benefit and to injure him, he must be able to act the friend and the foe. He must be esteemed for his good as well as for his evil qualities. The monstrous castration of a God by making him a God only of goodness, would lie beyond the pale of the desires of such a community. The evil God is just as urgently needed as the good God: for a people in such a form of society certainly does not owe its existence to toleration and humaneness .... What would be the good of a God who knew nothing of anger, revenge, envy, scorn, craft, and violence? — who had perhaps never experienced the rapturous ardeurs of victory and of annihilation? No one would understand such a God: why should one possess him?

You are charming. Your charm, just like your ability to live happily and be successful is beyond a limit. Day after day, innumerable people all over the world are always in search of social acceptance and validation for their beauty. Stop looking for people’s validation of your beauty! Stop trying to make people accept you; stop trying to look for someone to tell you how charming your eyes are. Stop searching for someone to be grateful for your love and beautiful smile. Stop looking for someone to admire you for your strong mind when you are faced with troubles in life. Don’t give people’s validation more power than it has earned. The can only give you a reflection of your connection with gravity. That’s it. Your purpose in life cannot be measured by a scale, the reason for your existence, your beauty; talent cannot be measured by this scale. Why don’t you just take the note of the number and then live your life freely? Because life is beautiful. You are Beautiful!

Some twenty minutes later, I was back at the river, and my son and father were waiting on the far side.  Crossing the swift river with my dad was something I was really dreading.  I helped him check his bandages, and he was under the impression that his injury was a compound fracture—bone sticking through flesh.  While I didn’t get a good look at the foot itself, I noticed there were blood blisters everywhere on his lower leg.  It was a shockingly bad injury, and I worried he might lose his foot.  It was time to cross the stream.  My son took my father’s left side, where he could keep close watch on the placement of the improvised wooden cane.  I took my father’s right arm in mine and silently prayed as our feet hit the water together.  Our footing held firm on the stream’s rocky bottom, and the rushing water didn’t rise above our knees.  I was so tremendously grateful at that final step onto the rocky shore, but there was lots of work still requiring our attention before my son and I could make the final journey to the trailhead beyond Lake Pamelia.

you will see what seems to be unfairness, cruelty and suffering. 24Do not blame these on your brother. 25Do not blame these on God. 26To blame what you see on anyone or anything is to accept what you see as real. 27You must be willing to see that it is not real. 28You must be willing to not let illusion be hardened. (v 19 – 24)1The one you seem to be within the world is not your reality. 2Do not mourn it. 3Do not be grateful for it. 4To mourn it or to be grateful for it is to believe in illusion. 5Be willing to see that the one you think you are is only an expression of thought. 6Be willing to look beyond the thought and acknowledge the Thinker of the thought as you. 7Do not fear that what you think is a statement of your truth. 8Do not fear there is truth to your guilt. 9Do not fear there is hideousness in your nature. 10Do not ask to be a hero. 11Do not ask to be good. 12Do not ask to be anything at all. 13Give only your willingness to let go of illusions. 14Give your willingness to know your truth. (v 25 – 33)1Do not fear God. 2There is no judgment in God. 3Judgment

The thoughts raced and crashed through her. The grate was thirty feet up—no way to go back now. And the floor of the pit was covered with these things, all smelling her, assessing her. But not … advancing. Like something about her gave them pause. Made. Maybe it also meant something to these creatures. Bryce tugged the neckline of her T-shirt down, revealing the star in all its glory. The beasts shrank back, hissing, tossing massive, scaled heads. Their teeth glinted in the starlight. A tunnel stretched on either side of the pit. She could only make out the cavernous mouths, but it seemed like this pit sat in the middle of a passage. To where, though? This was the stupidest thing she’d ever done. In a life full of stupid ideas and mistakes, that was saying something, but … Bryce turned toward one of the tunnels, trying to better see what lay beyond. The star in her chest dimmed. Like her magic was rapidly fading. She whirled toward the other tunnel, trying to see what she could before the magic vanished— The star flared brightly again. “Huh,” she murmured. Bryce turned back the other way. The star faded. To the opposite side: it brightened.

Perceiving good or bad is a insight beyond the perception understanding different level of perspectives to different outcomes. Awake and see through the illusion of mind & senses, 'beings' playing world as a game. Politics played with people is best example if you can see through it. It's not only about acceptance, acceptance may be a good step toward satisfying your Self. But the art of perception must be born for evolving our Consciousness. Grow the perspective inside to know the world outside. Don't be controled by illusion & limited by acceptance. Feelings & emotions sure can make you perspective grow, to understand yourself & people. But only to a level, sometimes one has to see beyond feelings & emotions, or it will end in a different direction. Acceptance is needed for gratefulness, no doubt but sometimes one need to see beyond it. Don't get confused or ungrateful, Just Be. Watching perception & accepting is a whole different level, it may get a little difficult for a new start, but surely will take you one step above. Accept but don't fail to see through the perception. Know things from their roots & perish them into bliss Let nothing inside, nothing outside. Just be, with what, what is. Answer from silence will be nessaasary to what needs to be.

Jake tried to pull away from the clutching hand and went sprawling on the Tick-Tock Man's throne. His eye fell on a pocket which had been sewn into the right-hand arm-rest. Jutting from the elasticized top was the cracked pearl handle of a revolver. "Oh, cully, how you'll suffer!" the Tick-Tock Man whispered ecstatically. The O of surprise had been replaced by a wide, trembling grin. "Oh how you'll suffer! And how happy I'll be to...WHAT--?" The grin slackened and the surprised O began to reappear as Jake pointed the cheesy nickel-plated revolver at him and thumbed back the hammer. The grip on Jake's ankle tightened until it seemed to him that the bones there must snap. "You DASN'T!" Tick-Tock said in a screamy whisper. "Yes I DO," Jake said grimly, and pulled the trigger of the Tick-Tock Man's runout gun. There was a flat crack, much less dramatic than the Schmeisser's Teutonic roar. A small black hole appeared high up on the right side of Tick-Tock's forehead. The Tick-Tock Man went on staring up at Jake, disbelief in his remaining eye. Jake tried to make himself shoot him again and couldn't do it. Suddenly a flap of the Tick-Tock Man's scalp peeled away like old wallpaper and dropped on his right cheek. Roland would have known what this meant; Jake, however, was now almost beyond coherent thought. A dark, panicky horror was spinning across his mind like a tornado funnel. He cringed back in the big chair as the hand on his ankle fell away and the Tick-Tock Man collapsed forward on his face. The door. He had to open the door and let the gunslinger in. Focusing on that and nothing but, Jake let the pearl-handled revolver clatter to the iron grating...

Top Dog" If I could, I would take your grief, dig it up out of the horseradish field and grate it into something red and hot to sauce the shellfish. I would take the lock of hair you put in the locket and carry it in my hand, I would make the light strike everything the way it hit the Bay Bridge, turning the ironwork at sunset into waffles. If I could, I would blow your socks off, they would travel far, always in unison, past the dead men running, past the cranes standing in snow, beyond the roads we rode, so small in our little car, it was like riding in a miner's helmet. If I could I would make everyone vote and call their public servants to say, “No one was meant for this.” I would go back to the afternoon we made love in the tall grass under the full sun not far from the ravine where the old owner had flung hundreds of mink cages. I would memorize gateways to the afterworld, the electric third rail, the blond braid our girl has hanging down her back, the black guppy we killed at our friends’ when we unplugged the bubbler and the fish floated to the top, one eye up at the ceiling, the other at the blue gravel on the bottom of the tank. I would beg an audience with Sister Lucia, the last living of the children visited by Our Lady of Fatima, I would ask her about the weight of secrets, if they let her sleep or if she woke at night with a body on her body, if the body said, “Let's play top dog, first I'll lie on you, then you lie on me.” I would ask how she lived with revelation, the normal state of affairs amplified beyond God, bumped up to the Virgin Mother, who no doubt knew a few things, passed them on, quietly, and I would ask Lucia how she lived with knowing, how she could keep it under her hat, under wraps, button up, zip her lip, play it close to the vest, never telling, never using truth as a weapon.

pine nuts and toss gently again. Green Bean, Tuna, and Mushroom “Casserole” One of my favorite things from my Midwestern upbringing is the green bean and mushroom casserole at Thanksgiving—probably the same one that was on your holiday table, thanks to the canned-mushroom-soup marketing campaign. This is my grown-up version of that casserole, which has all the comfort appeal of the childhood dish, but way better flavor and nutritional value. Make it with a one-to-one ratio of mushrooms to green beans, and have some fun with the beans, if you like—you can grill them, slice them thin and use raw, use pickled green beans, or use a mix of all of the above. » Serves 4 Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper Extra-virgin olive oil 2 garlic cloves, smashed and peeled 1 pound wild mushrooms, wiped off and cut into bite-size pieces (about 6 cups) One 5-ounce can oil-packed tuna, drained 1 pound green beans, trimmed 1 cup heavy cream 1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice ⅓ cup Dried Breadcrumbs Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add salt until it tastes like the sea. Meanwhile, add ¼ cup olive oil to a skillet that’s large enough to hold all the mushrooms and beans and still have some room to stir the ingredients. Add the garlic and cook slowly over medium heat to toast the garlic so it’s very soft, fragrant, and nicely golden brown—but not burnt—about 5 minutes. Scoop out the garlic and set it aside so it doesn’t burn. Increase the heat to medium-high and add the mushrooms. Season generously with pepper and salt and sauté, tossing frequently, until the mushrooms are nicely browned around the edges, 5 to 7 minutes. Add the tuna and toss to incorporate. Keep this warm until the green beans are ready. Add the beans to the boiling water and boil until they are just a bit beyond crisp-tender, 4 to 7 minutes. Drain them thoroughly in a colander and then add them to the mushrooms and tuna. Add the cream, toss all the ingredients to coat, and simmer until the cream has reduced to a nice cloaking consistency and all the flavors are nicely blended, 6 to 9 minutes. Add the lemon zest and lemon juice and toss. Taste and adjust with more salt, pepper, or lemon juice. When the flavors are delicious, pile into a serving bowl and top with the breadcrumbs.

Just pick one!' Lucien shouted, and some of those in the crowd laughed- his brothers no doubt the loudest. I reached a hand toward the levers and stared at the three numbers, beyond my trembling, tattooed fingers. I, II, III. They meant nothing to me beyond life and death. Chance might save me, but- Two. Two was a lucky number, because that was like Tamlin and me- just two people. One had to be bad, because one was like Amarantha, or the Attor- solitary beings. One was a nasty number, and three was too much- it was three sisters crammed into a tiny cottage, hating each other until they choked on it, until it poisoned them. Two. It was two. I could gladly, willingly, fanatically believe in a Cauldron and Fate if they would take care of me. I believed in two. Two. I reached for the second lever, but a blinding pain racked my hand before I could touch the stone. I hissed, withdrawing I opened my palm to reveal the slitted eye tattooed there. It narrowed. I had to be hallucinating. The grate was about to cover the inscription, barely six feet above my head. I couldn't breathe, couldn't think. The heat was too much, and metal sizzled so close to my ears. I again reached for the middle lever, but the pain paralysed my fingers. The eye had returned to its usual state. I extended my hand toward the first lever. Again, pain. I reached for the third lever. No pain. My fingers met with stone, and I looked up to find the grate not four feet from my head. Through it, I found a star-flecked violet gaze. I reached for the first lever. Pain. But when I reached for the third lever... Rhysand's face remained a mask of boredom. Sweat slipped down m brow, stinging my eyes. I could only trust him; I could only give myself up again, forced to concede by my helplessness. The spikes were so enormous up close. All I had to do was lift my arm above my head and I'd burn the flesh off my hands. 'Feyre, please!' Lucian moaned. I shook so badly I could scarcely stand. The heat of the spikes bore down on me. The stone lever was cool in my hand. I shut my eyes, unable to look at Tamlin, bracing myself up for the impact and the agony, and pulled the third lever. Silence. The pulsing heat didn't grow closer. Then- a sigh. Lucien. I opened my eyes to find my tattooed fingers white-knuckled beneath the ink as they gripped the lever. The spikes hovered not inches from my head. Unmoving- stopped. I had won- I had...

The trail wasn’t hard to follow. It had a pattern. An irregular patch of scattered spots that looked like spots of tar in the artificial light was interspersed every fourth or fifth step by a dark gleaming splash where blood had spurted from the wound. Now that all the soul people had been removed from the street, the five detectives moved swiftly. But they could still feel the presence of teeming people behind the dilapidated stone façades of the old reconverted buildings. Here and there the white gleams of eyes showed from darkened windows, but the silence was eerie. The trail turned from the sidewalk into an unlighted alleyway between the house beyond the rooming house, which described itself by a sign in a front window reading: Kitchenette Apts. All conveniences, and the weather-streaked red-brick apartment beyond that. The alleyway was so narrow they had to go in single file. The sergeant had taken the power light from his driver, Joe, and was leading the way himself. The pavement slanted down sharply beneath his feet and he almost lost his step. Midway down the blank side of the building he came to a green wooden door. Before touching it, he flashed his light along the sides of the flanking buildings. There were windows in the kitchenette apartments, but all from the top to the bottom floor had folding iron grilles which were closed and locked at that time of night, and dark shades were drawn on all but three. The apartment house had a vertical row of small black openings one above the other at the rear. They might have been bathroom windows but no light showed in any of them and the glass was so dirty it didn’t shine. The blood trail ended at the green door. “Come out of there,” the sergeant said. No one answered. He turned the knob and pushed the door and it opened inward so silently and easily he almost fell into the opening before he could train his light. Inside was a black dark void. Grave Digger and Coffin Ed flattened themselves against the walls on each side of the alley and their big long-barreled .38 revolvers came glinting into their hands. “What the hell!” the sergeant exclaimed, startled. His assistants ducked. “This is Harlem,” Coffin Ed grated and Grave Digger elaborated: “We don’t trust doors that open.” Ignoring them, the sergeant shone his light into the opening. Crumbling brick stairs went down sharply to a green iron grille. “Just a boiler room,” the sergeant said and put his shoulders through the doorway. “Hey, anybody down there?” he called. Silence greeted him. “You go down, Joe, I’ll light your way,” the sergeant said. “Why me?” Joe protested. “Me and Digger’ll go,” Coffin Ed said. “Ain’t nobody there who’s alive.

He called back with an incredible report: there were people lined up around the store already. Wow, I thought. Wow! Wow didn’t begin to cover it. People lined up on two floors of the store to talk to Chris and get their books signed, hours before he was even scheduled to arrive. Chris was overwhelmed when he got there, and so was I. The week before, he’d been just another guy walking down the street. Now, all of a sudden he was famous. Except he was still the same Chris Kyle, humble and a bit abashed, ready to shake hands and pose for a picture, and always, at heart, a good ol’ boy. “I’m so nervous,” confided one of the people on the line as he approached Chris. “I’ve been waiting for three hours just to see you.” “Oh, I’m sorry,” said Chris. “Waitin’ all that time and come to find out there’s just another redneck up here.” The man laughed, and so did Chris. It was something he’d repeat, in different variations, countless times that night and over the coming weeks. We stayed for three or four hours that first night, far beyond what had been advertised, with Chris signing each book, shaking each hand, and genuinely grateful for each person who came. For their part, they were anxious not just to meet him but to thank him for his service to our country-and by extension, the service of every military member whom they couldn’t personally thank. From the moment the book was published, Chris became the son, the brother, the nephew, the cousin, the kid down the street whom they couldn’t personally thank. In a way, his outstanding military record was beside the point-he was a living, breathing patriot who had done his duty and come home safe to his wife and kids. Thanking him was people’s way of thanking everyone in uniform. And, of course, the book was an interesting read. It quickly became a commercial success beyond anyone’s wildest dreams, including the publisher’s. The hardcover debuted at number two on the New York Times bestseller list, then rose to number one and stayed there for more than two months. It’s remained a fixture on the bestseller lists ever since, and has been translated into twenty-four languages worldwide. It was a good read, and it had a profound effect on a lot of people. A lot of the people who bought it weren’t big book readers, but they ended up engrossed. A friend of ours told us that he’d started reading the book one night while he was taking a bath with his wife. She left, went to bed, and fell asleep. She woke up at three or four and went into the bathroom. Her husband was still there, in the cold water, reading. The funny thing is, Chris still could not have cared less about all the sales. He’d done his assignment, turned it in, and got his grade. Done deal.

Put yourself in the way of grace,' says a friend of ours, who is a monk, and a bishop; and he smiles his floating and shining smile. And truly, can there be a subject of more interest to each of us than whether or not grace exists, and the soul? And, consequent upon the existence of the soul, a whole landscape of incorruptible forces, perhaps even a source, an almost palpably suggested second universe? A world that is incomprehensible through reason? To believe in the soul---to believe in it exactly as much and as hardily as one believes in a mountain, say, or a fingernail, which is ever in view---imagine the consequences! How far-reaching, and thoroughly wonderful! For everything, by such a belief, would be charged, and changed. You wake in the morning, the soul exists, your mouth sings it, your mind accepts it. And the perceived, tactile world is, upon the instant, only half the world! How easily I travel, about halfway, through such a scenario. I believe in the soul---in mine, and yours, and the blue-jay's, and the pilot whale's. I believe each goldfinch flying away over the coarse ragweed has a soul, and the ragweed too, plant by plant, and the tiny stones in the earth below, and the grains of earth as well. Not romantically do I believe this, nor poetically, nor emotionally, nor metaphorically except as all reality is metaphor, but steadily, lumpishly, and absolutely. The wild waste spaces of the sea, and the pale dunes with one hawk hanging in the wind, they are for me the formal spaces that, in a liturgy, are taken up by prayer, song, sermon, silence, homily, scripture, the architecture of the church itself. And as with prayer, which is a dipping of oneself toward the light, there is a consequence of attentiveness to the grass itself, and the sky itself, and to the floating bird. I too leave the fret and enclosure of my own life. I too dip myself toward the immeasurable. Now winter, the winter I am writing about, begins to ease. And what, if anything, has been determined, selected, nailed down? This is the lesson of age---events pass, things change, trauma fades, good fortune rises, fades, rises again but different. Whereas what happens when one is twenty, as I remember it, happens forever. I have not been twenty for a long time! The sun rolls toward the north and I feel, gratefully, its brightness flaming up once more. Somewhere in the world the misery we can do nothing about yet goes on. Somewhere the words I will write down next year, and the next, are drifting into the wind, out of the ornate pods of the weeds of the Provincelands. Once I went into the woods to find an almost unfindable bird, a blue grosbeak. And I found it: a rough, deep blue, almost black, with heavy beak; it was plucking one by one the humped, pale green caterpillars from the leaves of a thick green tree. Then it vanished into the shadows of the leaves and, in the same moment, from the crown of the tree flew a western bluebird---little aqua thrush of the mountains, hundreds of miles from its home. It is a moment hard to top---but, I can. Once I came upon two angels, they were standing quietly, keeping guard beside a car. Light streamed from them, and a splash of flames lay quietly under their feet. What is one to do with such moments, such memories, but cherish them? Who knows what is beyond the known? And if you think that any day the secret of light might come, would you not keep the house of your mind ready? Would you not cleanse your study of all that is cheap, or trivial? Would you not live in continual hope, and pleasure, and excitement?

They'd followed him up and had seen him open the door of a room not far from the head of the stairs. He hadn't so much as glanced their way but had gone in and shut the door. She'd walked on with Martha, past that door, down the corridor and around a corner to their chamber. Drawing in a tight-faintly excited-breath, she set out, quietly creeping back to the corner, her evening slippers allowing her to tiptoe along with barely a sound. Nearing the corner, she paused and glanced back along the corridor. Still empty. Reassured, she started to turn, intending to peek around the corner- A hard body swung around the corner and plowed into her. She stumbled back. Hard hands grabbed her, holding her upright. Her heart leapt to her throat. She looked up,saw only darkness. She opened her mouth- A palm slapped over her lips. A steely arm locked around her-locked her against a large, adamantine male body; she couldn't even squirm. Her senses scrambled. Strength, male heat, muscled hardness engulfed her. Then a virulent curse singed her ears. And she realized who'd captured her. Panic and sheer fright had tensed her every muscle; relief washed both away and she felt limp. The temptation to sag in his arms, to sink gratefully against him, was so nearly overwhelming that it shocked her into tensing again. He lowered his head so he could look into her face. Through clenched teeth, he hissed, "What the hell are you doing?" His tone very effectively dragged her wits to the fore. He hadn't removed his hand from her lips. She nipped it. With a muted oath, he pulled the hand away. She moistened her lips and angrily whispered back, "Coming to see you, of course. What are you doing here?" "Coming to fetch you-of course." "You ridiculous man." Her hands had come to rest on his chest. She snatched them back, waved them. "I'm hardly likely to come to grief over the space of a few yards!" Even to her ears they sounded like squabbling children. He didn't reply. Through the dark, he looked at her. She couldn't see his eyes, but his gaze was so intent, so intense that she could feel... her heart started thudding, beating heavier, deeper. Her senses expanded, alert in a wholly unfamiliar way. he looked at her...looked at her. Primitive instinct riffled the delicate hairs at her nape. Abruptly he raised his head, straightened, stepped back. "Come on." Grabbing her elbow, he bundled her unceremoniously around the corner and on up the corridor before him. Her temper-always close to the surface when he was near-started to simmer. If they hadn't needed to be quiet, she would have told him what she thought of such cavalier treatment. Breckenridge halted her outside the door to his bedchamber; he would have preferred any other meeting place, but there was no safer place, and regardless of all and everything else, he needed to keep her safe. Reaching around her, he raised the latch and set the door swinging. "In here." He'd left the lamp burning low. As he followed her in, then reached back and shut the door, he took in what she was wearing. He bit back another curse. She glanced around, but there was nowhere to sit but on the bed. Quickly he strode past her, stripped off the coverlet, then autocratically pointed at the sheet. "Sit there." With a narrow-eyed glare, she did, with the haughty grace of a reigning monarch. Immediately she'd sat, he flicked out the coverlet and swathed her in it. She cast him a faintly puzzled glance but obligingly held the enveloping drape close about her. He said nothing; if she wanted to think he was concerned about her catching a chill, so be it. At least the coverlet was long enough to screen her distracting angles and calves. Which really was ridiculous. Considering how many naked women he'd seen in his life, why the sight of her stockinged ankles and calves should so affect him was beyond his ability to explain.