Despite All Odds Quotes

My friend through many dangers. My lover who had healed my broken and weary soul. My mate who had waited for me against all hope, despite all odds.

If you're going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery--isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It's the only good fight there is.

We throw our parties; we abandon our families to live alone in Canada; we struggle to write books that do not change the world, despite our gifts and our unstinting efforts, our most extravagant hopes. We live our lives, do whatever we do, and then we sleep. It's as simple and ordinary as that. A few jump out windows, or drown themselves, or take pills; more die by accident; and most of us are slowly devoured by some disease, or, if we're very fortunate, by time itself. There's just this for consolation: an hour here or there when our lives seem, against all odds and expectations, to burst open and give us everything we've ever imagined, though everyone but children (and perhaps even they) know these hours will inevitably be followed by others, far darker and more difficult. Still, we cherish the city, the morning; we hope, more than anything, for more. Heaven only knows why we love it so...

When she spoke again it was in the thin, careful and above all brave voice of someone who has pulled themselves together despite overwhelming odds but might let go again at any moment.

Despite all odds, she still had this one precious life. She still had a chance to do things differently. Which meant they all could do things differently. They could choose a different future, a different fate. Together, they could end this senseless destruction. They could choose to rebuild, to create, rather than tear down and destroy.

Quitting is never an option on the road to success. Find the way forward. If you have a positive mindset and are willing to persevere, there is little that is beyond your reach. The attitude of being ready to work even in the face of challenges and despite odds is what will make all the difference in your life.

Recognizing someone as a part of you before they've even become that person in your life, and knowing, without a doubt, that neither of you will ever be who are you in this exact moment ever again and believing, against all odds, you will continue to belong to one another despite that.

r o l l t h e d i c e if you’re going to try, go all the way. otherwise, don’t even start. if you’re going to try, go all the way. this could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, jobs and maybe your mind. go all the way. it could mean not eating for 3 or 4 days. it could mean freezing on a park bench. it could mean jail, it could mean derision, mockery, isolation. isolation is the gift, all the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. and you’ll do it despite rejection and the worst odds and it will be better than anything else you can imagine. if you’re going to try, go all the way. there is no other feeling like that. you will be alone with the gods and the nights will flame with fire. do it, do it, do it. do it. all the way all the way. you will ride life straight to perfect laughter, its the only good fight there is.

You’re all still here because of an uncanny will to survive despite the odds, among … other reasons.

I understand we all have our differences. But while learning about history I've read about white people coming together, Jews coming together, Spanish coming together, different cultures and religions understanding and coming together despite their differences. Slavery was never something that shocked me. What shocks me is how black people have not yet overcome the odds and we're such strong smart people. Why we can't just stand together?

Against all odds and despite all evidence to the contrary, still we trust that there will be a light at the end of the tunnel, of our personal tunnel anyway.

The pain will never completely go away, but some of the hurt will fade leaving the room for true happiness

Every time a new house was built, a bucket of peach stones would be found, and even children on their way to school knew that finding one meant luck, whatever the outcome: love forgotten, love gone wrong, love despite all odds, love ever after, love after all this time.

Overcoming obstacles requires commitment and strength. Despite all odds, face each journey with courage, each struggle with accomplishment, and each challenge with victory.

This discussion was the catalyst for one of my awakening realizations – despite all odds, people largely feel entitled to, or deserving of, an important love of their life.

When People Ask How he’s doing now, I have no idea what to say except for, “Better.” I don’t know if that’s true, or what goes on in a place like Aspen Springs, not that any- one knows he’s there, thank God. He has dropped off most people’s radar, although that’s kind of odd. Before he took this unbelievable turn, Conner was top rung on our social ladder. But with his crash and burn no longer news of the day, all but a gossipy few have quit trying to fill in the blanks. One exception is Kendra, who for some idiotic reason still loves him and keeps asking about him, despite the horrible way he dumped her. Kendra may be pretty, but she’s not especially bright.

Your courage in the grove surprised me. Surprise is a reaction I had all but forgotten. I have seen enough that I alway know what to expect. I assess the odds of various outcomes, and me predictions are never thwarted. before you were finished confronting the revenant, the potion failed. I saw the artificial bravado leave you. Your demise was certain. Yet, despite my certainty, you removed the nail. Had you been full-grown, a seasoned hero of legendary renown, well-trained, armed with charms and talismans, I would have been deeply impressed. But for a mere boy to preform such a feat? I was truly surprised.

On this thanksgiving, I would like to thank that one girl, who never lost hope despite all odds were against her, who always worked, and moved on, despite losing all friends just after leaving school, a time when you need friends the most! Who had immense strength and will-power and so much inspiration inside her that she ended up being happy, satisfied, and successful, all alone. That one girl who always smiles in the mirror, and says, 'Bitch, you have a long way to go, and you gotta travel all alone, depending upon anyone will make you weak, so buck up, there's a lot you gotta do!' On this thanksgiving, I thank myself, my soul for being so majestically robust! I would have thanked other people, but sadly, nobody ever helped me, more than I helped myself...

Similarly, he forgot - or never really understood - that we live in a culture where men, as a group, have more power than women. This isn't a controversial statement, despite the protestations of guys who funnel their frustration that not all extremely young, conventionally attractive women want to sleep with them into and argument that women, as a group, have "all the power." (Bill Maher, repping for his fan base, famously jokes that men have to do all sorts of shit to get laid, but women only have to do "their hair.") The really great thing about this argument is how the patently nonsensical premise - that some young women's ability to manipulate certain men equals a greater degree of gendered power than say, owning the presidency for 220-odd years - obscures the most chilling part: in this mindset, "all the power" means, simply, the power to withhold consent. Let that sink in for a minute. If one believes women are more powerful that men because we own practically all of the vaginas, then women's power to withhold consent to sex is the greatest power there is. Which means the guy who can take away a woman's right to consent is basically a superhero. Right?

How very important it is, to see the reflection of yourself and to keep that reflection in sight— despite how much you have been pushed and shoved, forgotten and ripped, lied to and deceived! It seems like the number one most valuable thing you can carry with you is the constant appearance of your own reflection for the beauty and wonder that you are and it's a fight and a struggle to keep that. If you had a treasure box filled with magical things— this would be the one thing it seems like people want to destroy or to take away or in some cases to even make their own! But you must remember your reflection, you must see yourself illuminated and you must remember, against all odds, remember.

despite all odds, people largely feel entitled to, or deserving of, an important love of their life.

Sometimes we are pulled along by our genetic legacies, and sometimes we pull them along behind us, despite all odds, into the lives we choose to make for ourselves.

Since ancient times, in every place they have ever lived, Jews have represented the frightening prospect of freedom. As long as Jews existed in any society, there was evidence that it in fact wasn't necessary to believe what everyone else believed, that those who disagreed with their neighbors could survive and even flourish against all odds. The Jews' continued distinctiveness, despite overwhelming pressure to become like everyone else, demonstrated their enormous effort to cultivate that freedom: devotion to law and story, deep literacy, and an absolute obsessiveness about consciously transmitting those values between generations. The existence of Jews in any society is a reminder that freedom is possible, but only with responsibility—and that freedom without responsibility is no freedom at all.

In order to succeed he must remain true to the feeling that had inspired him in the first place. It didn't matter that other people would do it in a different way; in fact this was inevitable. He would keep to the roads because, despite the odd fast car, he felt safer there. It didn't matter that he had no mobile phone. It didn't matter that he had not planned his route, or brought a road map. He had a different map, and that was the one in his mind, made up of all the people and places he had passed. He would also stick to his yachting shoes because, despite the wear and tear, they were his. He saw that when a person becomes estranged from the things they know, and is a passerby, strange things take on a new significance. And knowing this, it seemed important to allow himself to be true to the instincts that made him Harold, as opposed to anyone else.

Sometime the witch hunting takes on atrocious dimensions — the Nazi persecution of Jews, the Salem witch trials, the Ku Klux Klan scapegoating of blacks. Notice, however, that in all such cases the persecutor hates the persecuted for precisely those traits that the persecutor displays with a glaringly uncivilized fury. At other times, the witch hunt appears in less terrifying proportions—the cold war fear of a "Commie under every bed," for instance. And often, it appears in comic form—the interminable gossip about everybody else that tells you much more about the gossiper than about the object of gossip. But all of these are instances of individuals desperate to prove that their own shadows belong to other people. Many men and women will launch into tirades about how disgusting homosexuals are. Despite how decent and rational they otherwise try to behave, they find themselves seized with a loathing of any homosexual, and in an emotional outrage will advocate such things as suspending gay civil rights (or worse). But why does such an individual hate homosexuals so passionately? Oddly, he doesn’t hate the homosexual because he is homosexual; he hates him because he sees in the homosexual what he secretly fears he himself might become. He is most uncomfortable with his own natural, unavoidable, but minor homosexual tendencies, and so projects them. He thus comes to hate the homosexual inclinations in other people—but only because he first hates them in himself. And so, in one form or another, the witch hunt goes. We hate people "because," we say, they are dirty, stupid, perverted, immoral.... They might be exactly what we say they are. Or they might not. That is totally irrelevent, however, because we hate them only if we ourselves unknowingly possess the despised traits ascribed to them. We hate them because they are a constant reminder of aspects of ourselves that we are loathe to admit. We are starting to see an important indicator of projection. Those items in the environment (people or things) that strongly affect us instead of just informing us are usually our own projections. Items that bother us, upset us, repulse us, or at the other extreme, attract us, compel us, obsess us—these are usually reflections of the shadow. As an old proverb has it, I looked, and looked, and this I came to see: That what I thought was you and you, Was really me and me.

Far from fading away, it appears that prisons are here to stay. And despite the unprecedented levels of incarceration in the African American community, the civil rights community is oddly quiet. One in three young African American men will serve time in prison if current trends continue, and in some cities more than half of all young adult black men are currently under correctional control - in prison or jail, on probation or parole. Yet mass incarceration tends to be categorized as a criminal justice issue as opposed to a racial justice or civil right issue (or crisis).

if you are going to try, go all the way.. Otherwise, don’t even start.. If you are going to try, go all the way.. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. Go all the way.. It could mean not eating for three or four days.. It could mean freezing on a park bench.. It could mean jail, derision, mockery, isolation.. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test for endurance, of how much you really want to do it.. And you’ll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine.. if you are going to try, go all the way.. there’s no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods and the nights will flame with fire. Do it, do it , do it.. all the way .. all the way.. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It’s the only good fight there is ….

Standing alone in the middle of the room, I looked at each of them, in turn, as I explained that we were lost in an uncharted part of the galaxy, that we would have to find a way to work together if we were to survive, that we must triumph over old rivalries and embrace new friendships, that we must face each unexpected challenge with courage and audacity and hope and that, above all, and despite seemingly insurmountable odds, I would find a way to get them home. Somehow, I promised them, someday, I would set a course… for home.

I just wanted to show you that sometimes things survive despite the harshest of odds.

Only one person in many thousands seeks full God-knowledge. And of these, only one in many thousands truly gains it. Despite these odds, it is the intent of God that all beings are, in the fullness of time, destined to reach this degree of perfection. The rare ones who do attain this level of knowing become indistinguishable from Divinity (Me), and thus achieve liberation.

I don't believe in love at first sight but maybe this is as close as it gets: seeing someone, a person you have no business loving, on a football field one night and thinking, I want you to be mine and I want to be yours. Lying on a closet floor with someone and thinking, I shouldn't know you but I do. Recognizing someone as a part of you before they've even become that person in your life, and knowing, without a doubt, that neither of you will ever be who you are in this exact moment ever again and believing, against all odds, you will continue to belong to one another despite that.

Because we’re the same you and me. Both fucked up, broken pieces on a game board that’s bigger than we can cope with. Both hoping to find some way of winning despite the odds being stacked against us all the damn time. Both addicted to things that push our boundaries and make us feel alive. Because at the end of the day, even feeling the worst of things is better than feeling nothing at all.

We all filter the realities of life through our own personal fears, individual experiences, and the human need to cling to hope despite the circumstances, regardless of the odds. And in doing so, we each determine our own truth.

any moment now that sun would burst into a ball of flame, a furnace to stifle the heart of Petites Cendres, his soul felt blood-raw, liquefied deep down inside him, in a pale, cold sea where the need that gnawed at him would break your heart, a fire burnt out, his heart, that dog should not have been there on Esmeralda or Bahama Street, hunger tottering on all fours, night-prowling around the Porte du Baiser Saloon where he just would not stop living despite all odds

As I was editing this chapter, a survey of more than thirty-five hundred Australian surgeons revealed a culture rife with bullying, discrimination, and sexual harassment, against women especially (although men weren’t untouched either). To give you a flavor of professional life as a woman in this field, female trainees and junior surgeons “reported feeling obliged to give their supervisors sexual favours to keep their jobs”; endured flagrantly illegal hostility toward the notion of combining career with motherhood; contended with “boys’ clubs”; and experienced entrenched sexism at all levels and “a culture of fear and reprisal, with known bullies in senior positions seen as untouchable.”68 I came back to this chapter on the very day that news broke in the state of Victoria, Australia, where I live, of a Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission report revealing that sexual discrimination and harassment is also shockingly prevalent in the Victorian Police, which unlawfully failed to provide an equal and safe working environment.69 I understand that attempts to identify the psychological factors that underlie sex inequalities in the workplace are well-meaning. And, of course, we shouldn’t shy away from naming (supposedly) politically unpalatable causes of those inequalities. But when you consider the women who enter and persist in highly competitive and risky occupations like surgery and policing—despite the odds stacked against them by largely unfettered sex discrimination and harassment—casual scholarly suggestions that women are relatively few in number, particularly in the higher echelons, because they’re less geared to compete in the workplace, start to seem almost offensive. Testosterone

I realized that despite society’s molds, we had choices. We, and only we, could decide the course of our lives. There would always be obstacles. Like a river meeting a boulder, we could go over it or around it — that decision was ours to make. Or we could take an entirely new course. Nothing was impossible.

Those who support such survivors of abuse often find it difficult to hear the reality of those survivors' lives and experience and are often unsupported themselves. Rather than being supported, workers are often ridiculed, castigated or accused of being gullible or of giving the survivor false memories. Many workers work in isolation and a climate of hostility and are unable to talk about the work they do. Yes, despite all the odds, survivors of ritual abuse are beginning to speak out about their experiences, and some people, mainly in voluntary organisations, are beginning to listen to them and support them. [Published 2001]

WHY 20 MILE MARCHERS WIN 20 Mile Marching helps turn the odds in your favor for three reasons: 1. It builds confidence in your ability to perform well in adverse circumstances. 2. It reduces the likelihood of catastrophe when you’re hit by turbulent disruption. 3. It helps you exert self-control in an out-of-control environment.

On average, odd years have been the best for me. I’m at a point where everyone I meet looks like a version of someone I already know. Without fail, fall makes me nostalgic for things I’ve never experienced. The sky is molting. I don’t know if this is global warming or if the atmosphere is reconfiguring itself to accommodate all the new bright suffering. I am struck by an overwhelming need to go to Iceland. Despite all awful variables, we are still full of ideas as possible as unsexed fruit. I was terribly sorry to be the one to explain to the first graders the connection between the sunset and pollution. On Venus you and I are not even a year old. Then there were two skies. The one we fly through and the one we bury ourselves in. I appreciate my wide beveled spatula which fulfills the moment I realized I would grow up and own such things. I am glad I do not yet want sexy bathroom accessories. Such things. In the story we were together every time. On his wedding day, the stone in his chest not fully melted but enough. Sometimes I feel like there are birds flying out of me.

They seemed almost at times like actors, I thought, making a great show of what a wonderful time they were having. They laughed a little too hard. They drank a great deal too much. And at the same time, despite all this evidence of merriment, they seemed to watch each other. Perhaps it’s hindsight, making this impression seem like more than it was. I suppose there are probably tensions in most groups of friends. But I was struck by the thought that they did not seem completely comfortable in one another’s company. Which was odd, as they’d told me right at the beginning that they were very old friends. But that’s the thing about old friends, isn’t it? Sometimes they don’t even realise that they no longer have anything in common. That maybe they don’t even like each other any more.

Oddly, the lack of reliability and validity did not keep the DSM-V from meeting its deadline for publication, despite the near-universal consensus that it represented no improvement over the previous diagnostic system.29 Could the fact that the APA had earned $100 million on the DSM-IV and is slated to take in a similar amount with the DSM-V (because all mental health practitioners, many lawyers, and other professionals will be obliged to purchase the latest edition) be the reason we have this new diagnostic system?

As I walked past I saw the extraordinary wreckage of beer-corpses. Somehow, despite all their economic mismanagement, these parties must have brought about an unexpected level of prosperity. Well, not having to wage war certainly saves the odd cost. Looking at the state of the Volk here, however, even the most deluded individual would have to admit than in 1942 or 1944, yes, even in the most harrowing nights of bombardment, the Germans were in better shape than on this September evening at the beginning of the third millennium.

It is a story, as the first word of the original Greek tells us about "a man" (andras). He is not "the" man, but one of many men-- albeit a man of extraordinary cognitive, psychological, and military power, one who can win any competition, outwit any opponent, and manage, against all odds, to survive. The poem tells us how he makes his circuitous way back home across stormy seas after many years at war. We may expect the hero of an "epic" narrative to confront evil forces, perform a superhuman task, and rescue vast numbers of people from an extraordinary kind of threat. Failing that, we might hope at least for a great quest unexpectedly achieved, despite perils all around; an action that saves the world, or at least changes it in some momentous way-- like Jason claiming the Golden Fleece, Launcelot glimpsing the Holy Grail, Aeanas beginning the foundation of Rome. In 'The Odyssey', we find instead the story of a man whose grand adventure is simply to go back to his own home, where he tries to turn everything back to the way it was before he went away. For this hero, mere survival is the most amazing feat of all.

At this point, perhaps you Hushlanders are beginning to doubt the truth of this narrative. You have seen several odd and inexplicable things happen. (Though, just as a warning, the story so far has actually been quite tame. Just wait until we get to the part with the talking dinosaurs.) Some readers might even think that I’m just making this story up. You might think that everything in this book is dreamy silliness. This book is serious. Terribly serious. Your skepticism results from a lifetime of training in the Librarians’ school system, where you were taught all kinds of lies. Indeed, you’d probably never even heard of the Smedrys, despite the fact that they are the most famous family of Oculators in the entire world. In most parts of the Free Kingdoms, being a Smedry is considered equivalent to being nobility. (If you wish to perform a fun test, next time you are in history class, ask your teacher about the Smedrys. If your teacher is a Librarian spy, he or she will get red-faced and give you a detention. If, on the other hand, your teacher is innocent, he or she will simply be confused, then likely give you a detention.)

The one image I eventually found of Alexis St. Martin as a whole young man is in a painting by Dean Cornwell entitled Beaumont and St. Martin—part of the Pioneers of American Medicine series commissioned in 1938 by Wyeth Laboratories for an ad campaign. Despite the unfortunate side-parted bob that St. Martin appeared to stick with all through his adult life, the man as Cornwell rendered him is striking: broad cheekbones, vertically plunging aquiline nose, and a firmly muscled, deeply tanned chest and arms. Beaumont is dashing but dandified. His hair is oddly waved and piled, like something squeezed from a cake decorator’s bag.

Even humanity's lack of concern for its rampant overpopulation problem now made a terrible kind of sense. What difference did it make if our planet was capable of supporting all seven billion of us in the long term when a far greater threat to our numbers was waiting in the wings? And despite the overwhelming odds, humanity had done what was necessary to ensure its own survival. It filled me with a strange new sense of pride in my own species. We weren't a bunch of primitive monkeys teetering on the brink of self-destruction after all—this appeared ti be an altogether different kind of destruction we were teetering on the brink of.

Michel’s death made my father question his faith, but it had the opposite effect on me. Amidst all the searing emotional pain I was feeling, I had a moment of revelation: despite all the torment and confusion we suffer in this valle lacrimarum, a divine sense of the universe exists, one we cannot comprehend. With this revelation came an oddly empowering sense that my life, like everyone else’s, is in God’s hands. This awareness hasn’t absolved me of the need to struggle for a better world and a better self, but it has helped me deal with things I cannot change, including death. It also helped reaffirm the core of the Christian beliefs I retain to this day.

My father was usually too far in the drink to remember he had children. My mother was half mad and had fewer morals than the barn cat we brought back today. Since none of our relations wanted custody of a pair of impoverished brats, Devon and I were sent to boarding school. We stayed there most holidays. I became a bully. I hated everyone. Henry was especially irritating- skinny, odd, fussy about his food. Always reading. I stole that book from the box under his bed because it seemed to be his favorite." Pausing uncomfortably, Mr. Ravenel raked a hand through his disordered hair, and it promptly fell back into the same gleaming, untidy layers. "I didn't plan to keep it. I was going to embarrass him by reading parts of it aloud in front of him. And when I saw what you'd written on the inside cover, I could hardly wait to torture him about it. But then I read the first page." "In which Stephen Armstrong is sinking in a pit of quicksand," Phoebe said with a tremulous smile. "Exactly. I had to find out what happened next." "After escaping the quicksand, he has to save his true love, Catriona, from the crocodiles." A husky sound of amusement. "You marked x's all over those pages." "I secretly longed for a hero to rescue me from crocodiles someday." "I secretly longed to be a hero. Despite having far more in common with the crocodiles.

Once again this unspeakable man had caused her to make a complete fool of herself, and the realization made her eyes blaze with renewed fury as she turned her head and looked at him. Despite Ian’s apparent nonchalance he had been watching her closely, and he stiffened, sensing instinctively that she was suddenly and inexplicably angrier than before. He nodded to the gun, and when he spoke there was no more mockery in his voice; instead it was carefully neutral. “I think there are a few things you ought to consider before you use that.” Though she had no intention of using it, Elizabeth listened attentively as he continued in that same helpful voice. “First of all, you’ll have to be very fast and very calm if you intend to shoot me and reload before Jake there gets to you. Second, I think it’s only fair to warn you that there’s going to be a great deal of blood all over the place. I’m not complaining, you understand, but I think it’s only right to warn you that you’re never again going to be able to wear that charming gown you have on.” Elizabeth felt her stomach lurch. “You’ll hang, of course,” he continued conversationally, “but that won’t be nearly as distressing as the scandal you’ll have to face first.” Too disgusted with herself and with him to react to that last mocking remark, Elizabeth put her chin up and managed to say with great dignity, “I’ve had enough of this, Mr. Thornton. I did not think anything could equal your swinish behavior at our prior meetings, but you’ve managed to do it. Unfortunately, I am not so ill-bred as you and therefore have scruples against assaulting someone who is weaker than I, which is what I would be doing if I were to shoot an unarmed man. Lucinda, we are leaving,” she said, then she glanced back at her silent adversary, who’d taken a threatening step, and she shook her head, saying with extreme, mocking civility, “No, please-do not bother to see us out, sir, there’s no need. Besides, I wish to remember you just as you are at this moment-helpless and thwarted.” It was odd, but now, at the low point of her life, Elizabeth felt almost exhilarated because she was finally doing something to avenge her pride instead of meekly accepting her fate. Lucinda had marched out onto the porch already, and Elizabeth tried to think of something to dissuade him from retrieving his gun when she threw it away outside. She decided to repeat his own advice, which she began to do as she backed away toward the door. “I know you’re loath to see us leave like this,” she said, her voice and her hand betraying a slight, fearful tremor. “However, before you consider coming after us, I beg you will take your own excellent advice and pause to consider if killing me is worth hanging for.” Whirling on her heel, Elizabeth took one running step, then cried out in pained surprise as she was jerked off her feet and a hard blow to her forearm sent the gun flying to the floor at the same time her arm was yanked up and twisted behind her back. “Yes,” he said in an awful voice near her ear, “I actually think it would be worth it.” Just when she thought her arm would surely snap, her captor gave her a hard shove that sent her stumbling headlong out into the yard, and the door slammed shut behind her. “Well! I never,” Lucinda said, her bosom heaving with rage as she glowered at the closed door. “Neither have I,” said Elizabeth, shaking dirt off her hem and deciding to retreat with as much dignity as possible. “We can talk about what a madman he is once we’re down the path, out of sight of the house. So if you’ll please take that end of the trunk?” With a black look Lucinda complied, and they marched down the path, both of them concentrating on keeping their backs as straight as possible.

The problem, of course, is that at any given historical moment, prevailing views about the right changes to make in how we care for our bodies can be bullying and shaming. There is a lot of widespread guilt about diet, exercise, sex, and treatments. How insistent all the advice is! Have sex a lot, don't have any sex; eat heartily, eat with restraint; hold your body in stillness, move it and have it moved; bind your ample body tightly, wear soft clothes but have no fat. Not only are the various instructions different; they are directly at odds with each other. Yet, despite our historical track record on these matters, we are today generally confident that we know best- that science and other experts have now got it right, after a long history of nonsense.

I remember." I nod. Wanting to say: I remember everything-all of it-the question is: Do you? But instead, I stare down at my feet, smiling stupidly. Everything I do around him is stupid. Some Seeker I've turned out to be. Attempting to redeem myself,say something normal,not let on that I already know he's employed here-thanks to the raven who allowed me to spy on him earlier,I say, "So,I guess you hang out here a lot then?" He pushes a hand through his hair, as his eyes-the color of aquamarines-glide down the length of me.And damn if I can't feel their trajectory. It's like showering in a stream of warm, molten honey-dripping from the top of my forehead all the way down to my feet. "I guess you could say that," he says,voicelow and deep. "More than most, anyway." He waves a damp towel, tugs on the string of his apron, and I blush in reply. The sight of it reminding me of what I saw in the alleyway-watching him lean against the wall,his face so soft anddreamy I longed to touch him-kiss him-like I did in the dream. I study him closely,seeking traces of recognition, remembrance-some small token of evidence to assure me that, as odd as it seems,that kiss in the cave was as real as it felt-but coming up empty. "So,how long have you worked here?" I ask, returning to the topic at hand. My gaze drifting over the black V-necked T-shirt skimming the sinuous line of his body-telling myself it's all part of my reconnaissance,my need to gather as uch information as I can about him and his kin. But knowing that's not really it.The truth is,I like looking at him, being near him. "I guess you could say somewhere between too long and not long enough-depending on the state of my wallet." His laugh is good-natured and easy-the kid that starts at the belly and trips all the way up. "It's pretty much the only decent game in town." He shrugs. "One way or another,you end up working for the Richters,and believe me, this is one of the better gigs." I peer at him closely,remembering what Cade said when I was here via the raven. How he referred to him by another name. "You're not a Richter?" I ask,holding my breath in my cheeks.Despite what Paloma told me, I need to hear it from him,confirm that he doesn't identify with their clan. "I go by Whitefeather," he says,gaze steady and serious. "I was raised by my mom,didn't even know the Richters when I was a kid." Despite getting the answer I wanted, I frown in return. His being a Richter was a good reason to avoid him-without it,I'm out of excuses. "Is that okay?" He dips his head toward mine,his mouth tugging at the side. "You seem a little upset by the news." I shake my head,break free of my reverie, and say, "No-not at all. Believe me,it's more like a relief." I meet his gaze,seeing the way it narrows in question. "Guess I'm not a big fan of your brother," I add,watching as he throws his head back and laughs,the sight of that long,glorious column of neck forcing me to look away,it's too much to take. "If it makes you feel any better, most of the time I'd have to agree." He returns to me,the warmth of his gaze solely reponsible for the wave of comfort that flows through me.

If you’re going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don’t even start. If you're going to try, go all the way. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, jobs and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean derision, mockery, isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you’ll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you’re going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. Do it. All the way You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It’s the only good fight there is.

if you’re going to try, go all the way. otherwise, don’t even start. if you’re going to try, go all the way. this could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives, jobs and maybe your mind. go all the way. it could mean not eating for 3 or 4 days. it could mean freezing on a park bench. it could mean jail, it could mean derision, mockery, isolation. isolation is the gift, all the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. and you’ll do it despite rejection and the worst odds and it will be better than anything else you can imagine. if you’re going to try, go all the way. there is no other feeling like that. you will be alone with the gods and the nights will flame with fire. do it, do it, do it. do it. all the way all the way. you will ride life straight to perfect laughter, its the only good fight there is.

Yes, Clarissa thinks, it’s time for the day to be over. We throw our parties; we abandon our families to live alone in Canada; we struggle to write books that do not change the world, despite our gifts and our unstinting efforts, our most extravagant hopes. We live our lives, do whatever we do, and then we sleep—it’s as simple and ordinary as that. A few jump out of windows or drown themselves or take pills; more die by accident; and most of us, the vast majority, are slowly devoured by some disease or, if we’re very fortunate, by time itself. There’s just this for consolation: an hour here or there when our lives seem, against all odds and expectations, to burst open and give us everything we’ve ever imagined, though everyone but children (and perhaps even they) knows these hours will inevitably be followed by others, far darker and more difficult. Still, we cherish the city, the morning; we hope, more than anything, for more.

Sound waves, regardless of their frequency or intensity, can only be detected by the Mole Fly’s acute sense of smell—it is a little known fact that the Mole Fly’s auditory receptors do not, in fact, have a corresponding center in the brain designated for the purposes of processing sensory stimuli and so, these stimuli, instead of being siphoned out as noise, bypass the filters to be translated, oddly enough, by the part of the brain that processes smell. Consequently, the Mole Fly’s brain, in its inevitable confusion, understands sound as an aroma, rendering the boundary line between the auditory and olfactory sense indistinguishable. Sounds, thus, come in a variety of scents with an intensity proportional to its frequency. Sounds of shorter wavelength, for example, are particularly pungent. What results is a species of creature that cannot conceptualize the possibility that sound and smell are separate entities, despite its ability to discriminate between the exactitudes of pitch, timbre, tone, scent, and flavor to an alarming degree of precision. Yet, despite this ability to hyper-analyze, they lack the cognitive skill to laterally link successions of either sound or smell into a meaningful context, resulting in the equivalent of a data overflow. And this may be the most defining element of the Mole Fly’s behavior: a blatant disregard for the context of perception, in favor of analyzing those remote and diminutive properties that distinguish one element from another. While sensory continuity seems logical to their visual perception, as things are subject to change from moment-to-moment, such is not the case with their olfactory sense, as delays in sensing new smells are granted a degree of normality by the brain. Thus, the Mole Fly’s olfactory-auditory complex seems to be deprived of the sensory continuity otherwise afforded in the auditory senses of other species. And so, instead of sensing aromas and sounds continuously over a period of time—for example, instead of sensing them 24-30 times per second, as would be the case with their visual perception—they tend to process changes in sound and smell much more slowly, thereby preventing them from effectively plotting the variations thereof into an array or any kind of meaningful framework that would allow the information provided by their olfactory and auditory stimuli to be lasting in their usefulness. The Mole flies, themselves, being the structurally-obsessed and compulsive creatures that they are, in all their habitual collecting, organizing, and re-organizing of found objects into mammoth installations of optimal functional value, are remarkably easy to control, especially as they are given to a rather false and arbitrary sense of hierarchy, ascribing positions—that are otherwise trivial, yet necessarily mundane if only to obscure their true purpose—with an unfathomable amount of honor, to the logical extreme that the few chosen to serve in their most esteemed ranks are imbued with a kind of obligatory arrogance that begins in the pupal stages and extends indefinitely, as they are further nurtured well into adulthood by a society that infuses its heroes of middle management with an immeasurable sense of importance—a kind of celebrity status recognized by the masses as a living embodiment of their ideals. And yet, despite this culture of celebrity worship and vicarious living, all whims and impulses fall subservient, dropping humbly to the knees—yes, Mole Flies do, in fact, have knees!—before the grace of the merciful Queen, who is, in actuality, just a puppet dictator installed by the Melic papacy, using an old recycled Damsel fly-fishing lure. The dummy is crude, but convincing, as the Mole flies treat it as they would their true-born queen.

If you're going to fight for love, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing that love, money, friends, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean embarrassment. It could mean mockery-- but they are all simply a test of your endurance, of how much you really want it. Her. Him. There are no safety nets in the fight for love. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can ever imagine. If you're going to try to fight for love, go all the way. There is no other better feeling than that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will burn with fire. You will ride life like a horse straight down a path of flaming beautiful insanity. It's the only good fight there is left in this world. The fight for love. There are no losers in the fight for love. Only cowards.

Well, it was a kind of back-to-front program. It’s funny how many of the best ideas are just an old idea back-to-front. You see there have already been several programs written that help you to arrive at decisions by properly ordering and analysing all the relevant facts so that they then point naturally towards the right decision. The drawback with these is that the decision which all the properly ordered and analysed facts point to is not necessarily the one you want.’ ‘Yeeeess...’ said Reg’s voice from the kitchen. ‘Well, Gordon’s great insight was to design a program which allowed you to specify in advance what decision you wished it to reach, and only then to give it all the facts. The program’s task, which it was able to accomplish with consummate ease, was simply to construct a plausible series of logical-sounding steps to connect the premises with the conclusion. ‘And I have to say that it worked brilliantly. Gordon was able to buy himself a Porsche almost immediately despite being completely broke and a hopeless driver. Even his bank manager was unable to find fault with his reasoning. Even when Gordon wrote it off three weeks later.’ ‘Heavens. And did the program sell very well?’ ‘No. We never sold a single copy.’ ‘You astonish me. It sounds like a real winner to me.’ ‘It was,’ said Richard hesitantly. ‘The entire project was bought up, lock, stock and barrel, by the Pentagon. The deal put WayForward on a very sound financial foundation. Its moral foundation, on the other hand, is not something I would want to trust my weight to. I’ve recently been analysing a lot of the arguments put forward in favour of the Star Wars project, and if you know what you’re looking for, the pattern of the algorithms is very clear. ‘So much so, in fact, that looking at Pentagon policies over the last couple of years I think I can be fairly sure that the US Navy is using version 2.00 of the program, while the Air Force for some reason only has the beta-test version of 1.5. Odd, that.

The bonds of family can be wonderful but there is a time to know when to stand apart." She held out a hand to Rycca on the nearby bench. "Besides, we are your family now, all of us, and we know your worth." Deeply touched, Rycca had to blink several times before she could respond. She knew both women spoke pure truth and loved them for it.After a lifetime of emotional solitude unbroken but for Thurlow, it was still difficult for her to comprehend that she was no longer alone. Yet was she beginning to understand it. Softly,she said, "I worry over Dragon. He refuses to talk of my father or of what will happen now that we are here, but I fear he is planning to take matters into his own hands." Cymbra and Krysta exchanged a glance. Quietly,Cymbra said, "Your instinct is not wrong. Dragon simmers with rage at the harm attempted to you. In Landsende I caught a mere glimpse of it,and it was like peering into one of those mountains that belch fire." Despite the heat of the sauna, Rycca shivered. "He came close to losing his life once because of me.I cannot bear for it to happen again." There was silence for a moment,broken only by the crackling of the fire and the hiss of steam.Finally, Cymbra said, "We are each of us married to an extraordinary man. There is something about them...even now I don't really know how to explain it." She looked at Krysta. "Have you told Rycca about Thorgold and Raven?" Krysta shook her head. "There was no time before." She turned on her side on the bench,facing the other two. "Thorgold and Raven are my...friends. They are somewhat unusual." Cymbra laughed at that,prompting a chiding look from Krysta,who went on to say, "I'm not sure how but I think somehow I called them to me when I was a child and needed them very much." "Krysta has the gift of calling," Cymbra said, "as I do of feeling and you do of truthsaying. Doesn't it strike you as odd that three very unusual women, all bearing special gifts, ccame to be married to three extraordinary men who are united by a common purpose,to bring peace to their peoples?" "I had not really thought about it," said Rycca, who also had not known of Krysta's gift and was looking at her with some surprise. All three of them? That was odd. "I believe," said Cymbra, who clearly had been thinking about it, "that there is a reason for it beyond mere coincidence. I think we are meant to be at their sides, to help them as best we can, the better to transform peace from dream to reality." "It is a good thought," Krysta said. Rycca nodded. Very quietly, she said, "Blessed are the peacemakers." Cymbra grinned. "And poor things, we appear to be their blessings. So worry not for Dragon, Rycca. He will prevail. We will all see to it." They laughed then,the trio of them, ancient and feminine laughter hidden in a chamber held in the palm of the earth. The steam rose around them, half obscuringm half revealing them. In time,when the heat had become too intense,they rose, wrapped themselves in billowing cloths,and ran through the gathering darkness to the river, where they frolicked in cool water and laughed again beneath the stars. The torches had been lit by the time they returned to the stronghold high on the hill. They dressed and hastened to the hall,where they greeted their husbands, who stood as one when they entered,silent and watchful men before beauty and strength, and took their seats at table. Wine was poured, food brought,music played. They lingered over the evening,taking it into night. The moon was high when they found the sweet,languid sanctuary of their beds. Day came too swiftly.

I will always be grateful to have been the Democratic Party’s nominee and to have earned 65,844,610 votes from my fellow Americans. That number—more votes than any candidate for President has ever received, other than Barack Obama—is proof that the ugliness we faced in 2016 does not define our country. I want to thank everyone who welcomed me into their homes, businesses, schools, and churches over those two long, crazy years; every little girl and boy who ran into my arms at full speed or high-fived me with all their might; and the long chain of brave, adventurous people, stretching back generations, whose love and strength made it possible for me to lead such a rewarding life in the country I love. Thanks to them, despite everything else, my heart is full. I started this book with some words attributed to one of those pathbreakers, Harriet Tubman. Twenty years ago, I watched a group of children perform a play about her life at her former homestead in Auburn, New York. They were so excited about this courageous, determined woman who led slaves to freedom against all odds. Despite everything she faced, she never lost her faith in a simple but powerful motto: Keep going. That’s what we have to do now, too. In 2016, the U.S. government announced that Harriet Tubman will become the face of the $20 bill. If you need proof that America can still get it right, there it is.

National Socialism nurtured racism. In reality there are only two races, namely the "race" of decent people and the "race" of people who are not decent. And "segregation" runs straight through all nations and within every single nation straight through all parties. Even in the concentration camps one came across halfway decent fellows here and there among the SS men-just as one came across the odd scoundrel or two among the prisoners. not to mention the Capos. That decent people are in the minority, that they have always been a minority and are likely to remain so is something we must come to terms with. Danger only threatens when a political system sends those not-decent people, i.e., the negative element of a nation, to the top. And no nation is immune from doing this, and in this respect every nation is in principle capable of a Holocaust! In support of this we have the sensational results of scientific experiments in the field of social psychology, for which we owe thanks to an American; they are known as the Milgram Experiment. If we want to extract the political consequences from all this, we should assume that there are basically only two styles of politics, or perhaps better said, only two types of politicians: the first are those believe that the end justifies the means, and that could be any means...While the other type of politician knows very well that there are mans that could desecrate the holiest end. And it is this type of politician whom I trust, despite the clamor around the year 1988, and the demands of the day, not to mention of the anniversary, trust to hear the voice of reason and to ensure that all who are of goodwill, stretch out their hands to each other, across all the graves and across all divisions.

a young Goldman Sachs banker named Joseph Park was sitting in his apartment, frustrated at the effort required to get access to entertainment. Why should he trek all the way to Blockbuster to rent a movie? He should just be able to open a website, pick out a movie, and have it delivered to his door. Despite raising around $250 million, Kozmo, the company Park founded, went bankrupt in 2001. His biggest mistake was making a brash promise for one-hour delivery of virtually anything, and investing in building national operations to support growth that never happened. One study of over three thousand startups indicates that roughly three out of every four fail because of premature scaling—making investments that the market isn’t yet ready to support. Had Park proceeded more slowly, he might have noticed that with the current technology available, one-hour delivery was an impractical and low-margin business. There was, however, a tremendous demand for online movie rentals. Netflix was just then getting off the ground, and Kozmo might have been able to compete in the area of mail-order rentals and then online movie streaming. Later, he might have been able to capitalize on technological changes that made it possible for Instacart to build a logistics operation that made one-hour grocery delivery scalable and profitable. Since the market is more defined when settlers enter, they can focus on providing superior quality instead of deliberating about what to offer in the first place. “Wouldn’t you rather be second or third and see how the guy in first did, and then . . . improve it?” Malcolm Gladwell asked in an interview. “When ideas get really complicated, and when the world gets complicated, it’s foolish to think the person who’s first can work it all out,” Gladwell remarked. “Most good things, it takes a long time to figure them out.”* Second, there’s reason to believe that the kinds of people who choose to be late movers may be better suited to succeed. Risk seekers are drawn to being first, and they’re prone to making impulsive decisions. Meanwhile, more risk-averse entrepreneurs watch from the sidelines, waiting for the right opportunity and balancing their risk portfolios before entering. In a study of software startups, strategy researchers Elizabeth Pontikes and William Barnett find that when entrepreneurs rush to follow the crowd into hyped markets, their startups are less likely to survive and grow. When entrepreneurs wait for the market to cool down, they have higher odds of success: “Nonconformists . . . that buck the trend are most likely to stay in the market, receive funding, and ultimately go public.” Third, along with being less recklessly ambitious, settlers can improve upon competitors’ technology to make products better. When you’re the first to market, you have to make all the mistakes yourself. Meanwhile, settlers can watch and learn from your errors. “Moving first is a tactic, not a goal,” Peter Thiel writes in Zero to One; “being the first mover doesn’t do you any good if someone else comes along and unseats you.” Fourth, whereas pioneers tend to get stuck in their early offerings, settlers can observe market changes and shifting consumer tastes and adjust accordingly. In a study of the U.S. automobile industry over nearly a century, pioneers had lower survival rates because they struggled to establish legitimacy, developed routines that didn’t fit the market, and became obsolete as consumer needs clarified. Settlers also have the luxury of waiting for the market to be ready. When Warby Parker launched, e-commerce companies had been thriving for more than a decade, though other companies had tried selling glasses online with little success. “There’s no way it would have worked before,” Neil Blumenthal tells me. “We had to wait for Amazon, Zappos, and Blue Nile to get people comfortable buying products they typically wouldn’t order online.

The brain is wired to minimize loss . . . [and] to keep you alive. [It] makes the assumption that because you were alive yesterday, what you did previously is safe. Therefore, repeating the past is good for survival. As a result, doing things differently, even if it seems like an improvement, is risky. Perpetuating past behaviors, from the brain’s reptilian perspective, is the safest way. This is why innovation is difficult for most individuals and organizations. Put another way, the brain wants its problems and predicaments solved first because it can’t deal with anything new or different until they are addressed. The brain has no incentive to come up with new ideas if it doesn’t have to. As long as your brain knows you have another out, it will always be content with keeping you alive by coming up with the same ideas that it used before. This suggests that when you decide to get scrappy, a shift occurs and seems to unlock a door. Once that new door opens, you are more capable than ever of getting innovative because your brain has been activated to manage discomfort or challenges first. You’re able to work on a new, perhaps more advanced, level with heightened energy and focus. It’s that initial commitment, that literal act of saying, “I’m going for it!” that stimulates your mind in new and clever ways and ultimately leads to the generation of fresh ideas. Let’s go back to the Greg Hague story. 1. He had a huge goal, which was to pass the Arizona state bar exam. 2. There was a limited time frame as he had only four and a half months to study. 3. He was all in: “I flat out made up my mind I was going to pass.” He decided to go despite the odds. 4. He had to figure out a way to learn a ton of information in a short period of time. His brain adapted, shifted, and developed an entirely new learning system in order to absorb more material, which helped him to pass the Arizona bar and get the top score in the state. It’s weird, right? But it happened.

he was no mountaineer when he decided to climb the Hindu Kush. A few days scrambling on the rocks in Wales, enchantingly chronicled here, were his sole preparation. It was not mountaineering that attracted him; the Alps abound in opportunities for every exertion of that kind. It was the longing, romantic, reasonless, which lies deep in the hearts of most Englishmen, to shun the celebrated spectacles of the tourist and without any concern with science or politics or commerce, simply to set their feet where few civilized feet have trod. An American critic who read the manuscript of this book condemned it as ‘too English’. It is intensely English, despite the fact that most of its action takes place in wildly foreign places and that it is written in an idiomatic, uncalculated manner the very antithesis of ‘Mandarin’ stylishness. It rejoices the heart of fellow Englishmen, and should at least illuminate those who have any curiosity about the odd character of our Kingdom. It exemplifies the essential traditional (some, not I, will say deplorable) amateurism of the English. For more than two hundred years now Englishmen have been wandering about the world for their amusement, suspect everywhere as government agents, to the great embarrassment of our officials. The Scotch endured great hardships in the cause of commerce; the French in the cause of either power or evangelism. The English only have half (and wholly) killed themselves in order to get away from England. Mr Newby is the latest, but, I pray, not the last, of a whimsical tradition. And in his writing he has all the marks of his not entirely absurd antecedents. The understatement, the self-ridicule, the delight in the foreignness of foreigners, the complete denial of any attempt to enlist the sympathies of his readers in the hardships he has capriciously invited; finally in his formal self-effacement in the presence of the specialist (with the essential reserve of unexpressed self-respect) which concludes, almost too abruptly, this beguiling narrative – in all these qualities Mr Newby has delighted the heart of a man whose travelling days are done and who sees, all too often, his countrymen represented abroad by other, new and (dammit) lower types. Dear reader, if you have any softness left for the idiosyncrasies of our rough island race, fall to and enjoy this characteristic artifact. EVELYN

In the cities of the Jewish diaspora (especially Alexandria, Antioch, Tarsus, Ephesus, and Rome), Jews were widely admired by their gentile neighbors. For one thing, they had a real religion, not a clutter of gods and goddesses and pro forma rituals that almost nobody took seriously anymore. They actually believed in their one God; and, imagine, they even set aside one day a week to pray to him and reflect on their lives. They possessed a dignified library of sacred books that they studied reverently as part of this weekly reflection and which, if more than a little odd in their Greek translation, seemed to point toward a consistent worldview. Besides their religious seriousness, Jews were unusual in a number of ways that caught the attention of gentiles. They were faithful spouses—no, really—who maintained strong families in which even grown children remained affectively attached and respectful to their parents. Despite Caesar Nero’s shining example, matricide was virtually unknown among them. Despite their growing economic success, they tended to be more scrupulous in business than non-Jews. And they were downright finicky when it came to taking human life, seeming to value even a slave’s or a plebeian’s life as much as anyone else’s. Perhaps in nothing did the gentiles find the Jews so admirable as in their acts of charity. Communities of urban Jews, in addition to opening synagogues, built welfare centers for aiding the poor, the miserable, the sick, the homebound, the imprisoned, and those, such as widows and orphans, who had no family to care for them. For all these reasons, the diaspora cities of the first century saw a marked increase in gentile initiates to Judaism. Many of these were wellborn women who presided over substantial households and who had likely tried out some of the Eastern mystery cults before settling on Judaism. (Nero’s wife Poppea was almost certainly one of these, and probably the person responsible for instructing Nero in the subtle difference between Christians and more traditional Jews, which he would otherwise scarcely have been aware of.) These gentiles did not, generally speaking, go all the way. Because they tended to draw the line at circumcision, they were not considered complete Jews. They were, rather, noachides, or God-fearers, gentiles who remained gentiles while keeping the Sabbath and many of the Jewish dietary restrictions and coming to put their trust in the one God of the Jews. Pilgrimage to Jerusalem, however, could turn out to be a difficult test of the commitment of the noachides. For here in the heart of the Jewish world, they encountered Judaism enragé, a provincial religion concerned only with itself, and ages apart from the rational, tolerant Judaism of the diaspora. In the words of Paul Johnson:

Their Graces bought me, you know. They’d acquired my brother Devlin the year before, and my mother, inspired by this development, threatened to publish all manner of lurid memoirs regarding His Grace.” Acquired her brother? As if he were a promising yearling colt or an attractive patch of ground? “You are going to burden me with the details of your family past, I take it?” “You are the man who glories in details.” Without the least rude inflection, she made it sound like a failing. “My point is that my mother sold me. She could just as easily have sold me to a brothel. It’s done all the time. Unlike your sisters, Mr. Hazlit, I do not take for granted the propriety with which I was raised. You may ignore it if you please; I will not.” She had such a lovely voice. Light, soft, lilting with a hint of something Gaelic or Celtic… exotic. The sound of her voice was so pretty, it almost disguised the ugliness of her words. “How old were you?” “Five, possibly six. It depends on whether I am truly Moreland’s by-blow or just a result of my mother’s schemes in his direction.” Six years old and sold to a brothel? The food he’d eaten threatened to rebel. “I’m… sorry.” For calling her a dollymop, for making her repeat this miserable tale, for what he was about to suggest. She turned her head to regard him, the slight sheen in her eyes making him sorrier still. Sorrier than he could recall being about anything in a long, long time. Not just guilty and ashamed, but full of regret—for her. The way he’d been full of regret for his sisters and powerless to do anything but support them in their solitary struggles. He shoved that thought aside, along with the odd notion that he should take Magdalene Windham’s hand in some laughable gesture of comfort. He passed her his handkerchief instead. “This makes the stated purpose of my call somewhat awkward.” “It makes just about everything somewhat awkward,” she said quietly. “Try a few years at finishing school when you’re the daughter of not just a courtesan—there are some of those, after all—but a courtesan who sells her offspring. I realized fairly early that my mother’s great failing was not a lack of virtue, but rather that she was greedy in her fall from grace.” “She exploited a child,” Hazlit said. “That is an order of magnitude different from parlaying with an adult male in a transaction of mutual benefit.” “Do you think so?” She laid his handkerchief out in her lap, her fingers running over his monogrammed initials. “Some might say she was protecting me, providing for me and holding the duke accountable for his youthful indiscretions.” Despite her mild tone, Hazlit didn’t think Miss Windham would reach those conclusions. She might long to, but she wouldn’t. By the age of six a child usually had the measure of her caretakers. And to think of Maggie Windham at six… big innocent green eyes, masses of red hair, perfect skin… in a brothel. “I

This point was driven home for me for the first time when I was traveling in Asia in 1978 on a trip to a forest monastery in northeastern Thailand, Wat Ba Pong, on the Thai-Lao border. I was taken there by my meditation teacher, Jack Kornfield, who was escorting a group of us to meet the monk under whom he had studied at that forest hermitage. This man, Achaan Chaa, described himself as a “simple forest monk,” and he ran a hundred-acre forest monastery that was simple and old-fashioned, with one notable exception. Unlike most contemporary Buddhist monasteries in Thailand, where the practice of meditation as the Buddha had taught had all but died out, Achaan Chaa’s demanded intensive meditation practice and a slow, deliberate, mindful attention to the mundane details of everyday life. He had developed a reputation as a meditation master of the first order. My own first impressions of this serene environment were redolent of the newly extinguished Vietnam War, scenes of which were imprinted in my memory from years of media attention. The whole place looked extraordinarily fragile to me. On my first day, I was awakened before dawn to accompany the monks on their early morning alms rounds through the countryside. Clad in saffron robes, clutching black begging bowls, they wove single file through the green and brown rice paddies, mist rising, birds singing, as women and children knelt with heads bowed along the paths and held out offerings of sticky rice or fruits. The houses along the way were wooden structures, often perched on stilts, with thatched roofs. Despite the children running back and forth laughing at the odd collection of Westerners trailing the monks, the whole early morning seemed caught in a hush. After breakfasting on the collected food, we were ushered into an audience with Achaan Chaa. A severe-looking man with a kindly twinkle in his eyes, he sat patiently waiting for us to articulate the question that had brought us to him from such a distance. Finally, we made an attempt: “What are you really talking about? What do you mean by ‘eradicating craving’?” Achaan Chaa looked down and smiled faintly. He picked up the glass of drinking water to his left. Holding it up to us, he spoke in the chirpy Lao dialect that was his native tongue: “You see this goblet? For me, this glass is already broken. I enjoy it; I drink out of it. It holds my water admirably, sometimes even reflecting the sun in beautiful patterns. If I should tap it, it has a lovely ring to it. But when I put this glass on a shelf and the wind knocks it over or my elbow brushes it off the table and it falls to the ground and shatters, I say, ‘Of course.’ But when I understand that this glass is already broken, every moment with it is precious.”5 Achaan Chaa was not just talking about the glass, of course, nor was he speaking merely of the phenomenal world, the forest monastery, the body, or the inevitability of death. He was also speaking to each of us about the self. This self that you take to be so real, he was saying, is already broken.

Feel" Hello everyone, how are y’all doing Y’all seem busy Don’t mean to disturb you, is it me or y’all look dizzy Can you hear the ocean screaming, can you see the wind in your hair I know it all seems scattered here and there Do I sound odd to you, Do you already have a name for me Where do I belong to, How hard is it for everyone to agree Can anyone hear me I see all of your vague faces Coming from all different places Unconsciously robbed of own your rights, I wish I could make you all feel despite of all your races Touch the ground, grab a stone and y’all know you’re not alone Have a mind of your own Time ticks on Each hour closer the death Love, feel what are you waiting upon Don’t waste one breath.

How you doing, Helena?" she asked quietly. "Not so good, Alley." The wounded trooper's voice was harsh, strained, despite all the painkillers in her pharmacope could do. The plasma bolt which had knocked out her armor hadn't killed her outright, but she'd lost her left leg just below the hip, and the entire left side of her armor was a smoking ruin. Her battle rifle had been destroyed, and her vital signs flickered unsteadily on Alicia's monitors. Alicia looked up at Tanis' face through the visor of her armor, and her wing shook her head silently. "We -" Alicia began, but Chu cut her off. "I already figured it out, Alley," she said. "I figured you had," Alicia said softly, and laid her armored hand on Chu's right shoulder. She knelt there for a few silent heartbeats, then straightened her spine. "You guys need to get moving," Chu said. She reached down and drew her sidearm-a CHK three-millimeter, identical to the one Alicia normally carried. "I'll just wait here with Bill," the crippled corporal said, nodding to where her wingman had already died. Alicia gazed down at her, longing for something-anything-to say. Some comforting lie, like "I'm sure the bad guys will be too busy concentrating on us to send in a follow-up sweep," or "Hang on, and we'll get a med team out here as soon as we've polished off Green Haven." But Chu knew the odds as well as Alicia did, and she could read her own life sign monitors. She knew how little time she had left unless the med team arrived almost instantly, that only her pharmacope and augmentation were keeping her alive even now, and Alicia owed her people something better than a lie. "God bless, Helena," she said, very quietly, instead, then turned to lead the fifty-eight surviving effectives of Charlie Company, Third Battalion, Second Regiment, Fifth Brigade, Imperial Cadre back into motion.

Since Disney’s animated extravaganzas reappeared with THE LITTLE MERMAID, they have been a weirdly accurate barometer of the “national political mood,” including a brief liberal flourish around the time of Clinton’s election. Disney’s 1980s features reflected the neo-conservative preoccupation with personal morality and “family values.” They consist mainly of family dramas, bent on achieving proper heterosexual couple bonding despite the odds. The female leads in all three are restless and eager to escape their fathers’ realms, an impulse which puts them in danger until they arrive safely into their husbands’ arms. The males are all, at first, unworthy of full patriarchal responsibility but, in true PINOCCHIO fashion, overcome their weaknesses and, through exertions of will, defeat their foes and become fit successors to their wives’ fathers.

He was probably never married. Some suppose that he was a widower. Jewish and rabbinical custom, the completeness of his moral character, his ideal conception of marriage as reflecting the mystical union of Christ with his church, his exhortations to conjugal, parental, and filial duties, seem to point to experimental knowledge of domestic life. But as a Christian missionary moving from place to place, and exposed to all sorts of hardship and persecution, he felt it his duty to abide alone.357 He sacrificed the blessings of home and family to the advancement of the kingdom of Christ.358 His "bodily presence was weak, and his speech contemptible" (of no value), in the superficial judgment of the Corinthians, who missed the rhetorical ornaments, yet could not help admitting that his "letters were weighty and strong."359  Some of the greatest men have been small in size, and some of the purest souls forbidding in body. Socrates was the homeliest, and yet the wisest of Greeks. Neander, a converted Jew, like Paul, was short, feeble, and strikingly odd in his whole appearance, but a rare humility, benignity, and heavenly aspiration beamed from his face beneath his dark and bushy eyebrows. So we may well imagine that the expression of Paul’s countenance was highly intellectual and spiritual, and that he looked "sometimes like a man and sometimes like an angel."360 He was afflicted with a mysterious, painful, recurrent, and repulsive physical infirmity, which he calls a "thorn in the flesh, " and which acted as a check upon spiritual pride and self-exultation over his abundance of revelations.361  He bore the heavenly treasure in an earthly vessel and his strength was made perfect in weakness.362  But all the more must we admire the moral heroism which turned weakness itself into an element of strength, and despite pain and trouble and persecution carried the gospel salvation triumphantly from Damascus to Rome.

I couldn’t stop thinking of all the tragedies, the heartache, and pain that life has thrown our way. We ended up together, despite all the obstacles and frankly dismal odds. But what if God intended it that way? Man has been broken since the Garden of Eden, but we were never meant to be broken apart. We were meant to be broken together until He comes for us.

She knew this rose petal was from that same rose and that John had saved it all this time. A link through eternity, despite all the odds, all the obstacles – their hearts connected, entwined forever.

I kept my mouth closed but continued to stretch out across Hendrix. I scratched my fingernails lightly up his side and arched my back, pressing my body into his. I was mostly trying to irritate him, but he grabbed my waist with two hands and flipped me over so that he loomed above me. “Are you trying to kill me, Reagan?” he demanded in a husky morning voice that revealed he was just waking up, too. I shook my head and pressed my lips together. Someone would have to threaten to shoot me before I spoke to this man without brushing my teeth first. “Then what are you doing with your body?” Hendrix demanded sounding a bit strangled. His hands lightened their grasp and his fingers brushed against my hipbones. He lowered his forehead to mine and rubbed his nose along my nose. “We’re in a room full of people. Reagan. I haven’t even kissed you yet. Probably it’s better not to turn me on violently first thing in the morning.” My stomach jolted awake, followed by the thousands of butterflies that had apparently fallen asleep in my stomach. His leg slipped between my thighs and his whole rigid, glorious body pressed down on mine. His breath was stale from sleep, but oddly I found it even more endearing. I had to close my eyes against all of the sensations flooding my body. Vaguely, I remembered those other people with us in the freezer, but just barely. He leaned down and kissed my cheek before he pulled back and moved away from me. I heard him groan into his hands. I tilted my head and watched as he scrubbed his face with his hands roughly. He noticed me watching him and shot me an evil scowl. I smiled. This boy was more than any girl was capable of resisting. I was falling for him, despite my better judgment.

DOING SOMETHING It is so much easier to not do something than to do something. Even the smallest task, like filling out a Scholastic Books order form or putting away the butter, requires time, focus, and follow-through. It’s astounding, actually, that anything gets done at all, by anyone. But then, let’s say you finally are prepared and determined to do that thing, whatever it is, but you wake up to find that your basement has flooded and you must spend your day making phone calls to the contractor, plumber, and carpet people. Or not that but something else—perhaps you must stand before a committee for approval, a committee that neither grasps your intent nor appreciates your ingenuity, and anyway, they are in a bit of a hurry to break for lunch. Yet. Still. Somehow. I am encouraged to see that despite the colossal effort, despite the odds against one, despite the mere constraints of time and schedules and sore throats, houses do get built, pottery gets glazed, e-mails get sent, trees get planted, shoes get reheeled, manifestos get Xeroxed, films get shot, highways get repaved, cakes get frosted, stories get told.

Odd how we measure things. As if the ability to purchase a large building or the most fuel-guzzeling mode of sitting in a traffick jam is the ultimate expression of achievement during our scant years upon this planet. Despite all our advances, we still judge people on terms of bricks, cloth and horsepower.

Perseverance is the paramount quality on the spiritual path. To succeed, one must make a firm resolve to not deviate from this path despite all odds.

The bed is warmer tonight. Warmer than it's ever been and stranger. But easier, too. Lucien catches me looking at him on the pillows, and he smirks. "You have my permission to stare at me all night." "And why would I do that?" I fire off a half-downy mumble. "I've already memorized everything on you." "Well." His smirk grows unmanageable. "Not everything." Since when is he the one who seduces, instead of me? My face fills red. "Princes aren't supposed to have roguish manners." "And ladies aren't supposed to sleep in beds with unmarried men." "Only married men, then." He hefts up on one elbow, tracing my hand under the covers. "What are you implying, Lady Zera?" "Go. To. Sleep." I pause. "Your Highness." The kiss comes, as I knew it would, breathless and enmeshed in each other, and I'm the first one to pull away and the only one to roll over in faux grumpiness. Lucien's laugh rumbling the mattress. I try to sleep--try so hard to play at being a human as he is--but I fade in and out, waking up in the odd hours to reach over and feel that he's still there. Still real. Still with me, despite everything. Despite how many mistakes I've made.

The lesson in this path is taught sufficiently by the trump of the Hanged Man, a personal favorite. The Hanged Man is one of the better teachers of all the trumps on how to train the human mind (Hod) to work from the spiritual perspective. Since the figure on the card is being hung upside down, this indicates that the values of the higher world are most often the reverse of the lower. The Hanged Man gives an indication of serenity through chaos, as his face is placid despite being strung up and his head about to be submerged in a body of water in the Thoth Tarot. This explains why most mystics throughout time have been thought to be insane: their ideas and values are normally at odds with dogma and culture, and they are revolutionaries and radicals. Most often, when engaging with the higher spheres of consciousness, one encounters realities that far surpass culture’s understanding of what is and is not acceptable. The Hanged Man encapsulates the expression of mystic action, which is rarely understood in conventional culture. When these spiritual ideas and values are expressed, the prevailing mindset of society often misinterprets these expressions, becomes afraid, and retaliates either through crucifixion, persecution, or banishment. Hence, the secrecy of occultism. Crowley calls this path and trump the “card of the Dying God,” and perhaps he has a point. Path 23 is the roadway where old ideas are purged to make way for a new, higher perspective in accordance with the spiritual Will of the universe. Turning one’s point of view upside down, in reverse, a pachakuti, is the magical formula of seeing the world via the perspective of spirit. It is the prime elixir of alchemy.

Superiority: Passive Skill. Some individuals are simply anointed with natural advantages that their peers can only envy. Although all other factors indicate you should lose, you manage to succeed, despite the odds. Stats and Skill Levels are worth an infinitely small amount more than normal. Slight chance to earn a higher Rarity Skill. Effects increases with Skill Level.

Through you, through you, through you...  The magic works through you. Not beside you. Not around you. Not for you. Not despite you. But through you. You have to go there. You have to choose your stage. You have to do your dance. Putting yourself in place, to any degree that you can, even if it scares you, even when it's "hard," even if it's just your big toe. Stretch yourself, scoff at the odds, get the ball rolling so that the magic can then come alive and sweep you off your feet with its infinite grace and glory. You wouldn't just carry around the seeds for the garden of your dreams in your pocket, all the while asking where your flowers were? Nope, you'd have to brave the elements, you'd have to choose the location, and then you'd have to go there. Your life is your wand.

Through you, through you, through you...the magic works through you. Not beside you. Not around you. Not for you. Not despite you. But through you. You have to go there. You have to choose your stage. You have to do your dance. Putting yourself in place, to any degree that you can, even if it scares you, even when it's "hard," even if it's just your big toe. Stretch yourself, scoff at the odds, get the ball rolling so that the magic can then come alive and sweep you off your feet with its infinite grace and glory. You wouldn't just carry around the seeds for the garden of your dreams in your pocket, all the while asking where your flowers were? Nope, you'd have to brave the elements, you'd have to choose the location, and then you'd have to go there. Your life is your wand.

It was quiet. Then he asked, “What do you have to do?” I pointed at his stress grip. “Things like that. I mean there’s more, but that’s a great place to start. But hey, I’m pretty similar to you in all this. I’ll show you a few things. You know, different ways to breathe, for example. How to talk to yourself in a positive way. How to realize that it’s the anxiety and not the situation. But on the positive side, do you know what happened when I learned to live with my anxiety instead of trying to find a way to get rid of it?” “What?” he asked. “Well, my life got better. I got happier. I started smiling more, and I stopped being so afraid all the time. And when I look back at my life thus far, I’ve gone to college. I’ve gotten married, gotten a good job, and had three amazing kids. All of it with my anxiety in the back seat. Life’s been pretty good despite my anxiety. Pretty sure it’s going to be the same for you.” I gave him one of those soft, fatherly punches to the arm. He let out this long breath, and I could almost see the steam of feeling odd or like he was holding on to some great burden alone come pouring out of him. Then he said something I think all dads never, ever, get tired of hearing. “Thanks, Dad.” “Anytime, kiddo. Anytime.

True bravery had nothing to do with looking your opponent in the eye before you knocked him to the ground and pummeled him with your fists. True bravery was looking into the eyes of the woman you loved and promising them forever. Despite the odds stacked against you, you’d be willing to risk it all for one more day, one more year, or if you got really lucky, an entire lifetime.

You're mine,' I whispered, dragging my hands through his hair, down his back, across his wings. My friend through many dangers. My lover who had healed my broken and weary soul. My mate who had waited for me against all hope, despite all odds.

Daniel sensed that everyone, except perhaps for himself and Shemyaza, were suffused with a suppressed hysterical frenzy. Even Enniel was behaving oddly. His normally bland expression held a hint of wildness. His hair appeared wantonly dissheveled and all his actions were exaggerated. His colleagues were no different. Daniel would not have been surprised to notice erections pushing out the front of their robes, but as far as he could tell, they were not sexually aroused. Something had been conjured within them, yet despite this, the ritual itself seemed empty and mechanical. In some subtle way, it lacked the essential spark of spiritual feeling that should have united everyone present. Perhaps this was a symptom of what had been discussed at the meeting earlier. Grigori ritual had gone stale.

Living in love (yes, that’s how she phrased it) is different, though. It means that someone stays willingly with their significant other despite their flaws and even when they drive you crazy.

It’s embarrassing for any executive or professional to forget the name of the person you just met, but it’s not life-changing. It’s the other working memory lapses that have a much bigger impact on your relationships and your career: consistently veering off course during a conversation, interrupting people because you’re afraid you’ll forget what you want to say, or arriving late for important meetings because once again you got caught up in a phone call. It’s not just frustrating for you – but for everyone else around you. No matter how good your intentions are, weak working memory will wreak havoc with your results. The significance of working memory to your overall performance cannot be overstated. It is the linchpin to all other executive functions. If it’s in top working order, other executive functions will be too. When prioritizing, working memory helps you remember – in the moment – all possible priorities while you sort through them. When planning, working memory helps you hold in your head all the details that you need to make time for. Regulating your emotions requires you to remember what you’re trying to achieve – despite the pull of strong feelings. You may be accomplished and highly intelligent and still struggle with working memory. When you do, the contrast between your intellectual ability and your ability to execute consistently can have a devasting impact on your self-concept. No matter how smart you are, or how much you care, the people around you may judge you for these working memory lapses and not who you truly are. Worse, you may be judging yourself. Here are some ways to support your working memory: Identify when you will need memory strategies You are unique. Know your strengths and weaknesses. Great memory strategists know themselves and have a tool kit for every occasion. Good strategies are efficient, automatic and flexible. Assume you’ll forget – everything Never assume you’ll remember something just because it’s front of mind right now. Your brain needs a strategy to remember it 30 minutes from now. Or tomorrow. Create your own external hard drives Visuals are essential. Plans, agendas, and a central notebook are all great. Whatever method you choose, it should be in plain sight. If you have to open a device, or look for the post-it-note, you’re giving your working memory one more thing to remember – which will definitely not help you. Create visual memory This is a good trick for someone with solid inner vision. Put the idea into your mind’s eye. See it. Experience it. Describe it to yourself. When time comes to remember it, go to your mind’s eye to find it. Say it out loud As you say it out loud to yourself or another person, really pay attention to the words. If you forget names, repeat that person’s name and look at them while focusing on connecting their name to what you know about them. Chunk information Practice categorizing or chunking items that go together and focus on the chunk, not the detail. Your working memory remembers chunks of information much better than 30 odd details. Pay attention to your working memory and show the world – and yourself – just how amazing you are!

As a child, I’d held grandiose dreams of leading my armies into battle and coming out victorious despite whatever odds. I’d always had such inspiring things to say on those occasions, yet now they all escaped me. And these odds didn’t look promising... No pretending at king anymore.

Being born is a blessing in itself. You have survived, despite all the odds.

If you're going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery--isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It's the only good fight there is

Perhaps all along my idea of failure had been wrong. Perhaps my body had been working hard to keep me as well as it could despite a serious, life-altering infection, and I needed to find a new story about it. A story that allowed for the contingency of identity, of health, of hope. One that saw survival of any kind as a form of strength. What I had experienced *was* life itself, the body straining to survive despite the odds stacked against it.

It’s up to you to navigate the obstacles and the difficulties and constantly drive toward success despite all odds against you. The best stories, movies, and inspiring real-life accounts always have major hardships followed by great triumphs. Why would your story be any different?

Line 4 - Sales (Director) Throughout the Golden Path Program we have gotten to know the 4th line as the great ‘friendmaker’. This gift comes from a truly genuine heart, and an easy warmth with people and community. This is the kind of person that emerges through the Venus Sequence, as those 4th lines release some of their inner restrictions and fears. To have a 4th line Vocation is to be a spokesperson. Such gifts are given to us to serve the whole, and although the 4th line wound may feel reluctant to engage at this level, they do have to overcome the fear that they inherited in their very early years. When we say that the 4th line is the most natural salesperson of all the lines, it does not mean only in business. The open 4th line is always selling their heart. They are here to create more openness, to help others overcome their fears, and to be examples of open-hearted communication. Like the 4th line, the 3rd line can be hugely successful in a business context. However, the role and style of the 4th line is very different. Their role is more like the director of the movie. They have to work closely with people, which involves diplomacy, conviction, and focus. The 4th line knows what the movie should look like, and their one-pointed drive will ensure that everyone else comes into harmony around that direction. The 4th line is comfortable taking control and guiding others to work towards a collective vision or ideal. This is where the notion of sales comes in - the 4th line can diffuse difficulties through the sheer strength and goodwill of its character. The 4th line also has a strong theme of aloneness as a counterbalance to its communal warmth. The inner strength and commitment of these people is rooted in this ability to stand alone and remain committed to one’s ideal, despite the odds. If you have a 4th line Vocation, then you are here to influence humanity. You are here to use your considerable gifts to open people’s hearts. If you happen to be selling a specific idea or product, then at the deepest level it is really an excuse to share your spirit with others. Sometimes you may also be here to deliver a rousing message that shakes people out of their comfort zones, and brings them to a new place inside themselves. Since the 4th line is so good at convincing people about things, it is for a very good reason. When this reason is for a higher purpose, then your whole life moves onto a higher level. There is nothing more powerful or authentic than when one of us stands alone in the world and expresses the love in our heart - whatever creative form that may take.

To trust yourself means that you will dare to step forward, despite all odds, no matter what’s up against you, no matter what forces may be at work. To trust yourself means that you are no longer content to lodge your soul in the circumstances that have long stopped serving you. To trust yourself means that you will no longer accept fear reprogramming you, reorienting your values and changing your perspective to one that is simply holding you back.

One unexpected hint comes from patients with a strange disorder called anosognosia, a condition in which people seem unaware of or deny their disability. Most patients with a right-hemisphere stroke have complete paralysis of the left side of their body and, as you might expect, complain about it. But about one in twenty of them will vehemently deny their paralysis even though they are mentally otherwise lucid and intelligent. For example, President Woodrow Wilson, whose left side was paralyzed by a stroke in 1919, insisted that he was perfectly fine. Despite the clouding of his thought processes and against all advice, he remained in office, making elaborate travel plans and major decisions pertaining to American involvement in the League of Nations. In 1996 some colleagues and I made our own little investigation of anosognosia and noticed something new and amazing: Some of these patients not only denied their own paralysis, but also denied the paralysis of another patient—and let me assure you, the second patient’s inability to move was as clear as day. Denying one’s own paralysis is odd enough, but why deny another patient’s paralysis? We suggest that this bizarre observation is best understood in terms of damage to Rizzolatti’s mirror neurons. It’s as if anytime you want to make a judgment about someone else’s movements, you have to run a virtual-reality simulation of the corresponding movements in your own brain. And without mirror neurons you cannot do this.

Despite the odds being stacked against us, there was a magnetic pull because of this. Because we’re meant to be together. This is fate, or destiny, or whatever. He’s ‘the one’. I saved myself for this man without knowing I was doing it. I wouldn’t have wanted to give myself to anyone else. It hasn’t been easy, and yes, I nearly lost him along the way, but I would go through all of that again to be here now. To know that I have the man of my dreams and that life can’t get any better than this.

Americans have been the population least sympathetic to debtors. In a way this is odd, since America was settled largely by absconding debtors, but it’s a country where the idea that morality is a matter of paying one’s debts runs deeper than almost any other. In colonial days, an insolvent debtor’s ear was often nailed to a post. The United States was one of the last countries in the world to adopt a law of bankruptcy: despite the fact that in 1787, the Constitution specifically charged the new government with creating one, all attempts were rejected, or quickly reversed, on “moral grounds” until 1898.13

Despite all odds, the practice of single mothering signifies a political act of resistance against patriarchy and intersecting inequalities. Being on the margins, oppressed, and excluded by society, single mothers, through their active and empowered mothering, are contesting the marginalities and questioning the domination.

Irie stepped out into streets she’d known her whole life, along a route she’d walked a million times over. If someone asked her just then what memory was, what the purest definition of memory was, she would say this: the street you were on when you first jumped in a pile of dead leaves. She was walking it right now. With every fresh crunch came the memory of previous crunches. She was permeated by familiar smells: wet woodchip and gravel around the base of the tree, newly laid turd underneath the cover of soggy leaves. She was moved by these sensations. Despite opting for a life of dentistry, she had not yet lost all of the poetry in her soul, that is, she could still have the odd Proustian moment, note layers upon layers, though she often experienced them in periodontal terms. She got a twinge – as happens with a sensitive tooth, or in a ‘phantom tooth’, when the nerve is exposed – she felt a twinge walking past the garage, where she and Millat, aged thirteen, had passed one hundred and fifty pennies over the counter, stolen from an Iqbal jam-jar, in a desperate attempt to buy a packet of fags. She felt an ache (like a severe malocclusion, the pressure of one tooth upon another) when she passed the park where they had cycled as children, where they smoked their first joint, where he had kissed her once in the middle of a storm. Irie wished she could give herself over to these past-present fictions: wallow in them, make them sweeter, longer, particularly the kiss. But she had in her hand a cold key, and surrounding her lives that were stranger than fiction, funnier than fiction, crueller than fiction, and with consequences fiction can never have. She didn’t want to be involved in the long story of those lives, but she was, and she found herself dragged forward by the hair to their denouement, through the high road – Mali’s Kebabs, Mr Cheungs, Raj’s, Malkovich Bakeries – she could reel them off blindfold; and then down under pigeon-shit bridge and that long wide road that drops into Gladstone Park as if it’s falling into a green ocean. You could drown in memories like these, but she tried to swim free of them. She jumped over the small wall that fringed the Iqbal house, as she had a million times over, and rang the doorbell. Past tense, future imperfect.

Irie stepped out into streets she’d known her whole life, along a route she’d walked a million times over. If someone asked her just then what memory was, what the purest definition of memory was, she would say this: the street you were on when you first jumped in a pile of dead leaves. She was walking it right now. With every fresh crunch came the memory of previous crunches. She was permeated by familiar smells: wet woodchip and gravel around the base of the tree, newly laid turd underneath the cover of soggy leaves. She was moved by these sensations. Despite opting for a life of dentistry, she had not yet lost all of the poetry in her soul, that is, she could still have the odd Proustian moment, note layers upon layers, though she often experienced them in periodontal terms. She got a twinge – as happens with a sensitive tooth, or in a ‘phantom tooth’, when the nerve is exposed – she felt a twinge walking past the garage, where she and Millat, aged thirteen, had passed one hundred and fifty pennies over the counter, stolen from an Iqbal jam-jar, in a desperate attempt to buy a packet of fags. She felt an ache (like a severe malocclusion, the pressure of one tooth upon another) when she passed the park where they had cycled as children, where they smoked their first joint, where he had kissed her once in the middle of a storm. Irie wished she could give herself over to these past-present fictions: wallow in them, make them sweeter, longer, particularly the kiss. But she had in her hand a cold key, and surrounding her lives that were stranger than fiction, funnier than fiction, crueller than fiction, and with consequences fiction can never have. She didn’t want to be involved in the long story of those lives, but she was, and she found herself dragged forward by the hair to their denouement, through the high road – Mali’s Kebabs, Mr Cheungs, Raj’s, Malkovich Bakeries – she could reel them off blindfold; and then down under pigeon-shit bridge and that long wide road that drops into Gladstone Park as if it’s falling into a green ocean. You could drown in memories like these, but she tried to swim free of them. She jumped over the small wall that fringed the Iqbal house, as she had a million times over, and rang the doorbell. Past tense, future imperfect.