Dexter Green Quotes

It is a great folly to hope that other men will harmonize with us; I have never hoped this. I have always regarded each man as an independent individual, whom I endeavored to understand with all his peculiarities, but from whom I desired no further sympathy. In this way have I been enabled to converse with every man, and thus alone is produced the knowledge of various characters and the dexterity necessary for the conduct of life. —JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE

Arabelle,” Debs was saying. “Arabelle, please listen to me.” Arabelle was not listening, and I didn’t think my sister’s vocal tone of combined anger and authority was well calculated to win over anyone—especially not someone who looked like she had been sent over from a casting office to play the part of a cleaning woman with no green card.

You must, in order that it shall speak to you, take a thing during a certain time as the only one that exists, as the only phenomenon which through your diligent and exclusive love finds itself set down in the center of the universe. . . . Don’t be frightened at the expression “fate” … I call fate all external events (illnesses, for example, included) which can inevitably step in to interrupt and annihilate a disposition of mind and training that is by nature solitary. . . . That went through me like an arrow, when I learned it, but like a flaming arrow that, while it pierced my heart through, left it in a conflagration of clear sight. There are few artists in our day who grasp this stubbornness, this vehement obstinacy. But I believe that without it one remains always at the periphery of art, which is rich enough as it is to allow us pleasant discoveries, but at which, nevertheless, we halt only as a player at the green table who, while he now and again succeeds with a “coup”, remains none the less at the mercy of chance, which is nothing but the docile and dexterous ape of the law.

Dexter has all sorts of complicated saws and things, not to mention all that plastic sheeting he uses. It’s not exactly what you’d find in the average kitchen.

Three square tiers of hazelnut cake filled with caramel mousse and sliced poached pears, sealed with vanilla buttercream scented with pear eau-de-vie. It's covered in a smooth expanse of ivory fondant decorated with what appear to be natural branches of pale green dogwood but are actually gum paste and chocolate, and with almost-haphazard sheer spheres of silvery blown sugar, as if a child came by with a bottle of bubbles and they landed on the cake. On the top, in lieu of the traditional bride and groom, is a bottle of Dexter's favorite Riesling in a bow tie and a small three-tier traditional wedding cake sporting a veil, both made out of marzipan. It took me the better part of the last three weeks to make this cake. Not to mention the loaves of banana bread, the cellophane bags of pine nut shortbread cookies, and the little silver boxes of champagne truffles in the gift bags. And the vanilla buttermilk panna cottas we're serving with balsamic-macerated berries as the pre-dessert before the cake. And the hand-wrapped caramels and shards of toffee and dark-chocolate-covered candied ginger slices that will be served with the coffee.

Acosta’s house was in a section of the Gables that would have been a walled community if it was built today. The houses were large, and many of them, like Acosta’s, were built in the Spanish style out of large blocks of coral rock. The lawn looked like a putting green and there was a two-story garage on the side, attached to the house by a breezeway. Deborah

We stalked carefully through the park in best paramilitary fashion, the lost patrol on its mission into the land of the B movie. To Deborah’s credit, she was very careful. She moved stealthily from one piece of cover to the next, frequently looking right to Chutsky and then left at me. It was getting harder to see her, since the sun had now definitely set, but at least that meant it was harder for them to see us, too—whoever them might turn out to be. We leapfrogged through the first part of the park like this, past the ancient souvenir stand, and then I came up to the first of the rides, an old merry-go-round. It had fallen off its spindle and lay there leaning to one side. It was battered and faded and somebody had chopped the heads off the horses and spray-painted the whole thing in Day-Glo green and orange, and it was one of the saddest things I had ever seen. I circled around it carefully, holding my gun ready, and peering behind everything large enough to hide a cannibal. At the far side of the merry-go-round I looked to my right. In the growing darkness I could barely make out Debs. She had moved up into the shadow of one of the large posts that held up the cable car line that ran from one side of the park to the other. I couldn’t see Chutsky at all; where he should have been there was a row of crumbling playhouses that fringed a go-kart track. I hoped he was there, being watchful and dangerous. If anything did jump out and yell boo at us, I wanted him ready with his assault rifle. But there was no sign of him, and even as I watched, Deborah began to move forward again, deeper into the dark park. A warm, light wind blew over me and I smelled the Miami night: a distant tang of salt on the edge of rotting vegetation and automobile exhaust. But even as I inhaled the familiar smell, I felt the hairs go up on the back of my neck and a soft whisper came up at me from the lowest dungeon of Castle Dexter, and a rustle of leather wings rattled softly on the ramparts. It was a very clear notice that something was not right here and this would be a great time to be somewhere else; I froze there by the headless horses, looking for whatever had set off the Passenger’s alarm. I saw and heard nothing. Deborah had vanished into the darkness and nothing moved anywhere, except a plastic shopping bag blowing by in the gentle wind. My stomach turned over, and for once it was not from hunger. My

My lover’s alluring propensities took on a vivacity I had difficulty conceding. His passion magnified a thousand-fold within my consciousness as I closed my eyes to this wanton dexterity. I desired him, and he wanted me. Under this euphoric ecstasy, I relinquished my person to his coveted demands.               My Apollo, my Phoebus, who never failed to brighten my person and radiate my soul, had coiled me into his solicitous web of ardent devotion. My coverings fell away with every inhalation of his loving elixir. My lover had exposed my nakedness to the gazing eyes of the unseen voyeur and stalker. They alone were granted dispensation to witness the audacity between my lover and me.               Our fiery gazes never left or strayed from each other. Bewitched by his blueish-green eyes, my soul was bare to him. His oral stimulation had fostered me to arch my back in a balletic pose as his hands supported the small of my back. Watched through the submerged glass, we felt like Poseidon’s pleasure slaves, performing solely for his gratification. I was awed by our agility and reminded of a supple aquatic dance performance I had witnessed during my extensive travels. My former ballet training surged through me as I saw myself swirling and pirouetting across the room, and Andy’s thickness gyrated within the core of my being. The ecstasy and the agony of my dance pedagogy had transformed into the art of intercourse. The grace of movement and the beauty of love had merged into a seraphic epiphany – a unity of the Godhead within and without.               At the precise moment of our orgasmic exultations, I finally grasped my chaperone’s universal knowledge: that the divine and I are but one and the same. It was then I comprehended my guardian’s god-like comportment. Andy knew his birth-right, and he wore his divinity with pride and honour. All of that I saw in him as it came gushing to the forefront. He was indeed a Phoebus Apollo, a sun god beheld in a darkened chamber. There and then, I made a secret covenant to myself, like an apostle to the Son of God - I would follow in his footsteps.               My Valet’s sanctity swirled within me, flooding my kernel with beatific sows of celestial grace. Overjoyed by his tokens of affection, I too released my passion into his garnering gulf. Streams of my succulent splendour oozed from his enticing lips. It was only when we shared the final droplets of my luscious deposits that he liberated his engorgement from my sopping honeycomb. I supped at his dripping remains before sharing my fill with him, so we could both partake in this sexual liturgy of heavenly Eucharist.               We did not relinquish our performance after the lights and music had disappeared, but remained entwined in darkness, savouring the inseparable devotion that had once been the domain of Apollo and his beloved Hyacinth.

I felt myself grinding my teeth together at the realization that, just like Deborah, Brian had decided that when the going gets tough, the tough get Dexter—and then they make him do all the work. “This is my problem?” I said with some heat. “I’m supposed to figure out how to keep us both alive?” “Well,” he said. “I mean, you had a much better education.” “Yes, but he’s your drug lord,” I said, and I realized that he’d succeeded in knocking away my cool control and I was speaking much too loudly. I lowered my voice. “I don’t know the first thing about these people, Brian,” I said. “Not what they’re likely to do, or how they’ll do it, or—Nothing at all. How am I even supposed to find them?” “Oh, that shouldn’t be a problem,” Brian said soothingly. “I’m quite sure they’ll find us.” For some reason, I could not find any comfort in that. “Wonderful,” I said. “And I can assume they know what they’re doing, of course.” “Of course,” he said happily. “Some of them are very good, too.” He smiled, and even though it was the closest to a real smile I’d ever seen from Brian, the effect was spoiled somewhat by the bright pink, blue, and green sprinkles stuck to his teeth. “Let’s just hope we’re a little better,” he said. I ground my teeth some more. It didn’t actually do any good, but it was probably better than leaping across the tabletop and sinking my canines into Brian’s neck. “All right,” I said. “So your wonderful plan is to wait until they come after us, and then be better than them.” “A little oversimplified,” he said. “But accurate.” I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. When I opened my eyes again, Brian was looking at me with a happy little smirk on his face. “How will they do it?” I asked him. “I mean, if it won’t spoil your plan to tell me.

Crack! Crack! The sniper. More swearing and more shooting. After some minutes two M-1 tanks arrived, clanking and smoking. They leveled their terrible guns. Ka-boom. Ka-boom. Ten shots. The shock waves bounced off our ears. Someone pointed and yelled. “Look!” shouted Corporal Christopher Spears. “He’s on a bike!” A man pedaled away from the building, away from the marines, in an alley. There was no shot to take; the angle was oblique. “He’s in the road, he’s in the road!” Eckert yelled. “Shoot him!” Evening approached. The sun sagged. Six hours had passed since the sniper first fired. The ruins belched smoke and fire. Omohundro sent a squad across the street. They put out clouds of green smoke to cover their advance. No one fired. The marines entered the building, what was left of it. There was no one inside.   I

The building was a sniper’s heaven; it was long with dozens of windows and many points of view. Three floors. Someone had put cardboard in each of the panes, dozens of cardboard boxes, making it almost impossible to see inside. The marines kept firing, thousands and thousands of rounds. The barrels of their machine guns glowed and sagged. “Get me another barrel,” one of the kids said. More firing commenced. “I don’t know who he is, but he is very well trained,” said Lieutenant Steven Berch, another one of the platoon leaders. Omohundro was downstairs. He listened to the commotion and called in an airstrike. “Just blow the building to shit,” he said. First a 2,000 -pound bomb, then a 500 -pounder flew into the building and burst. A cloud unfolded upward and revealed a gigantic fire. It rose through the ruined ceiling. Part of a wall collapsed. Crack! Crack! Crack! The marines ducked, cursed loudly and returned fire. No one spotted the sniper this time. The sniper fired back. The marines responded with another blast of gunfire, many thousands of rounds. I stood with some guys at the back of the roof, behind a shed. A blue and green parakeet fluttered out of the sky and hovered in tight circles. Bullets flew past. The parakeet landed on a slumping power line. The marines stared in amazement. “Someone’s pet?” a marine said. I ran across the top of the roof and the sniper took a shot. Crack! The bullet whizzed by. An artillery barrage began. First came the 155 mm shells, each filled with fifty pounds of high explosives. One after the other the shells sailed into the building. Fire swept through the three floors. What was left of the ceiling collapsed in the smoke. Cardboard sailed out of shattered windows. Twenty shells, then thirty, each one large enough to end the world. The shelling ceased and the shooting stopped. The building burned. Remarkably it still had a frame, and parts of its three floors still stood. Suddenly a sound rustled from a storefront on the first floor. The marines tensed. A cat sauntered out, dirty yellow, tail in the air. It walked like a runway model in front of a construction site. “Can I shoot it, sir?” a marine asked his squad leader. “Absolutely not,” came the reply. Crack!

Roger Williams, John Clarke, Joseph Clarke, Thomas Olney, Gregory Dexter, Samuel Hubbard, and many others in that little colony, held the pure doctrines of grace, and the importance of a holy life, as much as the fathers of Massachusetts did; and they established the first government upon earth, that gave equal liberty, civil and religious, which is now enjoyed in the most parts of America. General Greene also, the second military character in our revolutionary war, sprang from one of the first planters of Providence.

Ming searches through the family kitchen for supplies. Winnie left them overstocked with canned and dried goods, but the Chao men don't buy groceries. The fridge is stuffed with take-out containers. While Katherine pretends to catch up on emails from work, Ming digs out from the piled-up counter a sprouting yellow onion and some aged potatoes. He dices the onion, and, after digging the eyes out of the potatoes, he cubes them. He watches Katherine's reflection in the picture window. She studies his wiry hands moving with confidence from knife to bowl to pan handle. (At home, he won't use the wok.) He cracks some eggs deftly, showing off his dexterousness perhaps, and makes a savory Spanish omelet. Dagou isn't the only talented cook among the Chao brothers. The aging cabbage and the carrots from the fridge become, with a few flicks of magic, a salad, dressed with sesame oil and sweetened rice vinegar, sprinkled with sesame seeds. Ming and Katherine sit down at the cluttered kitchen table and eat together, not talking. Although doubtless Katherine would've preferred something "more authentic"----fried rice with eggs, green onions instead of yellow, and stir-fried cabbage instead of salad---the dinner leaves her curiously softened.

And these were just the main-stem dams. As they were going up, the Columbia tributaries were also being chinked full of dams. Libby Dam on the Kootenai River. Albeni Falls and Boundary dams on the Pend Oreille. Cabinet Gorge and Noxon Rapids dams on the Clark Fork. Kerr and Hungry Horse on the Flathead. Chandler and Roza dams on the Yakima. Ice Harbor Dam, Lower Monumental Dam, Little Goose Dam, Lower Granite Dam, Oxbow Dam, Hells Canyon Dam, Brownlee Dam, and Palisades Dam on the Snake. Dworshak Dam on the North Fork of the Clearwater. Anderson Ranch Dam on the South Fork of the Boise. Pelton and Round Butte dams on the Deschutes. Big Cliff, Foster, Green Peter, and Detroit dams on the three forks of the Santiam River. Cougar Dam on the South Fork of the McKenzie. Dexter, Lookout Point, and Hills Creek dams on the Willamette. Merwin Dam, Yale Dam, and Swift Dam on the Lewis River. Layfield and Mossyrock dams on the Cowlitz. Thirty-six great dams on one river and its tributaries—a dam a year. The Age of Dams.

So would you protect me if I were in harms way?” She knew Cal’s answer before he even spoke it. The stern look that he had fixed on her revealed it plainly. “Yes.” Tamera uncrossed her legs, and stood up from the table. She stepped down from the bench onto the ground, and walked up close to Cal. “Your question wasn’t exactly asked right before,” she told him. “What question?” Cal asked perplexed. “You know. What do I want out of life?” “Oh. How would you have asked it then?” “I would have asked… what are your aspirations.” “Okay then. What are your aspirations?” “Well, a family is among them. I don’t want to be single forever.” “So what are you waiting for?” “The same thing that you are, Cal.” “The right person.” “Exactly it.” “I think I’ve already found that.” “Really? So what’s the hold up?” “I live on the edge… and… I don’t know how comfortable that view would be for someone else.” “So is there a someone in particular that you have in mind?” “Yes.” “Well, I can’t speak for everyone, but as someone, I can tell you that I don’t mind heights.” Cal reached up and gently caressed the side of Tamera’s face. Excuse barriers had been removed, there was nothing else to hold him back, and the green light got the go that it was designed to get. Cal leaned down to his compatible crush, and gave her a kiss that heated up the night.