Diploma Memories Quotes

Why is it we want so badly to memorialize ourselves? Even while we're still alive. We wish to assert our existence, like dogs peeing on fire hydrants. We put on display our framed photographs, our parchment diplomas, our silver-plated cups; we monogram our linen, we carve our names on trees, we scrawl them on washroom walls. It's all the same impulse. What do we hope from it? Applause, envy, respect? Or simply attention, of any kind we can get? At the very least we want a witness. We can't stand the idea of our own voices falling silent finally, like a radio running down.

Before I had a car, I had feet. Before I had a telephone, I had prayer. Before I had a degree, I had commonsense. Before I had a diploma, I had curiosity. Before I had knowledge, I had an opinion. Before I had a reputation, I had a character. Before I had a bodyguard, I had a friend. Before I had a wife, I had a mother. Before I had a son, I had a father. Before I had a body, I had a mind. Before I had a brain, I had a soul. Before I had a memory, I had an experience. Before I had a lifetime, I had a moment.

Why is it we want so badly to memorialize ourselves? Even while we’re still alive. We wish to assert our existence, like dogs peeing on fire hydrants. We put on display our framed photographs, our parchment diplomas, our silver-plated cups; we monogram our linen, we carve our names on trees, we scrawl them on washroom walls. It’s all the same impulse. What do we hope from it? Applause, envy, respect? Or simply attention, of any kind we can get?

Why is it we want so badly to memorialize ourselves? Even while we’re still alive. We wish to assert our existence, like dogs peeing on fire hydrants. We put on display our framed photographs, our parchment diplomas, our silver-plated cups; we monogram our linen, we carve our names on trees, we scrawl them on washroom walls. It’s all the same impulse. What do we hope from it? Applause, envy, respect? Or simply attention, of any kind we can get? At the very least we want a witness.

Os conteúdos do inconsciente podiam, às vezes, fazer-me passar das marcas. Mas a família e o conhecimento - tenho um diploma de médico, tenho de ajudar os meus doentes, tenho mulher e cinco filhos e moro na SeetraBe, 228, em Kusnacht - eram circunstâncias factuais que me colocavam exigências. Elas demostravam-me dia após dia que eu existia realmente e não era apenas uma folha revolvida por um vento do espírito como Nietzsche. Nietzsche perdera o chão debaixo dos pés porque não possuía senão o mundo interior das suas ideais - que, aliás, o possuía mais do que ele o possuía.

recounted an early childhood memory of sitting on my grandfather’s shoulders and waving a tiny American flag in a crowd gathered to greet the astronauts from one of the Apollo space missions after a successful splashdown in the waters off Hawaii. And now, more than forty years later, I told the graduates, I’d just had a chance to watch my own daughters hear from a new generation of space explorers. It had caused me to reflect on all that America had achieved since my own childhood; it offered a case of life coming full circle—and proof, just as their diplomas were proof, just as my having been elected president was proof, that the American idea endures. The students and their parents had cheered, many of them waving American flags of their own. I thought about the country I’d just described to them—a hopeful, generous, courageous America, an America that was open to everyone. At about the same age as the graduates were now, I’d seized on that idea and clung to it for dear life. For their sake more than mine, I badly wanted it to be true.

When I came to Bucharest, I knew the reason why, yet I could not foresee the manifold hardships ahead of me. I wanted to get in touch with the family and also finish the studies at the university and finally get a diploma in languages and literature. However, nothing could be accomplished if I could not make a living. All three challenges were hard to fulfill. I did them all, but with an enormous effort.

When Scott got home that night and realized what had happened, he rushed to check if the plastic container in his room—the one stuffed with photographs, diplomas, and memories, hard evidence that he had once been someone else—was still there. It was. They had taken the bed but left the box. It felt like a