Exit My Life Quotes

I don't get scared very often," he said finally. "I was scared the first morning I woke up and you weren't here. I was scared when you left me after Vegas. I was scared when I thought I was going to have to tell my dad that Trent had died in that building. But when I saw you across the flames in the basement...I was terrified. I made it to the door, was a few feet from the exit, and I couldn't leave. "What do you mean? Are you crazy?" I said, my head jerking up to look into his eyes. "I've never been so clear about anything in my life. I turned around, made my way to that room you were in, and there you were. Nothing else mattered. I didn't even know if we would make it out or not, I just wanted to be where you were, whatever that meant. The only thing I'm afraid of is a life without you, Pigeon." I leaned up, kissing his lips tenderly. When our mouths parted, I smiled. "Then you have nothing to be afraid of. We're forever.

It was with some surprise that I saw that the person waiting for me at the airport's exit was Adrian. A grin spread over my face, and I picked up the pace. I threw my arms around him, astonishing both of us. "I have never been happier to see you in my life," I said. He squeezed me tightly and then let me go, regarding me admiringly. "The dreams never do justice to real life, little dhampir. You look amazing." "And you look . . ." I studied him. He was dressed as nicely as always. His dark brown hair had that crafted messiness he liked, but his face—ah, well. As I'd noted before, Simon had gotten a few good punches on him. One of Adrian's eyes was swollen and ringed with bruises. Nonetheless, thinking about him and everything he'd done . . . Well, none of the flaws mattered. " . . . Gorgeous." "Liar," he said. "Couldn't Lissa have healed that black eye away?" "It's a badge of honor. Makes me seem manly.

INEZ: Prove it. Prove it was no dream. It’s what one does, and nothing else, that shows the stuff one's made of. GARCIN: I died too soon. I wasn't allowed time to - to do my deeds. INEZ: One always dies too soon - or too late. And yet one's whole life is complete at that moment, with a line drawn neatly under it, ready for the summing up. You are - your life, and nothing else.

There is a story I always tell my students...when I came for the 1st time to the US. I didn’t speak English (Only Spanish) & I saw on every door the word “exit” which in Spanish means Success = Exito. And then I said :”No wonder Americans are winners ,every door they open leads to success

But the thing is, my slate will never be swiped clean--this will never fade into the background and become some sort of learning experience or bump in the road. The shit that happened in my life and this book is real. And because I finally woke up to that whole realization much too late--the realization that life really happens and there is always a consequence for your actions--I lost everything in some sense, but in a weird kind of great way, if you flip it all around, I may have gained the most important thing of all: the truth. I can live with that.

I just wasn't anticipating Goblin assassins with crossbows pushing me into a situation where the only viable exit involved riding a mermaid's wheelchair into the marina. Sometimes I think my life is too complicated.

When I learned the Spanish word for succeed, I thought it was kind of ironic that the word exit is embedded in it. Like the universe was telling me that in order for me to make something of this life, I'd have to leave home, my neighbourhood, my friends.

I enter my life the way words entered me— by falling through the silence of this wide open mouth

This is what people who have never wanted to die don’t understand: the worst thing for those of us who do is feeling like we have to live when we don’t want to. That we have to be when we don’t want to, exist where we don’t want to. What we want is nothingness, numbness, because that has to be better than the life of quiet desperation we’re living. Mara’s hand is in my hair as I lean my head back against the cracked leather seat, eyes closed, mind ruminating. The others…they weren’t missing what I’m missing, is the thing. They didn’t exist because they had no other choice. They didn’t see the world through a lens in which every scene contains a door marked exit, a door I’m forever unable to open. They lived because they wanted to. Until the end, when something, or someone, made them stop wanting. And I need to find out what.

I’m one of those introverts with well-honed social skills, and I have even danced on the occasional table, but I have felt sheer panic when my exhaustion precedes my exit. It’s like the Cinderella story with a twist: I want to get out of there and into my duds before midnight—or ten, or eight.

So that’s how you do it, I thought while exiting my little office. You get on with life by facing it.

I’ll tell you how we’re wrong enough to be forgiven. How one night, after backhanding mother, then taking a chain saw to the kitchen table, my father went to kneel in the bathroom until we heard his muffled cries through the walls. & so I learned—that a man in climax was the closest thing to surrender.

My life felt so cluttered and obstructed that I could hardly breathe. I inhabited a closed, concentrated world, airless and without exits.

You try so hard to be good at things you don’t actually want to do. You never ask yourself if maybe you should just stop doing them.

Our life is our prayer. It’s our gift to this universe, and the memories we leave behind when we someday exit this world will be our legacy to our loved ones.

Students exit history textbooks without having developed the ability to think coherently about social life. Even

The mirror's light sparks in the eyes, And horrified, my lids drawn tight, I step back to that realm of night Where not a single exit lies... (Untitled: "I pass away this life of mine...")

I've never met any of these women before, and I will never see any of them after today. I don't know their names and they don't know mine. I've been on teams and in clubs my whole life, surrounded by people who are united by a common purpose, and I have never felt anything like this. Maybe it's the gas, but until this moment, I have never felt such a kinship with a person who was not actually family. I love every person in this room, and I'm pretty sure that if they asked, I'd do anything for them. Anything, except have a baby.

no was a bad word in my hone no was met with the lash erased from our vocabulary beaten out of our backs till we became well-behaved kids who obediently nodded to yes to everything when he climbed on top of me every part of my body wanted to reject it but i couldn't say no to save my life when i tried to scream all that escaped me was silence i heard no pounding her fist on the roof of my mouth begging to let her out but i had not put up the exit sign never built the emergency staircase there was no trapdoor for no to escape from i want to ask all the parents and guardians a question what use was obedience then when there were hands that were not mine inside me - how can i verbalize consent as an adult if i was never taught to as a child

The whole world seemed a maze of shifting mirrors in which I wandered alone, looking always and frenziedly for the exit back into my real life, where people had substance, did as they said they would, and were whole.

Someone has already taken out a Minolta cellular phone and called for a car, and then, when I'm not really listening, watching instead someone who looks remarkably like Marcus Halberstam paying a check, someone asks, simply, not in relation to anything, "Why? " and though I'm very proud that I have cold blood and that I can keep my nerve and do what I'm supposed to do, I catch something, then realize it: Why? and automatically answering, out of the blue, for no reason, just opening my mouth, words coming out, summarizing for the idiots: "Well, though I know I should have done that instead of not doing it, I'm twenty-seven for Christ sakes and this is, uh, how life presents itself in a bar or in a club in New York, maybe anywhere, at the end of the century and how people, you know, me, behave, and this is what being Pat rick means to me, I guess, so, well, yup, uh..." and this is followed by a sigh, then a slight shrug and another sigh, and above one of the doors covered by red velvet drapes in Harry's is a sign and on the sign in letters that match the drapes' color are the words THIS IS NOT AN EXIT.

It feels as though it were just yesterday Grandfather exited my life like a bullet, leaving a bleeding hole behind.

yes, my life is riddled by clichés, but do you know what a cliché is? It’s a story so fine and thrilling that it’s grown old in its hopeful retelling.

The story that you wanted to write will never be pen down that way, The chapters of incidences will variate, The entrance and exit of characters will alter, The starting of pages might be different, The ending of pages might be unclear, The attractive introduction, The charming ending, Considering the facts in your mind, Concluding with ideas in your heart, The end product will be something else, The same goes with your life, This person is going to be my lover, friend, helper, and well-wisher, or in case some of you decide an enemy, We’re breathing humans, Our thoughts, our minds, our hearts, and our souls, everything works according to our moods, likes, dislikes, etc., There’s a problem with us, There’s a fault in ourselves, When we think that they’ll be there for us, No, they wouldn’t be, Why should they be? They have a different story to live, It’s not their duty to make your story happening, So be delighted with your tale, And enjoy whatever comes your way.

It's just that I've never seen you care about anything in your life.' I zip my fly. And Michael goes, "I mean, I've watched you spend your while life not feeling bad about anything you're ever done.

Porcelain Heart I have grown into me I have become And I have swapped my pain for compassion My hurt for healing And my wounds for wisdom So I thank you To all those that demolished who I was So I could finally become And find the strongest parts of me Breaking the shell From the weaknesses of all those so cocooned in their unease

That night, lying beside her, I remembered how when I was a child I would slip my cold feet between my mother’s thighs to warm them. How she’d shiver and whisper that she would always suffer to bring me comfort, that that was how you knew someone really loved you. I remembered the boots she’d broken in so that by the time I got them I could go on unbothered, without harm. Now, more than ever, I wished desperately for a way to transfer pain, wished I could prove to my mother just how much I loved her, that I could just crawl into her hospital cot and press my body close enough to absorb her burden. It seemed only fair that life should present such an opportunity to prove one’s filial piety. That the months my mother had been a vessel for me, her organs shifting and cramping together to make room for my existence, and the agony she’d endured upon my exit could be repaid by carrying this pain in her place. The rite of an only daughter. But I could do no more than lie nearby, ready to be her advocate, listening to the slow and steady beeping of machinery, the soft sounds of her breathing in and out.

They say all good things come to those who wait, and as I deplaned and began walking toward the exit, all I could think about was that I’d waited long enough. I’d been dying in a gray hell, longing for a taste of everything for as long as I could remember, and I would take a bite out of it all. I’d spent too many years of my life living vicariously through movies.

Over Christmas break, I took on additional hours and was working late one Saturday night when Wild Bill came sauntering into my department tipsy to pick me up so I wouldn’t have to hitchhike home. I had scarcely seen him since he enrolled me in school, except slumped over the bar at Dave’s or when he would occasionally drop by the Tampico unannounced on the way home to his new family. He’d beach himself on the sofa while I did my homework, and when he sobered up enough to drive home, he would down a can of beer before saying goodbye. To say it made me happy to see him, drunk and all, is an understatement. Seeing my father anywhere besides Dave’s Tavern was akin to spotting a unicorn in the wild. I asked him to meet me out in front of the store, but he insisted on following me through the employees’ exit. On the way out, he stole two poinsettias. He thought it was hilarious to be running out of the JCPenney’s with a poinsettia in each hand.

I have grown weary of talking about life as if it is deserved, or earned, or gifted, or wasted. I'm going to be honest about my scoreboard and just say that the math on me being here and the people who have kept me here doesn't add up when weighed against the person I've been and the person I can still be sometimes. But isn't that the entire point of gratitude? To have a relentless understanding of all the ways you could have vanished, but haven't? The possibilities for my exits have been endless, and so the gratitude for my staying must be equally endless. I am sorry that this one is not about movement, or history, or dance. But instead about stillness. About all of the frozen moments that I have been pulled back from, in service of attempting another day.

Hannah leaned forward and reached for the dial. The radio hissed, shrieked and blasted a few bars of Mozart before finally settling on Radiohead’s Exit Music (for a Film). Hannah, delighted with her discovery, smiled and slumped back in her seat. She listened to Thom Yorke’s nasally vocals in silence for a couple of verses before joining in. Singing heartily and drumming away on her knees, she was like a ball of energy, and already I felt this energy permeating my own body. I felt as fresh and as happy as I’d been in months. Radiohead ended and became The Stone Roses, who in turn became The Killers. Finally, when they became the hourly news, Hannah rolled her eyes and turned off the radio.

In idyllic small towns I sometimes see teenagers looking out of place in their garb of desperation, the leftover tatters and stains and slashes of the fashion of my youth. For this phase of their life, the underworld is their true home, and in the grit and underbelly of a city they could find something that approximates it. Even the internal clock of adolescents changes, making them nocturnal creatures for at least a few years. All through childhood you grow toward life and then in adolescence, at the height of life, you begin to grow toward death. This fatality is felt as an enlargement to be welcomed and embraced, for the young in this culture enter adulthood as a prison, and death reassures them that there are exits. “I have been half in love with easeful death,” said Keats who died at twenty-six and so were we, though the death we were in love with was only an idea then.

Well, for one," said Frances, "that's an extremely shitty thing to say to me. Two, the glamour passed a long time ago, and toy know very well that it did. And third, three, yes, my life is riddled by cliches, but do you know what a cliche is? It's a story so fine and thrilling that it's grown old in its hopeful retelling.

I just wish life was more like my books,” Fern complained [...] “Main characters never die in books. If they did, the story would be ruined, or over.” “Everybody is a main character to someone,” Bailey theorized, winding his way through the busy hall and out the nearest exit into the November afternoon. “There are no minor characters.

I have wanted to die enough times in my life to understand the idea that wanting to die is not a foolish thing... I don't mean to prop up the idea of wanting an exit, but for me, not to imagine it as a foolish means that I am, by default, tasked with taking it seriously. I can't life as I once did, telling people that I was doing fine and desperately wanting them to wade through the language and see that I was in pain.

Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.

My family had two settings: Everything Is Fine, and Screaming Fights with Lasting Damage.

Fortunately Stephen was a better navigator than he had been a driver – except on those occasions when he would spot an exit at the last minute and yell at me to cross four lanes immediately.

Yes, my life is riddled by clichés, but do you know what a cliche is? It’s a story so fine and thrilling that it’s grown old in it’s hopeful retelling. People tell it. Not so many live it. – Frances

You want to know the secret to ruining your life? It's never one big black-and-white decision. It's dozen's of little ones that you make every single day. It's excuses, in my case. Excuses are poison

You burn to have your photograph in a tennis magazine.” “I’m afraid so.” “Why again exactly, now?” “I guess to be felt about as I feel about those players with their pictures in magazines.” “Why?” “Why? I guess to give my life some sort of meaning, Lyle.” “And how would this do this again?” “Lyle, I don’t know. I do not know. It just does. Would. Why else would I burn like this, clip secret pictures, not take risks, not sleep or pee?” “You feel these men with their photographs in magazines care deeply about having their photographs in magazines. Derive immense meaning.” “I do. They must. I would. Else why would I burn like this to feel as they feel?” “The meaning they feel, you mean. From the fame.” “Lyle, don’t they?” “LaMont, perhaps they did at first. The first photograph, the first magazine, the gratified surge, the seeing themselves as others see them, the hagiography of image, perhaps. Perhaps the first time: enjoyment. After that, do you trust me, trust me: they do not feel what you burn for. After the first surge, they care only that their photographs seem awkward or unflattering, or untrue, or that their privacy, this thing you burn to escape, what they call their privacy is being violated. Something changes. After the first photograph has been in a magazine, the famous men do not enjoy their photographs in magazines so much as they fear that their photographs will cease to appear in magazines. They are trapped, just as you are.” “Is this supposed to be good news? This is awful news.” “LaMont, are you willing to listen to a Remark about what is true?” “Okey-dokey.” “The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you.” “Maybe I ought to be getting back.” “LaMont, the world is very old. You have been snared by something untrue. You are deluded. But this is good news. You have been snared by the delusion that envy has a reciprocal. You assume that there is a flip-side to your painful envy of Michael Chang: namely Michael Chang’s enjoyable feeling of being-envied-by-LaMont-Chu. No such animal.” “Animal?” “You burn with hunger for food that does not exist.” “This is good news?” “It is the truth. To be envied, admired, is not a feeling. Nor is fame a feeling. There are feelings associated with fame, but few of them are any more enjoyable than the feelings associated with envy of fame.” “The burning doesn’t go away?” “What fire dies when you feed it? It is not fame itself they wish to deny you here. Trust them. There is much fear in fame. Terrible and heavy fear to be pulled and held, carried. Perhaps they want only to keep it off you until you weigh enough to pull toward yourself.” “Would I sound ungrateful if I said this doesn’t make me feel very much better at all?” “LaMont, the truth is that the world is incredibly, incredibly, unbelievably old. You suffer with the stunted desire caused by one of its oldest lies. Do not believe the photographs. Fame is not the exit from any cage.” “So I’m stuck in the cage from either side. Fame or tortured envy of fame. There’s no way out.” “You might consider how escape from a cage must surely require, foremost, awareness of the fact of the cage.

Our life is our prayer. It’s our gift to this universe, and the memories we leave behind when we someday exit this world will be our legacy to our loved ones. We owe it to ourselves and to everyone around us to be happy and to spread that joy around.

That's how this world works. To get a lot, you have to at least give a little. You have to make a concentrated effort to let it be known that you'll do whatever it takes to get ahead." Pause. My father takes a drink from his beer while I stare at him. Smirking, continuing, he says, "Once you accept this fact of life, you'll be able to do whatever you want to do and have anything you want to have.

creating a plan, writing that shit down, being a good person, asking lots of questions, learning from my mistakes, surrounding myself with great people, exiting relationships that no longer aligned with me, taking care of my body and my relationships, and working my fucking ass off.

The first time she had tried to kill herself, she had intuited that there was no escape. She had seen, with sudden clarity, that her life was a series of boxes, a maze that she would run and run through and never find an exit, and she thought, almost peacefully, I don't want it. I don't want my life.

Well, for one," said Frances, "that's an extremely shitty thing to say to me. Two, the glamour passed a long time ago, and you know very well that it did. And third, three, yes, my life is riddled by cliches, but do you know what a cliche is? It's a story so fine and thrilling that it's grown old in its hopeful retelling.

My life is a stage without a curtain or an exit

You’re not gonna believe what just happened to me,” Jase says the minute I flip my cell open, taking advantage of break at the B&T. I turn away from the picture window just in case Mr. Lennox, disregarding the break sign, will come dashing out to slap me with my first-ever demerit. “Try me.” His voice lowers. “You know how I put that lock on the door of my room? Well, Dad noticed it. Apparently. So today, I’m stocking the lawn section and he comes up and asks why it’s there.” “Uh-oh.” I catch the attention of a kid sneaking into the hot tub (there’s a strict no-one-under-sixteen policy) and shake my head sternly. He slinks away. Must be my impressive uniform. “So I say I need privacy sometimes and sometimes you and I are hanging out and we don’t want to be interrupted ten million times.” “Good answer.” “Right. I think this is going to be the end of it. But then he tells me he needs me in the back room to have a ‘talk.’” “Uh-oh again.” Jase starts to laugh. “I follow him back and he sits me down and asks if I’m being responsible. Um. With you.” Moving back into the shade of the bushes, I turn even further away from the possible gaze of Mr. Lennox. “Oh God.” “I say yeah, we’ve got it handled, it’s fine. But, seriously? I can’t believe he’s asking me this. I mean, Samantha. Jesus. My parents? Hard not to know the facts of life and all in this house. So I tell him that we’re moving slowly and—” “You told him that?” God, Jase! How am I ever going to look Mr. Garret in the eye again? Help. “He’s my dad, Samantha. Yeah. Not that I didn’t want to exit the conversation right away, but still . . .” “So what happened then?” “Well, I reminded him they’d covered that really thoroughly in school, not to mention at home, and we weren’t irresponsible people.” I close my eyes, trying to imagine having this conversation with my mother. Inconceivable. No pun intended. “So then . . . he goes on about”—Jase’s voice drops even lower—“um . . . being considerate and um . . . mutual pleasure.” “Oh my god! I would’ve died. What did you say?” I ask, wanting to know even while I’m completely distracted by the thought. Mutual pleasure, huh? What do I know about giving that? What if Shoplifting Lindy had tricks up her sleeve I know nothing about? It’s not like I can ask Mom. “State senator suffers heart attack during conversation with daughter.” “I said ‘Yes sir’ a lot. And he went on and on and on and all I could think was that any minute Tim was gonna come in and hear my dad saying things like, ‘Your mom and I find that . . . blah blah blah.’” I can’t stop laughing. “He didn’t. He did not mention your mother.” “I know!” Jase is laughing too. “I mean . . . you know how close I am to my parents, but . . . Jesus.

What do think about abortion?” “I could feel the tension growing in the plane. I dropped my head, acknowledging that we had very different value systems for our lives. Then I thought of a way to respond to his question. “You’re Jewish, right?” I asked. “Yes,” he said defensively. “I told you I was!” “Do you know how Hitler persuaded the German people to destroy more than six million of your Jewish ancestors?” The man looked at me expectantly, so I continued. ”He convinced them that Jews were not human and then exterminated your people like rats.” I could see that I had his attention, so I went on. “Do you understand how Americans enslaved, tortured, and killed millions of Africans? We dehumanized them so our constitution didn’t apply to them, and then we treated them worse than animals.” “How about the Native Americans?” I pressed. “Do you have any idea how we managed to hunt Indians like wild animals, drive them out of their own land, burn their villages, rape their women, and slaughter their children? Do you have any clue how everyday people turned into cruel murderers?” My Jewish friend was silent, and his eyes were filling with tears as I made my point. “We made people believe that the Native Americans were wild savages, not real human beings, and then we brutalized them without any conviction of wrongdoing! Now do you understand how we have persuaded mothers to kill their own babies? We took the word fetus, which is the Latin word for ‘offspring,’ and redefined it to dehumanize the unborn. We told mothers, ‘That is not really a baby you are carrying in your belly; it is a fetus, tissue that suddenly forms into a human being just seconds before it exits the womb.’ In doing so, we were able to assert that, in the issue of abortion, there is only one person’s human rights to consider, and then we convinced mothers that disposing of fetal tissue (terminating the life of their babies) was a woman’s right. Our constitution no longer protects the unborn because they are not real people. They are just lifeless blobs of tissue.” By now, tears were flowing down his cheeks. I looked right into his eyes and said, “Your people, the Native Americans, and the African Americans should be the greatest defenders of the unborn on the planet. After all, you know what it’s like for society to redefine you so that they can destroy your races. But ironically, your races have the highest abortion rates in this country! Somebody is still trying to exterminate your people, and you don’t even realize it. The names have changed, but the plot remains the same!” Finally he couldn’t handle it anymore. He blurted out, “I have never heard anything like this before. I am hanging out with the wrong people. I have been deceived!

And then there was me, sitting across from them, with my fake name and life built inside my organization. I was an uneducated preacher posing as an English teacher, my presence here not what I claimed it was. I was out to change the course of other people’s lives, and their children’s lives, and their children’s children’s lives. I somehow had the effrontery to try to alter the course of their history, to urge these people to make over their lives into the shape of mine, when I had never even considered how my own life had come to look as it did.

Was I a good person? The righteous war of black versus white, right or wrong, good against bad, had given meaning to my life. It was comfortable to know that everyone was wrong and you were right. I had known who I was by which side I was on, but there are not only two sides there are thousands of dimensions to things. Living in uncertainty is humbling and terrifying. Uncertainty is pain.

I have wanted to die enough times in my life to understand the idea that wanting to die is not a foolish thing... I don't mean to prop up the idea of wanting an exit, but for me, not to imagine it as foolish means that I am, by default, tasked with taking it seriously. I can't live as I once did, telling people that I was doing fine and desperately wanting them to wade through the language and see that I was in pain.

I have wanted to die enough times in my life to understand the idea that wanting to die is not a foolish thing... I don't mean to prop up the idea of wanting an exit, but for me, not to imagine it as a foolish means that I am, by default, tasked with taking it seriously. I can't live as I once did, telling people that I was doing fine and desperately wanting them to wade through the language and see that I was in pain.

The day you were born was the happiest day of my life, but I was so nervous that I don’t know if happiness is really the best word to describe what I felt. I think it is my obligation to tell you, in spite of the absolute love I have always felt for you, in spite of how much you have brightened my life, and I assume your mother’s as well—I haven’t seen her in around ten years now, but I’m sure that for her as well you have been a constant source of happiness—in spite of all that, I have to tell you that during the eighteen years you’ve now been alive, I’ve never stopped wondering what my life would have been like if you had never been born. It’s an overwhelming thought, an exit that leads to the darkest of nights, to the most complete blackness, but also to shadow and sometimes, slowly, toward something like a clearing in the woods. These fantasies are normal, but it’s not so common for parents to confess them. For example, over the years I have thought thousands of times that if you hadn’t been born I would have needed less money, or could have disappeared for weeks on end without worrying about anyone. I could have prolonged my youth for several more years. I could have even killed myself. I mean, the first consequence of your birth was that from then on, I could never kill myself.

I am, for certain, a powerful force. I've stood outside on a winter day, for years an unending winter, without batting an eye. While you... even when you go out on a sunny day, you bring a sweater just in case. You can never be on the outskirts, you can never be in the cold, you can never be at the losing end. You need your blankets. You make me think twice about what it means to be a protector; you protected me so well only because I was beside you. It wasn't about me. It was still about you. But I have learned... that even in the winter the summer lasts within me. Flowers grow and sunbeams exit the palms of my hands. And that I can grow feathers and lots of fur.

We Close In Fifteen Minutes by Stewart Stafford Found myself the only taker, Of a minefield guided tour, Through no man's land life, Every exit is now invisible. Stardom magnified my flaws, A broken man lost in a maze, A deadly structure's hostage, A hermit in denial's labyrinth. Glimpse dwindling fragments, In the looking glass of hubris, Flounder in glossy quicksand, The solutions devoured whole. © Stewart Stafford, 2023. All rights reserved.

I look back at the thousands of days through which I have lived, and feel awed by their inconsequentiality. My life resembles the writing in my diary (or perhaps it’s the other way around): the days, like the sentences, each making a kind of superficial sense of their own, but in the context of the surrounding sentences and days, creating not a narrative or a meaning, but the very opposite: a riddle without solutions, a labyrinth without exits. A chaos.

Here is how I got every single one of those jobs: I sat across a desk from a man old enough to be my father and I enveloped us both in a force field of earnest competence, the kind I’d been practicing since kindergarten with my hand permanently raised in class, the kind that says I will die before I let you down, and at some point in each of these interviews the man pronounced me “impressive” and gave me a job and the prophecy came true. I never let him down.

Since you exited from my life story, it seems as if time stands still, and my soul has become trapped in that very moment. It's like a coiled spring that can extend and stretch, but ultimately, it always returns to its original shape—back to that frozen moment in time.

I long to stretch out on the sofa, wrapping myself in the red quilt that's lying there. Then, with a stab, I recognize the quilt. My father had brought it back from a business trip he took to New England long ago. Ironic, how objects remain in your life long after people have exited.

I think it's important to have clearly defined goals in life, don't you? Especially if you don't have a lot of life left. Because if you don't have clear goals, you might run out of time, and when the day comes, you'll find yourself standing on the parapet of a tall building, or sitting on your bed with a bottle of pills in your hand, thinking, Shit! I blew it. If only I'd set clearer goals for myself! I'm telling you this because I'm actually not going to be around for long, and you might as well know this up front so you don't make assumptions. Assumptions suck. They're like expectations. Assumptions and expectations will kill any relationship, so let's you and me not go there, okay? The truth is that very soon I'm going to graduate from time, or maybe I shouldn't say graduate because that makes it sound as if I've actually met my goals and deserve to move on, when the fact is that I just turned sixteen and I've accomplished nothing at all. Zilch. Nada. Do I sound pathetic? I don't mean to. I just want to be accurate. Maybe instead of graduate, I should say I'm going to drop out of time. Drop out. Exit my existence. I'm counting the moments.

I never fail, because I never take on anything I’m truly unsure I can handle; even when it looks as if I were stretching myself, I keep a secret 10 percent in reserve. So if I take this job and I blow it, will it mean I destroyed myself out of hubris, and deserve whatever misery comes my way?

Simple remedies for dire situations, that’s the lesson. In a falling elevator, try to climb up on the person nearby so their body will cushion your landing. Or in a crowded theater when everybody’s hightailing it for the fire exit, stick your elbows hard into the ribs of your neighbors to wedge yourself in, then pick up your feet so you won’t get trampled. That is how people frequently lose their lives in a riot: somebody steps on your heel, then walks right up till you’re flat and they’re standing on you. That’s what you get for trying to stand on your own two feet—you end up getting crushed! So that’s my advice. Let others do the pushing and shoving, and you just ride along. In the end, the neck you save will be your own. Perhaps I sound un-Christian, but let’s face it, when I step outside my own little world at night and listen to the sounds out there in the dark, what I feel down in my bones is that this is not a Christian kind of place. This is darkest Africa, where life roars by you like a flood and you grab whatever looks like it will hold you up. If you ask me, that’s how it is and ever shall be. You stick out your elbows, and hold yourself up.

I had never thought of my influence on other people before, how all the work I was doing might pave the way for the next generations, as others had paved the way for me. But I saw it now, and it inspired me. it made me happy and it awed me and of course it made me really want to get back out there and play my game. It's interesting. Before all this happened I was thinking only about the finish line. How it would end, how I would make my exit. But I don't think about that anymore. Now I only think about playing. As long as I can. as hard as I can. Until they take down the nets. Until they burn my rackets. Until they stop me. And I want to see them try.

I am always amused by those couples- lovers and spouses- who perform and ask others to perform musical chairs whenever they, by random seat selection, are separated from each other. 'Can you switch seats with me?' A woman asked me. 'So I can sit with my husband?' She wanted me, a big man, who always books early, and will gratefully pay extra for the exit row, to trade my aisle seat for her middle seat. By asking me to change my location for hers, the woman is actually saying to me: 'Dear stranger, dear Sir, my comfort is more important than yours. Dear solitary traveler, my love and fear- as contained within my marriage- are larger than yours.' O, the insult! O, the condescension! And this is not an isolated incident. I've been asked to trade seats twenty or thirty times over the years. How dare you! How dare you ask me to change my life for you! How imperial! How colonial! But, ah, here is the strange truth: whenever I'm asked to trade seats for somebody else's love, I do, I always do.

In the ebb and flow of my life, in years gone by, in moments now, in currents, undertows that almost did me in, someone was there, never let me go. I bathe myself in this love. Because of it I did not get lost in crossroads, curves of the years gone by. No dead-end streets, always an exit! How lucky I am—someone loves me! -Inward Journey

And then we line up to exit the plane, into a place that has defined my whole life. I’m hit with a wave of emotions as we enter the airport. The thing that hits me hardest is that everyone looks like me, and I realize I’ve never had that experience. I’ve always stood out because of my brownness, but here I blend in. It feels strange, and safe.

I start to worry I’ve become the thing Calista once warned me about: someone who wants a promotion too much. “They can smell it on you, and if they can smell it, they won’t give it to you,” she said. “It’s not fair, but it’s true.” I need to pretend that external recognition is just a cute little extra bonus and that consistently delivering world-changing greatness for Amazon’s benefit is its own intrinsic reward. But everyone I know here is trying to get promoted. True, most of us grew up as hyper-achievers. Amazon didn’t create our yearning for recognition, but it exploits it for maximum return by holding the rat pellet just out of reach and then frowning on any rat who looks hungry.

Alec jumped to his feet and exited my apartment shouting, “At least think about it,” as he ran. “I’ve never seen him move so fast in my life.” Nico snickered. “It’s like he caught a glimpse of the Magic Mike cast and took off after them.” I burst into unexpected laughter and laughed so hard I thought a little pee came out. “I. Love. Your. Brothers.

Exit our Miss Mel. Exit Friend Tim. When I glanced over my shoulder, Max Friedlander had disappeared—a remarkable feat, considering that there was nowhere on that side of the hole for him to go except into the Chronicle building. But he can’t have gone in there. His soul would have been ripped instantly from his body while demons sucked out his life force.

i bring my kiasu friend to the airport leavings are never easy, not for long and though we both saw blur along the way memories flooded present tensions. in the curry of his life no lemak remained so now the predictable exit signalled the end of his roundings, his bombings– he can bluff like hell, ma, he got style– and left me thinking about home, my kampong.

Three postcards await our perusal, yea, three visions of a world. One: I see a theme park where there are lots of rides, but there is nobody who can control them and nobody who knows how the rides end. Grief counseling, however, is included in the price of admission. Two: I see an accident. An explosion of some kind inhabited by happenstantial life forms. A milk spill gone bacterial, only with more flame. It has no meaning or purpose or master. It simply is. Three: I see a stage, a world where every scene is crafted. Where men act out their lives within a tapestry, where meaning and beauty exist, where right and wrong are more than imagined constructs. There is evil. There is darkness. There is the Winter of tragedy, every life ending, churned back into the soil. But the tragedy leads to Spring. The story does not end in frozen death. The fields are sown in grief. The harvest will be reaped in joy. I see a Master's painting. I listen to a Master's prose. When darkness falls on me, when I stand on my corner of the stage and hear my cue, when I know my final scene has come and I must exit, I will go into the ground like corn, waiting for the Son.

After he'd gone, I slammed the door shut and, after the day I had, wasn't the least bit surprised to see my closet door open and Whitley stick his head out. "Son of hibachi," I muttered. Now I would have to add burning all of my clothes to my list of things to do. "What?" He exited the closet with a smile. "I don't even get a hello?" I held up a finger. "Wait right here." He shrugged. I shut the door behind me and marched back into the living room and pointed at Dr. Wendell. "You. Come with me. Now." Wide-eyed, he rose from the couch and followed me to my door. Before I opened it, I turned to him. "You said part of your job was to protect me, right?" He nodded, his brow knit in lines of confusion. "Just to prove how bad you suck at your job, look at this." I swung open the door and Whitley waved from his perch at the end of my bed. Dr. Wendell's mouth dropped and he took a step back. "Wait. What is-who is that?" "That"-I gestured to the boy on my bed-"is Whitley, aka Zeami, aka the psycho who tried to kill me, steal my powers, and burnt down my house." Whitley smiled. "Guilty as charged." I folded my arms and glared at Dr. Wendell. "If you're supposedly protecting me, how could you let my past-life murderer walk right into my bedroom and hide out in my closet?" Dr. Wendell shook his head, his skin a shade paler than it had been moments ago. "But I-I didn't-how-" He looked at Whitley. "How did you get in here?" Whitley rolled his eyes. "Through the door. Duh." Dr. Wendell pushed me behind him, bringing his shaking fists in front of his face. "It doesn't matter. If you want to kill Rileigh, you're going to have to get past me.

From insomnia and as a result of the intense struggle against mounting weakness, something strange is happening to me. In the midst of a lecture, tears suddenly choke me, my eyes begin to itch, and I feel a passionate, hysterical desire to stretch my arms out and complain loudly. I want to cry in a loud voice that fate has sentenced me, a famous man, to capital punishment, and that in six months or so another man will be master of this auditorium. I want to cry out that I've been poisoned; new thoughts such as I have never known before have poisoned the last days of my life and go on stinging my brain like mosquitoes. And at such times my situation seems so terrible that I want all my listeners to be horrified, to jump up from their seats and, in panic fear, rush for the exit with a desperate cry. It is not easy to live through such moments.

there are two aspects to feminism. The first is individualism, which is that I get to shape my own life. That I don’t have to fit into a stereotype, doing what my mother tells me, conforming to someone else’s idea of what a woman is. But there’s a second aspect too, and here I want to use the old-fashioned word ‘sisterhood,’ which may make you groan a little and head for the exits in a stampede, but I’ll just have to take that chance.

Having now finished the work assigned me," Washington solemnly said, "I retire from the great theatre of Action....I here offer my Commission, and take leave of all the enjoyments of public life." The man who had known how to stay the course now showed that he also understood how to leave it. Horses were waiting at the door immediately after Washington read his statement. The crowd gathered at the doorway to wave him off. It was the greatest exit in American history.

A pine cone cannot fall from a tree unless God is involved. A bumblebee cannot pollenate a flower or sting your arm apart from the will of God. Money cannot enter or exit your bank account apart from the sovereignty of God. Little Ernest cannot be born or be buried in that grave just a half-mile from my house apart from God’s will. Legislation cannot be passed in this country or in any other apart from God’s sovereignty. You hold this book in your hands because God sovereignly allows you to hold this book in your hands. Everything is under His sovereign rule. Some of us believe that God is a bit like the president. He has a lot of power and authority, but there are checks and balances to limit Him. He is limited by our human choices, the events of the future, the wrongs of the past, or by those who do not believe in Him. Some of His legislations could be vetoed. His popularity can ebb and flow. But God is not like that at all. There are no limits to His rule and power.

How you holding up, old man?” Daniel calls A.J. “old man” despite the fact that Daniel is five years older than A.J. “I’ve lost my fortune, and the doctor says I’m going to die, but other than that, I’m fantastic.” The sedative has given him perspective. “Great. Let’s get drinks.” Daniel turns to Nurse Jill and whispers something in her ear. When Daniel returns the book to her, A.J. can see that he has written his phone number. “Come, thou monarch of the vine!” Daniel says as he heads for the exit.

…for now I float in a sea of undifferentiated information and pray no one asks me something I should know, but don’t. That’s how I feel for weeks on end, actually, only I’m not floating on the water, I’ve been shot from a cannon to the bottom of the sea and have to make my way back to the surface, mostly unassisted, and weighted down by salt and seaweed, by figuring out which starfish and shells and old cannonballs I need, and how they fit together. It’s not that I’m being hazed, my coworkers are kind and helpful, but they are above the surface, so to reach one I have to stretch my arm up blindly and hope I’m grabbing at the right person, and that they have time to come hang with me under the sea. And even when they do, I can tell from their eyes that they don’t really have time. That every minute spent orienting me is one where something else might be blowing up, just out of sight. And Arjun is right, everyone here is operating on partial information, no one really knows what the fuck is going on.

There is nothing that the media could say to me that would justify the way they’ve acted. You can hound me. You can follow me, but in no way should you frighten those around me. To harm my wife and potentially harm my daughter—there is no excuse that could put any of you on the right side of morality. I met Rose when I was fifteen and she was fourteen, and through what she would call fate and I’d call circumstance of our hobbies, we’d cross paths dozens of times over the course of a decade. At seventeen, I attended the same national Model UN conference as Rose, and a delegate for Greenland locked us in a janitorial closet. He also stole our phones. He had to beat us dishonorably because he couldn’t beat us any other way. Rose said being locked in a confined space with me was the worst two hours of her life" They look bemused, brows furrowing. I can’t help but smile. “You’re confused because you don’t know whether she was exaggerating or whether she was being truthful. But the truth is that we are complex people with the ability to love to hate and to hate to love, and I wouldn’t trade her for any other person. So that day, stuck beside mops and dirtied towels, I could’ve picked the lock five minutes in and let her go. Instead, I purposefully spent two hours with a girl who wore passion like a dress made of diamonds and hair made of flames. Every day of my life, I am enamored. Every day of my life, I am bewitched. And every day of my life, I spend it with her.” My chest swells with more power, lifting me higher. “I’ve slept with many different kinds of people, and yes, the three that spoke to the press are among them. Rose is the only person I’ve ever loved, and through that love, we married and started a family. There is no other meaning behind this, and for you to conjure one is nothing less than a malicious attack against my marriage and my child. Anything else has no relevance. I can’t be what you need me to be. So you’ll have to accept this version or waste your time questioning something that has no answer. I know acceptance isn’t easy when you’re unsure of what you’re accepting, but all I can say is that you’re accepting me as me. I leave them with a quote from Sylvia Plath. “‘I took a deep breath and listened to the old brag of my heart.’” My lips pull higher, into a livelier smile. “‘I am, I am, I am.’” With this, I step away from the podium, and I exit to a cacophony of journalists shouting and asking me to clarify. Adapt to me. I’m satisfied, more than I even predicted. Some people will rewind this conference on their television, to listen closely and try to understand me. I don’t need their understanding, but my daughter will—and I hope the minds of her peers are wide open with vibrant hues of passion. I hope they all paint the world with color.

Suddenly my heart again goes bangety-bang, bangety-bangety-bang, as if I myself were about to exit life in a hurry. And if I could, I would spring up, switch on the light, dial someone and shout right down into the hard little receiver, “It’s okay. I got away. It was goddamned close, I’ll tell ya. It didn’t get me, though. I smelled its breath, saw its red eyes in the dark, shining. A clammy hand touched mine. But I made it. I survived. Wait for me. Wait for me. Not that much is left to do.” Only there’s no one. No one here or anywhere near to say any of this to. And I’m sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.

He looked up at Dana. Tears streamed down her face. No sounds escaped. The silence wrung his heart. He almost preferred sobs to this stoic display and that said something since a woman’s tears normally sent him scrambling to the closest exit. Jon sat with his back propped against a tree, pulled her close, and wrapped his arms around her. “What if they . . .” His arms tightened. “We’ll deal with it together.” “We?” “You aren’t alone anymore, baby. Never again. I’ll walk through every step of this with you. As long as you’ll allow me, we’re a team.” Dana pressed her head against his shoulder, her face against his neck. “I’m guessing you know about my history with Ross. That’s in the past, before you knew me. If Grace’s thugs assaulted me, would it . . .?” She lapsed into silence. “Affect how I feel about you?” he asked. She nodded. “Whatever they did shames them, Dana. You aren’t to blame for anything they might have done to you. People in this line of work are masters at their trade. Nothing will affect how much you mean to me or the role I hope you’ll play in my life from now on.” She sat up to look into his eyes. “What role?” Hope shined from her gaze. “A permanent one. When you’re safe and on U.S. soil, we’ll talk. I meant what I said. We’ll get through this together. I’ll stay beside you all the way.

One evening while at prayer, wrapped in those threads, I saw my entire life flash before me. This was not like my pretty dream; it was actually rather ugly. I saw my life as vitiated by pride, by the inordinate desire to be liked, loved, approved, applauded, and accepted . . . My motives were peeled away to reveal complete self-centred yuck. . . . Brother Dominique Voillaume saw my exit from the chapel and asked me what happened. So I told him, told him everything, about my disgust with my own motives and my thoughts of walking away from it all. In that moment he said a powerful thing, a life-changing thing: "You are on the threshold of receiving the greatest grace of your life. You are discovering what it means to be poor in spirit. Brother Brennan, it's okay not to be okay.

Worthy Andronicus, ill art thou repaid For that good hand thou sent’st the Emperor. Here are the heads of thy two noble sons, And here’s thy hand in scorn to thee sent back. Thy grief their sports! thy resolution mock'd, That woe is me to think upon thy woes More than remembrance of my father’s death. [Exit.] Marc. Now let hot Aetna cool in Sicily, And be my heart an ever-burning hell! These miseries are more than may be borne. To weep with them that weep doth ease some deal, But sorrow flouted at is double death. Luc. Ah, that this sight should make so deep a wound And yet detested life not shrink thereat! That ever death should let life bear his name, Where life hath no more interest but to breathe. [Lavinia kisses Titus.] Marc. Alas, poor heart, that kiss is comfortless As frozen water to a starvèd snake. Tit. When will this fearful slumber have an end? Marc. Now farewell, flatt’ry; die, Andronicus. Thou dost not slumber. See thy two sons’ heads, Thy warlike hand, thy mangled daughter here, Thy other banished son with this dear sight Struck pale and bloodless; and thy brother, I, Even like a stony image cold and numb. Ah, now no more will I control thy griefs. Rent off thy silver hair, thy other hand, Gnawing with thy teeth, and be this dismal sight The closing up of our most wretched eyes. Now is a time to storm. Why art thou still? Tit. Ha, ha, ha! Marc. Why dost thou laugh? It fits not with this hour. Tit. Why, I have not another tear to shed. Besides, this sorrow is an enemy And would usurp upon my wat’ry eyes And make them blind with tributary tears. Then which way shall I find Revenge’s cave? For these two heads do seem to speak to me And threat me I shall never come to bliss Till all these mischiefs be returned again Even in their throats that hath committed them. Come, let me see what task I have to do. You heavy people, circle me about That I may turn me to each one of you And swear unto my soul to right your wrongs. The vow is made. Come, brother, take a head, And in this hand the other will I bear. And, Lavinia, thou shalt be employed in these arms. Bear thou my hand, sweet wench, between thy teeth. As for thee, boy, go get thee from my sight. Thou art an exile, and thou must not stay. Hie to the Goths and raise an army there. And if you love me, as I think you do, Let’s kiss and part, for we have much to do. Exeunt.

The Portal Potion Success! After weeks and weeks of trying, I’ve finally discovered the correct ingredients for the potion I’d hoped to create for my son! With just a few drops, the potion turns any written work into a portal to the world it describes. Even with my ability to create portals to and from the Otherworld, I never thought it would be possible to create a substance that allowed me passage to any world I wished. My son will get to see the places and meet the characters he’s spent his whole childhood dreaming about! And best of all, I’ll get to watch his happiness soar as it happens! The ingredients are much simpler than I imagined, but difficult to obtain. Their purposes are more metaphysical than practical, so it took some imagination to get the concoction right. The first requirement is a branch from the oldest tree in the woods. To bring the pages to life, I figured the potion would need the very thing that brought the paper to life in the first place. And what else has more life than an ancient tree? The second ingredient is a feather from the finest pheasant in the sky. This will guarantee your potion has no limits, like a bird in flight. It will ensure you can travel to lands far and wide, beyond your imagination. The third component is a liquefied lock and key that belonged to a true love. Just as this person unlocked your heart to a life of love, it will open the door of the literary dimensions your heart desires to experience. The fourth ingredient is two weeks of moonlight. Just as the moon causes waves in the ocean, the moonlight will stir your potion to life. Last, but most important, give the potion a spark of magic to activate all the ingredients. Send it a beam of joy straight from your heart. The potion does not work on any biographies or history books, but purely on works that have been imagined. Now, I must warn about the dangers of entering a fictional world: 1. Time only exists as long as the story continues. Be sure to leave the book before the story ends, or you may disappear as the story concludes. 2. Each world is made of only what the author describes. Do not expect the characters to have any knowledge of our world or the Otherworld. 3. Beware of the story’s villains. Unlike people in our world or the Otherworld, most literary villains are created to be heartless and stripped of all morals, so do not expect any mercy should you cross paths with one. 4. The book you choose to enter will act as your entrance and exit. Be certain nothing happens to it; it is your only way out. The

I now pronounce you husband and wife. I hadn’t considered the kiss. Not once. I suppose I’d assumed it would be the way a wedding kiss should be. Restrained. Appropriate. Mild. A nice peck. Save the real kisses for later, when you’re deliciously alone. Country club girls don’t make out in front of others. Like gum chewing, it should always be done in private, where no one else can see. But Marlboro Man wasn’t a country club boy. He’d missed the memo outlining the rules and regulations of proper ways to kiss in public. I found this out when the kiss began--when he wrapped his loving, protective arms around me and kissed me like he meant it right there in my Episcopal church. Right there in front of my family, and his, in front of Father Johnson and Ms. Altar Guild and our wedding party and the entire congregation, half of whom were meeting me for the first time that night. But Marlboro Man didn’t seem to care. He kissed me exactly the way he’d kissed me the night of our first date--the night my high-heeled boot had gotten wedged in a crack in my parents’ sidewalk and had caused me to stumble. The night he’d caught me with his lips. We were making out in church--there was no way around it. And I felt every bit as swept away as I had that first night. The kiss lasted hours, days, weeks…probably ten to twelve seconds in real time, which, in a wedding ceremony setting, is a pretty long kiss. And it might have been longer had the passionate moment not been interrupted by the sudden sound of a person clapping his hands. “Woohoo! All right!” the person shouted. “Yes!” It was Mike. The congregation broke out in laughter as Marlboro Man and I touched our foreheads together, cementing the moment forever in our memory. We were one; this was tangible to me now. It wasn’t just an empty word, a theological concept, wishful thinking. It was an official, you-and-me-against-the-world designation. We’d both left our separateness behind. From that moment forward, nothing either of us did or said or planned would be in a vacuum apart from the other. No holiday would involve our celebrating separately at our respective family homes. No last-minute trips to Mexico with friends, not that either of us was prone to last-minute trips to Mexico with friends. But still. The kiss had sealed the deal in so many ways. I walked proudly out of the church, the new wife of Marlboro Man. When we exited the same doors through which my dad and I had walked thirty minutes earlier, Marlboro Man’s arm wriggled loose from my grasp and instinctively wrapped around my waist, where it belonged. The other arm followed, and before I knew it we were locked in a sweet, solidifying embrace, relishing the instant of solitude before our wedding party--sisters, cousins, brothers, friends--followed closely behind. We were married. I drew a deep, life-giving breath and exhaled. The sweating had finally stopped. And the robust air-conditioning of the church had almost completely dried my lily-white Vera.

In front of me girls were entering and exiting the showers. The flashes of nakedness were like shouts going off. A year or so earlier these same girls had been porcelain figurines, gingerly dipping their toes into the disinfectant basin at the public pool. Now they were magnificent creatures. Moving through the humid air, I felt like a snorkeler. On I came, kicking my heavy, padded legs and gaping through the goalie mask at the fantastic underwater life all around me. Sea anemones sprouted from between my classmates’ legs. They came in all colors, black, brown, electric yellow, vivid red. Higher up, their breasts bobbed like jellyfish, softly pulsing, tipped with stinging pink. Everything was waving in the current, feeding on microscopic plankton, growing bigger by the minute. The shy, plump girls were like sea lions, lurking in the depths. The surface of the sea is a mirror, reflecting divergent evolutionary paths. Up above, the creatures of air; down below, those of water. One planet, containing two worlds. My classmates were as unastonished by their extravagant traits as a blowfish is by its quills. They seemed to be a different species. It was as if they had scent glands or marsupial pouches, adaptations for fecundity, for procreating in the wild, which had nothing to do with skinny, hairless, domesticated me.

There’s an unexpected lull in the traffic about two-thirds of the way to Darmstadt, and I make the mistake of breathing a sigh of relief. The respite is short-lived. One moment I’m driving along a seemingly empty road, bouncing from side to side on the Smart’s town-car suspension as the hairdryersized engine howls its guts out beneath my buttocks, and the next instant the dashboard in front of me lights up like a flashbulb. I twitch spasmodically, jerking my head up so hard I nearly dent the thin plastic roof. Behind me the eyes of Hell are open, two blinding beacons like the landing lights on an off-course 747. Whoever they are, they’re standing on their brakes so hard they must be smoking. There’s a roar, and then a squat, red Audi sports coupe pulls out and squeezes past my flank close enough to touch, its blonde female driver gesticulating angrily at me. At least I think she’s blonde and female. It’s hard to tell because everything is gray, my heart is trying to exit through my rib cage, and I’m frantically wrestling with the steering wheel to keep the roller skate from toppling over. A fraction of a second later she’s gone, pulling back into the slow lane ahead of me to light off her afterburners. I swear I see red sparks shooting out of her two huge exhaust tubes as she vanishes into the distance, taking about ten years of my life with her.

Who doesn't like to be a center for concern? A kind of second childhood falls on so many men. They trade their violence for the promise of a small increase of life span. In effect, the head of the house becomes the youngest child. And I have searched myself for this possibility with a kind of horror. For I have always lived violently, drunk hugely, eaten too much or not at all, slept around the clock or missed two nights of sleeping, worked to hard and too long in glory, or slobbed for a time in utter laziness. I've lifted, pulled, chopped, climbed, made love with joy and taken my hangovers as a consequence, not as a punishment. I did not want to surrender fierceness for a small gain in yardage. My wife married a man; I saw no reason why she should inherit a baby. I knew that ten or twelve thousand miles driving a truck, alone and unattended, over every kind of road, would be hard work, but to me it represented the antidote for the poison of the professional sick man. And in my own life I am not willing to trade quality for quantity. If this projected journey should proved too much then it was time to go anyway. I see to many men delay their exits with a sickly, slow reluctance to leave the stage. It's bad theater as well as bad living. I am very fortunate in having a wife who likes men, not elderly babies. Although this last foundation for the journey was never discussed, I am sure she understood it.

The last name made Ro unleash an impressive string of ogre curses. “I take it that means you know the guy?” Keefe asked. Sophie could see every one of Ro’s pointed teeth when she said, “I do.” “And?” Keefe pressed. “It’s none of your business,” Ro snapped back. “Pretty sure it is, since Foster’s supposed to trust him with her life,” Keefe argued. Ro muttered a few more creative words under her breath. “Bo’s a loyal Mercadir. That’s not the issue.” “You call him Bo?” Keefe noted as Sophie asked, “Then what’s the issue?” Ro ignored both of them. “Stay here,” she told Keefe, “and don’t even think about leaving until I return.” “Where are you going?” Elwin called as she headed for the exit. “To throttle my father.” The door slammed hard enough to shake the walls, and Sophie, Keefe, and Elwin all shared a look. “Yeah . . . we definitely need to get the story on Bo and Ro,” Keefe decided. Sophie nodded. “Do you think they dated?” “Ohhhhhhhh, now I do! And I’ve been trying to get dirt like that on Ro since she got here!” He cracked his knuckles. “Okay, this is going to call for some epic-level snooping—and if that doesn’t work, I guess I know what my next bet will be!” “No more betting,” Elwin warned. “At least not on my watch. And today’s lesson better be chaos-free or I’m nixing these little sessions.” “Aw, we can’t have that. Foster would miss me too much. Who knew the way to her heart was my mad teaching skills?

But whether I’m on deck or below it, I’ll never be far.” “Shall I take that as a promise? Or a threat?” She sauntered toward him, hands cocked on her hips in an attitude of provocation. His eyes swept her body, washing her with angry heat. She noted the subtle tensing of his shoulders, the frayed edge of his breath. Even exhausted and hurt, he still wanted her. For a moment, Sophia felt hope flicker to life inside her. Enough for them both. And then, with the work of an instant, he quashed it all. Gray stepped back. He gave a loose shrug and a lazy half-smile. If I don’t care about you, his look said, you can’t possibly hurt me. “Take it however you wish.” “Oh no, you don’t. Don’t you try that move with me.” With trembling fingers, she began unbuttoning her gown. “What the devil are you doing? You think you can just hike up your shift and make-“ “Don’t get excited.” She stripped the bodice down her arms, then set to work unlacing her stays. “I’m merely settling a score. I can’t stand to be in your debt a moment longer.” Soon she was down to her chemise and plucking coins from the purse tucked between her breasts. One, two, three, four, five… “There,” she said, casing the sovereigns on the table. “Six pounds, and”-she fished out a crown-“ten shillings. You owe me the two.” He held up open palms. “Well, I’m afraid I have no coin on me. You’ll have to trust me for it.” “I wouldn’t trust you for anything. Not even two shillings.” He glared at her a moment, then turned on his heel and exited the cabin, banging the door shut behind him. Sophia stared at it, wondering whether she dared stomp after him with her bodice hanging loose around her hips. Before she could act on the obvious affirmative, he stormed back in. “Here.” A pair of coins clattered to the table. “Two shillings. And”-he drew his other hand from behind his back-“your two leaves of paper. I don’t want to be in your debt, either.” The ivory sheets fluttered as he released them. One drifted to the floor. Sophia tugged a banknote from her bosom and threw it on the growing pile. To her annoyance, it made no noise and had correspondingly little dramatic value. In compensation, she raised her voice. “Buy yourself some new boots. Damn you.” “While we’re settling scores, you owe me twenty-odd nights of undisturbed sleep.” “Oh, no,” she said, shaking her head. “We’re even on that regard.” She paused, glaring a hole in his forehead, debating just how hateful she would make this. Very. “You took my innocence,” she said coldly-and completely unfairly, because they both knew she’d given it freely enough. “Yes, and I’d like my jaded sensibilities restored, but there’s no use wishing after rainbows, now is there?” He had a point there. “I suppose we’re squared away then.” “I suppose we are.” “There’s nothing else I owe you?” His eyes were ice. “Not a thing.” But there is, she wanted to shout. I still owe you the truth, if only you’d care enough to ask for it. If only you cared enough for me, to want to know. But he didn’t. He reached for the door. “Wait,” he said. “There is one last thing.” Sophia’s heart pounded as he reached into his breast pocket and withdrew a scrap of white fabric. “There,” he said, unceremoniously casting it atop the pile of coins and notes and paper. “I’m bloody tired of carrying that around.” And then he was gone, leaving Sophia to wrap her arms over her half-naked chest and stare numbly at what he’d discarded. A lace-trimmed handkerchief, embroidered with a neat S.H.

Irene: Why would anyone choose to experience illness or disease as part of their spiritual agenda? Jared: The purpose of disease varies with each individual. For most people, disease serves to end physical life when the soul’s agenda has been fulfilled. Irene: An exit strategy. Jared: Yes. Disease also helps people put things in proper perspective and discover what’s really important. Irene: My brother Joe comes to mind. Since suffering a mild heart attack, he’s less judgmental and more accepting. Jared: Precisely. Disease also serves to remind people that control is an illusion and that a greater Power is directing life, providing them with an opportunity to surrender to that Power. Irene: That’s a good example of why it’s impossible to judge a situation as “good,” or “bad.” (Pause) In what other ways do illness and disease serve us? Jared: When people are no longer able to do things the same way they used to, disease can lead to deeper levels of compassion for oneself, as well as for others who are facing similar challenges. Irene: Sometimes we need a wake-up call to open our hearts. Jared: That’s true. As people begin to appreciate what they’d once taken for granted, disease can also assist them in accessing gratitude; maybe they hadn’t stopped to enjoy the changing colors in the evening sky, or maybe it takes being home with an illness to help them appreciate their family. Irene: It’s all for our highest good. Jared: Yes, it is. (Pause) Disease can also provide an opportunity to ask for assistance. People are forced to call on the service of others, who are given the chance to help. Irene: That’s my Achilles heel. I don’t like to impose on others. Anything else? Jared: Yes. People are often more receptive to the wisdom of their soul as a result of disease.

I heard the fear in the first music I ever knew, the music that pumped from boom boxes full of grand boast and bluster. The boys who stood out on Garrison and Liberty up on Park Heights loved this music because it told them, against all evidence and odds, that they were masters of their own lives, their own streets, and their own bodies. I saw it in the girls, in their loud laughter, in their gilded bamboo earrings that announced their names thrice over. And I saw it in their brutal language and hard gaze, how they would cut you with their eyes and destroy you with their words for the sin of playing too much. “Keep my name out your mouth,” they would say. I would watch them after school, how they squared off like boxers, vaselined up, earrings off, Reeboks on, and leaped at each other. I felt the fear in the visits to my Nana’s home in Philadelphia. You never knew her. I barely knew her, but what I remember is her hard manner, her rough voice. And I knew that my father’s father was dead and that my uncle Oscar was dead and that my uncle David was dead and that each of these instances was unnatural. And I saw it in my own father, who loves you, who counsels you, who slipped me money to care for you. My father was so very afraid. I felt it in the sting of his black leather belt, which he applied with more anxiety than anger, my father who beat me as if someone might steal me away, because that is exactly what was happening all around us. Everyone had lost a child, somehow, to the streets, to jail, to drugs, to guns. It was said that these lost girls were sweet as honey and would not hurt a fly. It was said that these lost boys had just received a GED and had begun to turn their lives around. And now they were gone, and their legacy was a great fear. Have they told you this story? When your grandmother was sixteen years old a young man knocked on her door. The young man was your Nana Jo’s boyfriend. No one else was home. Ma allowed this young man to sit and wait until your Nana Jo returned. But your great-grandmother got there first. She asked the young man to leave. Then she beat your grandmother terrifically, one last time, so that she might remember how easily she could lose her body. Ma never forgot. I remember her clutching my small hand tightly as we crossed the street. She would tell me that if I ever let go and were killed by an onrushing car, she would beat me back to life. When I was six, Ma and Dad took me to a local park. I slipped from their gaze and found a playground. Your grandparents spent anxious minutes looking for me. When they found me, Dad did what every parent I knew would have done—he reached for his belt. I remember watching him in a kind of daze, awed at the distance between punishment and offense. Later, I would hear it in Dad’s voice—“Either I can beat him, or the police.” Maybe that saved me. Maybe it didn’t. All I know is, the violence rose from the fear like smoke from a fire, and I cannot say whether that violence, even administered in fear and love, sounded the alarm or choked us at the exit. What I know is that fathers who slammed their teenage boys for sass would then release them to streets where their boys employed, and were subject to, the same justice. And I knew mothers who belted their girls, but the belt could not save these girls from drug dealers twice their age. We, the children, employed our darkest humor to cope. We stood in the alley where we shot basketballs through hollowed crates and cracked jokes on the boy whose mother wore him out with a beating in front of his entire fifth-grade class. We sat on the number five bus, headed downtown, laughing at some girl whose mother was known to reach for anything—cable wires, extension cords, pots, pans. We were laughing, but I know that we were afraid of those who loved us most. Our parents resorted to the lash the way flagellants in the plague years resorted to the scourge.

Marlboro Man opened the passenger door of the semi and allowed me to climb out in front of him, while Tim exited the driver-side door to see us off. That wasn’t so bad, I thought as I made my way down the steps. Aside from the manicure remark and my sweating problem, meeting Marlboro Man’s brother had gone remarkably well. I looked okay that evening, had managed a couple of witty remarks, and had worn just the right clothing to conceal my nervousness. Life was good. Then, because the Gods of Embarrassment seemed hell-bent on making me look bad, I lost my balance on the last step, hooking the heel of my stupid black boots on the grate of the step and awkwardly grabbing the handlebar to save myself from falling to my death onto the gravel driveway below. But though I stopped myself from wiping out, my purse flew off my arm and landed, facedown, on Tim’s driveway, violently spilling its contents all over the gravel. Only a woman can know the dreaded feeling of spilling her purse in the company of men. Suddenly my soul was everywhere, laid bare for Marlboro Man and his brother to see: year-old lip gloss, a leaky pen, wadded gum wrappers, and a hairbrush loaded up with hundreds, if not thousands, of my stringy auburn hairs. And men don’t understand wads of long hair--for all they knew, I had some kind of follicular disorder and was going bald. There were no feminine products, but there was a package of dental floss, with a messy, eight-inch piece dangling from the opening and blowing in the wind. And there were Tic Tacs. Lots and lots of Tic Tacs. Orange ones. Then there was the money. Loose ones and fives and tens and twenties that had been neatly folded together and tucked into a pocket inside my purse were now blowing wildly around Tim’s driveway, swept away by the strengthening wind from an approaching storm. Nothing in my life could have prepared me for the horror of watching Marlboro Man, my new love, and his brother, Tim, whom I’d just met, chivalrously dart around Tim’s driveway, trying valiantly to save my wayward dollars, all because I couldn’t keep my balance on the steps of their shiny new semi. I left my car at Tim’s for the evening, and when we pulled away in Marlboro Man’s pickup, I stared out the window, shaking my head and apologizing for being such a colossal dork. When we got to the highway, Marlboro Man glanced at me as he made a right-hand turn. “Yeah,” he said, consoling me. “But you’re my dork.

Hey,” he said, his hand gently rubbing my back. I heard the diesel rattle of vehicles driving away from the scene. “Hey,” I replied, sitting up and looking at my watch. It was 5:00 A.M. “Are you okay?” “Yep,” he said. “We finally got it out.” Marlboro Man’s clothes were black. Heavy soot covered his drawn, exhausted face. “Can I go home now?” I said. I was only halfway kidding. And actually, I wasn’t kidding at all. “Sorry about that,” Marlboro Man said, still rubbing my back. “That was crazy.” He gave a half-chuckle and kissed my forehead. I didn’t know what to say. Driving back to his house, the pickup was quiet. My mind began to race, which is never good at five in the morning. And then, inexplicably, just as we reached the road to his house, I lost it. “So, why did you even take me there, anyway?” I said. “I mean, if I’m just going to ride in someone’s pickup, why even bring me along? It’s not like I was any help to anyone…” Marlboro Man glanced over at me. His eyes were tired. “So…did you want to operate one of the sprayers?” he asked, an unfamiliar edge to his voice. “No, I just…I mean…” I searched for the words. “I mean, that was just ridiculous! That was dangerous!” “Well, prairie fires are dangerous,” Marlboro Man answered. “But that’s life. Stuff like this happens.” I was cranky. The nap had done little to calm me down. “What happens? You just drive right into fires and throw caution to the wind? I mean, people could die out there. I could have died. You could have died! I mean, do you realize how crazy that was?” Marlboro Man looked straight ahead, rubbing his left eye and blinking. He looked exhausted. He looked spent. We arrived in his driveway just in time to see the eastern sun peeking over the horse barn. Marlboro Man stopped his pickup, put it into park, and said, still looking straight ahead, “I took you with me…because I thought you’d like to see a fire.” He turned off the pickup and opened his door. “And because I didn’t want to leave you here by yourself.” I didn’t say anything. We both exited the pickup, and Marlboro Man began walking toward his house. And then, still walking, he said it--words that chilled me to the bone. “I’ll see you later.” He didn’t even turn around. I stood there, not knowing what to say, though deep down I knew I wouldn’t have to. I knew that just as he’d always done anytime I’d ever been rendered speechless in his presence, he’d speak up, turn around, come to my rescue, hold me in his arms…and infuse love into my soul, as only he could do. He always swooped in to save me, and this time would be no different. But he didn’t turn around. He didn’t speak up. He simply walked toward the house, toward the door on his back porch--the same porch door where, hours earlier, he and I had stood in a complete fit of romance and lust, where the heat between us was but a foreshadowing of the fire waiting for us in that distant prairie.

I turned and entered the airport with my escort. Suddenly, I had a horrible realization: in order to return to the flight line I needed to move through a modern international airport complete with metal detectors and X-ray machines and I had a loaded pistol in my fanny pack. And, because of the ongoing civil war, security was beefed up and the guards were extra wary. Before we reached the first checkpoint, I pretended that I needed to use the restroom and told my escort to go on ahead. I needed to think. One option was to drop my pistol in a trash can and exit the airport, later claiming I lost the gun somehow. The lost-gun option had serious flaws. I couldn’t ditch my pistol because I had signed it out by serial number. Police could easily trace the gun back to me. My personal interpretation of the, “no weapons” order would probably not be an effective defense at my court marshal. My other option was to try and sneak through the airport onto the flight line, somehow avoiding a gauntlet of security checkpoints. This was the ninja option. This daunting course of action was fraught with serious danger. If guards confronted me and caught me with a loaded pistol I knew I would not have a pleasant day. There was no telling where that situation would lead; there was a real possibility I could spend time in a Yemeni prison. Despite the risks I decided on the ninja option. I figured I might have one slim advantage. Maybe the guards would remember me coming through the airport from the flight-line side with the embassy official and not pay me much attention. I was sweating bullets as I approached the first checkpoint. I tried to act casual and confident, not furtive and suspicious like a criminal. I waited until the guard looked away, his attention elsewhere and boldly walked behind him past the checkpoint. When I approached the X-ray and metal detectors I strode right past the line of people, bypassing the machines. I had to play it that way. I could not hang out near the detectors waiting for guards to look the other way and then sneak past; there were just too many. As I brazenly strode around each checkpoint I feared to hear a sudden barked command, rushing feet behind me, and hands spinning me around to face angry guards with drawn weapons. The last part of my mission to get on the airfield was tricky and nerveracking. Imagine being at an American airport in the gate area where people board the airplanes. Then imagine trying to sneak out a Jetway or access door without being stopped. I remembered the door I had used to enter the terminal and luckily it was unlocked. I picked my moment and quickly slipped out the door onto the airfield. I boldly strode across the airfield, never looking behind me until I reached my plane. Finally, I turned and looked back the way I came and saw … nothing. No one was pursuing me. I was in the midst of an ongoing civil war, surrounded by fresh bomb craters and soldiers carrying soviet rifles, but as scary situations go, so far Tiger Rescue was a relaxing walk in the park compared to Operation Ninja Escape.

Elvis was pretty slick. Nonetheless, I knew that he was cheating. His four-of-a-kind would beat my full house. I had two choices. I could fold my hand and lose all the money I’d contributed to the pot, or I could match Elvis’s bet and continue to play. If a gambler thought he was in an honest game, he would probably match the bet thinking his full house was a sure winner. The con artist would bet large amounts of money on the remaining cards, knowing he had a winning hand. I narrowed my eyes and pursed my lips, as if struggling to decide whether to wager five hundred pesos or fold my hand and call it quits. I knew there were five men between me and the door and watched them from the corner of my eye. Even if I folded and accepted my losses, I knew they would not let me leave without taking all my cash. They had strength in numbers and would strong arm me if they could. The men stared, intently watching my next move. I set down my beer and took five one hundred peso notes from my wallet. The men at the bar relaxed. My adrenaline surged, pumping through my brain, sharpening my focus as I prepared for action. I moved as if to place my bet on the table, but instead my hand bumped my beer bottle, spilling it onto Elvis’ lap. Elvis reacted instinctively to the cold beer, pushing back from the table and rising to his feet. I jumped up from my chair making a loud show of apologizing, and in the ensuing pandemonium I snatched all the money off the table and bolted for the door! My tactics took everyone by complete surprise. I had a small head start, but the Filipinos recovered quickly and scrambled to cut off my escape. I dashed to the door and barely made it to the exit ahead of the Filipinos. The thugs were nearly upon me when I suddenly wheeled round and kicked the nearest man square in the chest. My kick cracked ribs and launched the shocked Filipino through the air into the other men, tumbling them to the ground. For the moment, my assailants were a jumble of tangled bodies on the floor. I darted out the door and raced down the busy sidewalk, dodging pedestrians. I looked back and saw the furious Filipinos swarming out of the bar. Running full tilt, I grabbed onto the rail of a passing Jeepney and swung myself into the vehicle. The wide-eyed passengers shrunk back, trying to keep their distance from the crazy American. I yelled to the driver, “Step on the gas!” and thrust a hundred peso note into his hand. I looked back and saw all six of Johnny’s henchmen piling onto one tricycle. The jeepney driver realized we were being pursued and stomped the gas pedal to the floor. The jeepney surged into traffic and accelerated away from the tricycle. The tricycle was only designed for one driver and two passengers. With six bodies hanging on, the overloaded motorcycle was slow and unstable. The motorcycle driver held the throttle wide open and the tricycle rocked side to side, almost tipping over, as the frustrated riders yelled curses and flailed their arms futilely. My jeepney continued to speed through the city, pulling away from our pursuers. Finally, I could no longer see the tricycle behind us. When I was sure I had escaped, I thanked the driver and got off at the next stop. I hired a tricycle of my own and carefully made my way back to my neighborhood, keeping careful watch for Johnny and his friends. I knew that Johnny was in a frustrated rage. Not only had I foiled his plans, I had also made off with a thousand pesos of his cash. Even though I had great fun and came out of my escapade in good shape, my escape was risky and could’ve had a very different outcome. I feel a disclaimer is appropriate for those people who think it is fun to con street hustlers, “Kids. Don’t try this at home.

I write now what 15 years past I would still not have thought possible to write: that if today I were given the choice to accept the experience, with everything that it entails, or to refuse the bitter largesse, I would have to stretch out my hands — because out of it has come, for all of us, an unimagined life. And I will not change the last word of the story. It is still love.

Youth and death have always been an intoxicating combination for the myth makers left amongst the living. And dangerous, even violent, self-loathing has long been an essential ingredient in the fires of transformation. When the "new self" burns to life, the twins of great control *and* recklessness are immutably linked. It's what makes life interesting. The high tension between those two forces often makes a performer fascinating and fun to watch, but also a white-cross highway marker. Here, many who've come this way have burned out hard or died. The rock death cult is well loved and chronicled in literature and music, but in practice, there ain't much in it for the singer and his song, except a good life unlived, lovers and children left behind, and a six-foot-deep hole in the ground. The exit in a blaze of glory is bullshit. Now, if you're not one of the handful of music revolutionaries—and I was not—you naturally set your sights on something different. In a transient field, I was suited for the long haul. I had years of study behind me; I was physically built to endure and by disposition was not an edge dweller. I was interested in what I might accomplish over a lifetime of music making, so assumption number one is you are going to keep breathing. In my business, the above case studies prove, no matter who you are, that's not as easy as it sounds.

Ha! little honour to be much believed, And most pernicious purpose! Seeming, seeming! I will proclaim thee, Angelo; look for't: Sign me a present pardon for my brother, Or with an outstretch'd throat I'll tell the world aloud What man thou art. ANGELO Who will believe thee, Isabel? My unsoil'd name, the austereness of my life, My vouch against you, and my place i' the state, Will so your accusation overweigh, That you shall stifle in your own report And smell of calumny. I have begun, And now I give my sensual race the rein: Fit thy consent to my sharp appetite; Lay by all nicety and prolixious blushes, That banish what they sue for; redeem thy brother By yielding up thy body to my will; Or else he must not only die the death, But thy unkindness shall his death draw out To lingering sufferance. Answer me to-morrow, Or, by the affection that now guides me most, I'll prove a tyrant to him. As for you, Say what you can, my false o'erweighs your true. Exit ISABELLA To whom should I complain? Did I tell this, Who would believe me? O perilous mouths, That bear in them one and the self-same tongue, Either of condemnation or approof; Bidding the law make court'sy to their will: Hooking both right and wrong to the appetite, To follow as it draws! I'll to my brother: Though he hath fallen by prompture of the blood, Yet hath he in him such a mind of honour. That, had he twenty heads to tender down On twenty bloody blocks, he'ld yield them up, Before his sister should her body stoop To such abhorr'd pollution. Then, Isabel, live chaste, and, brother, die: More than our brother is our chastity. I'll tell him yet of Angelo's request, And fit his mind to death, for his soul's rest. Exit From Measure for Measure, Act II, Scene IV