“
Life is like a box of chocolates.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gump and Co. (Forrest Gump, #2))
“
I may not be a smart man, but I know what love is.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
I don't know if mama was right, that we each have a destiny, or if if was Lt Dan, that we are all just floating around, accidental, like on a breeze, but I think... I think... maybe... it's both happening at the same time.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Stupid is as stupid looks.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gump and Co. (Forrest Gump, #2))
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
The desert, when the sun comes up...I couldn't tell where heaven stopped and the Earth began.
”
”
Tom Hanks
“
That's all I have to say about that.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Life is like a box of Hand grenades,You never know what will blow you to kingdom come
”
”
Mario Puzo (The Last Don (The Godfather))
“
Now you wouldn't believe me if I told you, but I could run like the wind blows. From that day on, if I was ever going somewhere, I was running!
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Forest Gump had it wrong. Life is not a box of chocolate; it's a kaleidoscope. In the flip of a wrist, realities are shredded and the world takes on a totally new shape.
”
”
Carolyn Haines (Them Bones (Sarah Booth Delaney, #1))
“
Bubba was my best good friend. And even I know that ain't something you can find just around the corner.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
He paused, gazing down at her in amusement, "Do you know when I first fell in love with you?"
"No, when?" she asked, intrigued.
"When you got out of your SUV looking hotter than a firecracker and madder than hell, and you said, 'Don't they stop at red lights where you're from, Forest Gump"'"
--Zack to Cori after their first "I love you's
”
”
Jo Davis
“
I may be a idiot, but most of the time, anyway, I tried to do the right thing, an dreams is just dreams, ain’t they? So whatever else has happened, I am figgerin this: I can always look back an say, at least I ain’t led no hum-drum life.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
...but I forgot that I've been bound to the Forest Gump of Guardians. Lucky, lucky me.
”
”
Katie MacAlister (You Slay Me (Aisling Grey, #1))
“
Father, I'd rather die at your hands than at Liam's...or worse, Mel's. Give me one second to tell you and then I will run faster than Forrest Gump.
”
”
J.J. McAvoy (The Untouchables (Ruthless People, #2))
“
He was such a glass-half-full, Forrest Gump-type,
”
”
Molly Black (Found You (Rylie Wolf #1))
“
What does it all mean? Am I a Gump, or am I a juggernaut?
”
”
L. Frank Baum (The Marvelous Land of Oz (Oz, #2))
“
But let me tell you this: sometimes at night, when I look up at the stars, an see the whole sky jus laid out there, don't you think I ain't rememberin it all. I still got dreams like anybody else, an ever so often, I am thinkin about how things might of been. An then, all of a sudden, I'm forty, fifty, sixty years ole, you know?
Well, so what? I may be a idiot, but most of the time, anyway, I tried to do the right thing-- an dreams is jus dreams, ain't they? So whatever else has happened, I am figgerin this: I can always look back an say, at least I ain't led no hum-drum life.
You know what I mean?
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Mama read it an began pulling her hair an weepin an praisin the Lord, 'cause it say I am 'Temporarily Deferred' on account of I am a numbnuts.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Mom lies down next to me and we both stare at the ceiling in complete silence. “Boys are like candy,” she suddenly says. I grin. “Really, Mom? That’s your advice? Boys are like candy. What is that? Forrest Gump on teens?
”
”
Rucy Ban
“
I have suffered a loss, Forrest, far greater than my legs. It's my spirit, my soul, if you will. There is only a blank there now - medals where my soul used to be.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Plus, I can't look at him the same since I ran into Mrs. Marino at our family reunion. It's not comforting to learn you've made out with your cousin."
"Third cousin once removed," I argued. "It's hardly incest."
"Life is like a box of chocolates, Lisa," Katie noted around a half-chewed carrot stick. "You never know what you're going to get."
Lisa narrowed her eyes, confused. "Did she just quote Forrest Gump at me?"
"It's Matt's fault," I said. "She lost a bet and now anytime his name gets mentioned, she has sixty seconds to drop a relevant movie quote."
"That's insane."
"Yup," Katie piped in, "insanity tuns in my family. Its practically gallops."
"Classic." I high-fived her.
”
”
Cecily White (Prophecy Girl (Angel Academy, #1))
“
Let me say this: being an idiot is no box of chocolates. People laugh, lose patience, treat you shabby. Now they say folks supposed to be kind to the afflicted, but let me tell you this - it ain't always that way. Even so, I got no complaints, cause I reckon I done live a pretty interesting life, so to speak.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
We were freshman, taking her film class, and we'd spend hours after school sitting in her classroom talking about any old thing—life, sex, Forrest Gump.
”
”
Marisha Pessl (Special Topics in Calamity Physics)
“
THE SOUNDTRACK OF WES AND LIZ Someone Like You | Van Morrison Paper Rings | Taylor Swift Lovers | Anna of the North ocean eyes | Billie Eilish Bad Liar | Selena Gomez Public Service Announcement (Interlude) | Jay-Z Up All Night | Mac Miller How Would You Feel (Paean) | Ed Sheeran Hello Operator | The White Stripes Paradise | Bazzi Sabotage | Beastie Boys Feelin’ Alright | Joe Cocker Someone Like You | Adele Monkey Wrench | Foo Fighters Bella Luna | Jason Mraz Forrest Gump | Frank Ocean Electric (feat. Khalid) | Alina Baraz Kiss | Tom Jones Enter Sandman | Metallica Death with Dignity | Sufjan Stevens We Are Young | fun. feat. Janelle Monáe New Year’s Day | Taylor Swift River | Joni Mitchell
”
”
Lynn Painter (Better Than the Movies)
“
I don't know if we each have a destiny, or if we're all just floatin' around accidental-like on a breeze, but I, I think maybe it's both. Maybe both is happenin' at the same time.
”
”
Forrest Gump
“
Life is like a box of chocolates. Ya never know whatcha gonna get!
”
”
Forest Gump
“
Sure, Gump,” he say. “What the hell—we will even get him accommodations in first class.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
“
Forrest Gump had gotten it all wrong. Life wasn’t a box of chocolates. It was a box of ex-lax, and I felt like I’d consumed the entire thing.
”
”
Jana Deleon (Louisiana Longshot (Miss Fortune Mystery, #1))
“
Now you wouldn’t believe me if I told you, but I could run like the wind blows. From that day on, if I was ever going somewhere, I was running!” —FORREST GUMP
”
”
Dean Karnazes (Run! 26.2 Stories of Blisters and Bliss)
“
How does Forrest Gump have sex? What could be more of a revelation about a character than watching them have sex? That says a lot about them, how they touch another person in bed.
”
”
Paul Thomas Anderson
“
All my own life, I ain't understood shit about what was goin on. A thing jus happen, then somethin else happen, then somethin else, an so on, an haf the time nothin makin any sense.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
So I tole him a little bit about my checkered career, an after he listened for a while, Tom Hanks says, "Well, Mr. Gump, you are sure a curious feller. Sounds like somebody ought to make a movie of your life's story.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gump and Co. (Forrest Gump, #2))
“
Sometimes, I guess there just arn't enough rocks
”
”
Winston Groom
“
Think of Forrest Gump. For him, magic just kept happening because he was in total allowance of everything. His life was magic because he didn’t limit the possibilities of what could show up for him by judging anything. You could say he wasn’t smart enough to judge. Maybe he was smart enough NOT to.
”
”
Dain Heer (Being You, Changing The World)
“
That's why you look down on me, because you know I lie. At wakes, at funerals, at weddings - yes, I lie. I lie at wakes and funerals to relieve pain. 'Cause reading, writing, and 'rithmetic is not enough. You think that's all the sent you to school for? They send you to school to relieve pain, to relieve hurt - and if you have to lie to do it, then you lie. You lie and you lie and you lie. When you tell yourself you feeling good when you sick, you lying. When you tell other people you feeling well when you feeling sick, you lying. You tell them that 'cause they have pain too, and you don't want to add yours - and you lie. She been lying every day of her life, your aunt in there. That's how you got through that university - cheating herself here, cheating herself there, but always telling you she's all right. I've seen her hands bleed from picking cotton. I've seen the blisters from the hoe and the cane knife. At that church, crying on her knees. You ever looked at the scabs on her knees, boy? Course you never. 'Cause she never wanted you to see it. And that's the difference between me and you, boy; that make me the educated one, and you the gump. I know my people. I know what they gone through. I know they done cheated themself, lied to themself - hoping that one they all love and trust can come back and help relieve the pain.
”
”
Ernest J. Gaines (A Lesson Before Dying)
“
So the next day I asked Dan how is it that Bubba can get killed, and what kind of half assed nature law would allow that. He thought about it for a while, and said, 'Well, I'll tell you, Forrest, all of these laws are not specially pleasing to us. But there is laws nonetheless. Like when a tiger pounce on a monkey in the jungle - bad for the money, but good for the tiger. That is just the way it is.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
I got to tell you, that if it weren't for that harmonica music, i might of just packed up and gone home, but it made me feel so good, I can hardly describe it. Sort of like my whole body is the harmonica and the music give me goosebumps when I play it.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
I know that bein a idiot an all, I ain't sposed to have no philosophy of my own, but maybe it's just because nobody never took the time to talk to me bout it.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
The fact that I were too dumb to play college football did not seem to impress the United States Army none.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
You might not be the smartest feller in town, but you've got more sense than most people.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gump and Co. (Forrest Gump, #2))
“
Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get.
”
”
Forest Gump
“
To save energy, do not go out lookin' for trouble; chances are, it will find you soon enough.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gumpisms: The Wit and Wisdom of Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #3))
“
Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you might get!
”
”
Forrest Gump (movie)
“
Let me say this: bein a idiot is no box of chocolates. People laugh, lose patience, treat you shabby.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
“
When you feel there is an unfair burden on your shoulders, that's just the way it is sometimes.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gumpisms: The Wit and Wisdom of Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #3))
“
There's only so much fortune a man really needs and the rest is just for showing off.
”
”
Forrest Gump
“
Try not to screw up. This will satisfy a few people, and amaze everybody else.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gumpisms: The Wit and Wisdom of Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #3))
“
Nobody ever went broke sayin' 'Good Mornin'' to folks.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gumpisms: The Wit and Wisdom of Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #3))
“
Dream, but don't quit your day job.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gumpisms: The Wit and Wisdom of Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #3))
“
The taste of a triangle sandwich has no real surprise, it is not like the box of chocolates of Mother Gump, you know roughly what you gonna get.
”
”
Alain Bremond-Torrent (running is flying intermittently (CATEMPLATIONS 1))
“
The world will never be the same once you’ve seen it through the eyes of Forrest Gump.
”
”
Forrest Gump (movie) Tagline
“
If you start Forrest Gump at exactly 10:38:57 PM on New Years Eve, you can ring in the new year with Lieutenant Dan.
”
”
stained hanes (94,000 Wasps in a Trench Coat)
“
As Forest Gump would say.
"Self publishing is like a box of chocolates. You never know whatcha gonna ghet!
”
”
Joe King
“
Mason will run faster than Forest Gump if I tell him I almost got strangled by a ghost.
”
”
Apryl Baker (The Ghost Files (The Ghost Files, #1))
“
Well, so what? I may be a idiot, but most of the time, anyway, I tried to do the right thing—an dreams is jus dreams, ain’t they? So whatever else has happened, I am figgerin this: I can always look back an say, at least I ain’t led no hum-drum life. You know what I mean?
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
“
You treat everybody like they are your friend. It ain't that way in the world, Forrest. A lot of people ain't your friend. They are just lookin at you the way a banker looks at somebody comes in for a loan—How I'm gonna fleece this rube? That's the way it is, Forrest. That's the way it is.
”
”
Winston Groom (Gump and Co. (Forrest Gump, #2))
“
Life is like a box of chocolates: You get through what little actual good stuff there is right away, then you constantly fool yourself into believing there's still something good in whatever's left.
”
”
James Rozoff
“
I’m sure there are many other Forrest Gump moments that I’m forgetting. I don’t mention them as boasts, but rather as evidence of how ridiculously lucky I have been to have lived the life that I have.
”
”
Michael J. Fox (Always Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist)
“
Billy's native arrogance might well have been a gift of miffed genes, then come to splendid definition through the tests to which a street like Broadway puts a young man on the make: tests designed to refine a breed, enforce a code, exclude all simps and gumps, and deliver into the city's life a man worthy of functioning in this age of nocturnal supremacy. Men like Billy Phelan, forged in the brass of Broadway, send, in the time of their splendor, telegraphic statements of mission: I, you bums, am a winner. And that message, however devoid of Christ-like other-cheekery, dooms the faint-hearted Scottys of the night, who must sludge along, never knowing how it feels to spill over with the small change of sassiness, how it feels to leave the spillover on the floor, more where that came from, pal. Leave it for the sweeper.
”
”
William Kennedy (Billy Phelan's Greatest Game)
“
One researcher, J.P. Gump found that the most profound shame results from the destruction of your subjectivity when "what you need, what you desire, and what you feel are of complete and utter insignificance.
”
”
Pamela Newkirk (Spectacle: The Astonishing Life of Ota Benga)
“
It also creates a problematic reflection: If a villain is the person who knows the most and cares the least, then a hero is the person who cares too much without knowing anything. It makes every hero seem like Forrest Gump. But it’s not the intelligence that people dislike; it’s the dispassionate application of that intelligence. It’s the calculation. It’s someone who views life as a game where the rules are poorly written and designed for abuse.
”
”
Chuck Klosterman (I Wear the Black Hat: Grappling With Villains (Real and Imagined))
“
I don't know if mama was right, that we each have a destiny, or if it was Lt Dan, that we are all just floating around, accidental, like on a breeze, but I think... I think... maybe... it's both happening at the same time. -Winston Groom (1943 -), Forrest Gump
”
”
M. Prefontaine (The Big Book of Quotes: Funny, Inspirational and Motivational Quotes on Life, Love and Much Else (Quotes For Every Occasion 1))
“
It commenced raining one day and did not stop for two months. We went through ever different kind of rain they is, cep'n maybe sleet or hail. It was little tiny stinging rain sometimes, an big ole fat rain at others. It came sidewise an straight down an sometimes even seem to stand up from the ground. Nevertheless, we was expected to do our shit, which was mainly walking upland down the hills an stuff looking for gooks.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
So, there you have it, you get up and go to school, thinking it's just another ordinary day and the next thing you know, something totally unexpected happens! Life's like that. I guess it's like Forrest Gump said about the box of chocolates-you just never know what you're going to get!
”
”
Melody Carlson (Becoming Me (Diary of a Teenage Girl: Caitlin, #1))
“
But what finally undid me was when Ariana came whistle-toning in with excitement because she had spent the previous evening playing charades at Tom Hanks’s house. That was the moment I broke. I couldn’t take it anymore. Music performances and magazine covers…whatever, I’ll get over it. But playing a family game at National Treasure, two-time Academy Award-winner and six-time nominee Tom Hanks’s house? I’m done.
From that moment on, I didn’t like her. I couldn’t like her. Pop star success I could handle, but hanging out with Sheriff Woody, with fucking Forrest Gump? This has gone too far.
”
”
Jennette McCurdy (I'm Glad My Mom Died)
“
But let me tell you this: sometimes at night, when I look up at the stars, an see the whole sky jus laid out there, don’t you think I ain’t rememberin it all. I still got dreams like anybody else, an ever so often, I am thinkin about how things might of been. An then, all of a sudden, I’m forty, fifty, sixty years ole, you know?
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
“
You should have seen the coachload I looked over. There was a mortician wearing odd shoes, one brown, one yellow. And a moon-faced gump sporting a hat made from the skin of a barber's pole, all stripy. Only thing missing was his bubble pipe - and probably he'll be given that where he was going." - Colonel Sheldon
"Where was he going?" -Ambassador
"I don't know, your excellency. They refused to say." -Sheldon
"Well, that is a valuable addition to the sum total of our knowledge. Our minds are now enriched by the thought that an anonymous individual may be presented with a futile object for an indefinable purpose when he reaches his unknown destination." -Ambassador
”
”
Eric Frank Russell
“
I shrug my shoulders an nod my head, but somethin down in me sinkin fast. I am jus a po ole idiot, an now I have got the whole human race to look after.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Things is very primitive in the jungle - no place to shit, sleep on the ground like an animal, eat out of cans, no place to take a bath or nothing, clothes is all rotting off.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
What's normal anyways?
”
”
Forrest Gump
“
I'm not a smart man, but I know what love is.
”
”
Forrest Gump
“
The one thing I remember from Fort Benning is that they didn’t seem to be nobody much smarter than I was, which was certainly a relief.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
“
Maybe I am a idiot, but at least I ain’t stupid,
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
“
Tớ biết làm một thằng đần thì tớ chả cần có triết lí sống quái gì hết, nhưng có lẽ đấy chỉ vì chưa ai thèm dành thời gian để nói với tớ về việc đó thôi.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
My mamma always said, 'Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you gonna get.
”
”
Forrest Gump
“
Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get next.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know which kind yo're gonna get
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
One day we found them. They must of been holding a gook convention or something, cause it seem like the same sort of deal as when you step on a anthill and they all come swarming around.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Bullets an stuff be flying all over. It is something I simply cannot understand - why in hell is we doing all this, anyway? Playing football is one thing. But this, I do not know why. Goddamn.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Bubba then grabbed a hold of my leg and his eyes got all cloudy and that terrible pink sky seem to drain all the colour in his face.
He was trying to say something, and so I bent over real close to hear what it was. But I never could make it out. So I asked the medic, ' You hear what he say?'
And the medic say, 'Home. He said, home.'
Bubba, he died, and that's all I got to say about that.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
I found the head nurse and asked her, and she said Dan has been flown back to America on account of they can take better care of him there. I asked her if he is okay, and she said, 'Yeah, if you can call two punctured lungs, a severed intestine, spinal separation, a missing foot, a truncated leg, and third degree burns over half the body okay, then he is just fine. I thanked her, and went on my way.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
He unbutton his jacket an inside, on his shirt, is all his medals—Purple Heart, Silver Star—must of been ten or twelve of them. “They remind me of somethin,” he said. “I’m not quite sure what—the war, of course, but that’s jus a part of it. I have suffered a loss, Forrest, far greater than my legs. It’s my spirit, my soul, if you will. There is only a blank there now—medals where my soul used to be.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
“
contrary to previous assumptions, young men and women who possess the collective social graces of a herd of sex-crazed water buffalo and have an intelligence quotient in the range of Forrest Gump on three hits of acid, can be taught to sound like Wall Street wizards, as long as you write every last word down for them and then keep drilling it into their heads again and again—every day, twice a day—for a year straight.
”
”
Jordan Belfort (The Wolf of Wall Street)
“
Two-year-old Christine Hanson and four-year-old Juliana McCourt would never visit Disneyland. Neither they nor David Gamboa-Brandhorst would know first days of school, first loves, or any other milestone, from triumph to heartbreak, of a full life. Andrea LeBlanc would never again travel the world with her gregarious, pacifist husband, Bob. Julie Sweeney wouldn’t bear children, grow old, and feel safe with her confident warrior husband, Brian. Delayed passengers wouldn’t hear recitals of Forrest Gump dialogue from Captain Victor Saracini. First Officer Michael Horrocks’s daughter wouldn’t rise from bed with the promise that her daddy loved her to the moon. Ace Bailey and Mark Bavis would never again share their gifts with young hockey players or with their own families. Retired nurse Touri Bolourchi, who’d fled Iran and the Ayatollah Khomeini, wouldn’t see her grandsons grow up as Americans.
”
”
Mitchell Zuckoff (Fall and Rise: The Story of 9/11)
“
I get a letter once a week from my mama. She say everything fine at home..
I write her back too, when I can, but what I'm gonna tell her that won't start her bawling again? So I just say we is having a nice time and everybody treating us fine.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
I think that sitting there talking to Dan was a thing that had a great impression on my life. I know that being an idiot and all, I ain't supposed to have no philosophy of my own, but maybe it's just because nobody never too the time to talk to me about it. It was Dan's philosophy that everything that happen to us, or for that matter, to anything everywhere, is controlled by natural laws that govern the universe. His views were extremely complicated, but the gist of what he said begun to change my whole outlook on things.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
Dear Forrest,
I am sorry there was no time for us to speech other before I left. The doctors made their decision quickly, and before I knew it, I was being taken away, but I asked if I could stop long enough to write you this note, because you have been so kind to me whileI was here.
I sense, Forrest, that you are on the verge of something very significant in your life, some change, or event that will move you in a different direction, and you must seize the moment, and not let it pass. When I think back on it now, there is something in your eyes, some tiny flash of fire that comes now and then, mostly when you smile, and , on those infrequent occasions, I believe what I saw was almost a Genesis of our ability as humans to think, to create, to be.
This war is to for you, old pal - nor me - and I am well out of it as I'm sure you will be in time. The crucial question is, what will you do? I don't think you're an idiot at all. Perhaps by the measure of tests or the judgement of fools, you might fall into some category or other, but deep down, Forrest, I have seen that glowing sparkle of curiosity burning deep in your mind. Take the tide, my friend, and as you are carried along, make it work for you, fight the shallows and the snags and never give up. You are a good fellow, forrest, and you have a big heart.
Your pal,
Dan
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
At dawn, they call in a napalm airplane, but it drop the shit damn near right on top of us. Our own fellers be all signed and burnt up - come running out into the open, eyes big as biscuits, everybody cussing and sweating and scared, woods set on fire, damn near put the rain out!
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
There was some people hurt far worst than I was in that hospital, let me tell you. Poor old boys with arms and legs and hands and who knows what else missing. Boys what had been shot in their stomach and chests and faces. At night the place sound like a torture chamber - them fellers be howling and crying and calling for their mamas.
”
”
Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
“
clothes off, cept for the big chef’s hat I was wearin at the time. An it blowed stew all over us, so’s we looked like—well, I don’t know what we looked like—but man, it was strange. Incredibly, it didn’t do nothin to all them guys settin out there in the mess hall neither. Jus lef em settin at they tables, covered with stew, actin kinda shell-shocked or somethin—but it sure did shut their asses up about when they food is gonna be ready. Suddenly the company commander come runnin into the buildin. “What was that!” he shouted. “What happen?” He look at the two of us, an then holler, “Sergeant Kranz, is that you?” “Gump—Boiler—Stew!” the sergeant say, an then he kind of git holt of hissef an grapped a meat cleaver off the wall. “Gump—Boiler—Stew!” he scream, an come after me with the cleaver. I done run out the door, an he be chasin me all over the parade grounds, an even thru the Officer’s Club an the Motorpool. I outrunned him tho, cause that is my specialty, but let me say this: they ain’t no question in my mind that I am up the creek for sure. One night, the next fall, the phone rung in the barracks an it was Bubba. He say they done dropped his atheletic scholarship cause his foot broke worst than they thought, an so he’s leavin school too. But he axed if I can git off to come up to Birmingham to watch the University play them geeks from Mississippi. But I am confined to quarters that Saturday, as I have been ever weekend since the stew
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Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
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After a while, they start landing some relief in helicopters, and I guess the napalm bomb have frightened away the gooks. They must of figured that if we was willing to do that to ourselves, then what the hell would we of done to them?
They taking the wounded out of there, when along come Sergeant Kranz, hair all singed off, clothes burnt up, looking like he just got shot out of a cannon.
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Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
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After a haf hour or so, they was beatin on the tables with they knives an forks like in a prison riot, an I knowed I had to do somethin fast, so I turned the boiler up high as it could go. I’m settin there watchin it, so nervous I didn’t know what to do, when all of a sudden the first sergeant come bustin thru the door. “What in hell is goin on here?” he axed. “Where is these men’s food?” “It is almost ready, Sergeant,” I say, an jus about then, the boiler commenced to rumble an shake. Steam begun to come out of the sides an one of the legs on the boiler tore loose from the floor. “What is that?” the sergeant axed. “Is you cookin somethin in that boiler!” “That is the supper,” I says, an the sergeant got this real amazed look on his face, an a secont later, he got a real frightened look, like you might get jus before an automobile wreck, an then the boiler blew up. I am not exactly sure what happened nex. I do remember that it blowed the roof off the mess hall an blowed all the winders out an the doors too. It blowed the dishwasher guy right thru a wall, an the guy what was stackin plates jus took off up in the air, sort of like Rocket Man. Sergeant an me, we is miraculously spared somehow, like they say will happen when you are so close to a han grenade that you aren’t hurt by
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Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
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Or when you keep a sex-addiction meeting under surveillance because they’re the best places to pick up chicks.” Serge looked around the room at suspicious eyes. “Okay, maybe that last one’s just me. But you should try it. They keep the men’s and women’s meetings separate for obvious reasons. And there are so many more opportunities today because the whole country’s wallowing in this whiny new sex-rehab craze after some golfer diddled every pancake waitress on the seaboard. That’s not a disease; that’s cheating. He should have been sent to confession or marriage counseling after his wife finished chasing him around Orlando with a pitching wedge. But today, the nation is into humiliation, tearing down a lifetime of achievement by labeling some guy a damaged little dick weasel. The upside is the meetings. So what you do is wait on the sidewalk for the women to get out, pretending like you’re loitering. And because of the nature of the sessions they just left, there’s no need for idle chatter or lame pickup lines. You get right to business: ‘What’s your hang-up?’ And she answers, and you say, ‘What a coincidence. Me, too.’ Then, hang on to your hat! It’s like Forrest Gump’s box of chocolates. You never know what you’re going to get. Most people are aware of the obvious, like foot fetish or leather. But there are more than five hundred lesser-known but clinically documented paraphilia that make no sexual sense. Those are my favorites . . .” Serge began counting off on his fingers. “This one woman had Ursusagalmatophilia, which meant she got off on teddy bears—that was easily my weirdest three-way. And nasophilia, which meant she was completely into my nose, and she phoned a friend with mucophilia, which is mucus. The details on that one are a little disgusting. And formicophilia, which is being crawled on by insects, so the babe bought an ant farm. And symphorophilia—that’s staging car accidents, which means you have to time the air bags perfectly
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Tim Dorsey (Pineapple Grenade (Serge Storms #15))
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Therefore, we are led to the conclusion that growth in the spiritual life (and this is surprising to capitalists) takes place not by acquisition of something new. It isn’t like the acquisition of new information, which some call “spiritual capitalism.” In reality our growth is hidden. It is accomplished by the release of our current defense postures, by the letting go of fear and our attachment to self-image. Thus, we grow by subtraction much more than by addition. It’s not a matter of more and better information. The wisdom traditions say that information itself is not the key. Once our defenses are out of the way and we are humble and poor, truth is allowed to show itself. It is not acquired. It shows itself when we are free from ideology, fear, and anger. “I know” won’t get us anywhere. The truth is, I don’t know anything. Our real hero is Forrest Gump! Perhaps he was a metaphor for beginner’s mind. Only nonknowing is spacious enough to hold and not distort the knowing that is possible.
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Richard Rohr (Everything Belongs: The Gift of Contemplative Prayer)
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trigger, a gook bullet hit him square in the head an blowed it inside out. He lyin on the ground, han still holdin to the gun for dear life, which he does not have any more of now. Oh God, it were awful—an gettin worst. No tellin what them gooks would of done if they caught us. I call out to Doyle to come here, but they is no answer. I jerk the machine gun from po ole Bones’ fingers an squirm over to Doyle, but he an the two other guys layin there shot. They dead, but Doyle still breathin, so’s I grap him up an thow him over my shoulder like a flour sack an start runnin thru the brush towards Charlie Company, cause I scared outta my wits. I runnin for maybe twenty yards an bullets wizzin all aroun me from behin, an I figger I be shot in the ass for sure. But then I crash thru a canebreak an come upon a area with low grass an to my suprise it is filled with gooks, lyin down, lookin the other way, an shootin at Charlie Company—I guess. Now what do I do? I got gooks behin me, gooks in front of me an gooks right under my feet. I don’t
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Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))
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There was a guy next to my cot name of Dan, who had been blowed up inside a tank. He was all burnt and had tubes going in and out of him everyplace, but I never heard him holler. He talk real low and quiet, and after a day or so, him and me got to be friends. Dan came from the state of Connecticut, and he was a teacher of history when they grabbed him up and threw him into the Army. But because he was smart, they sent him to officer school and made him a lieutenant. Most of the lieutenants I know were about as simple minded as me, but Dan was different. He had his own philosophy about why we were here, which was that we were doing maybe the wrong thing for the right reasons, or vice-versa, but whatever it is, we ain't doing it right. Him being a tank officer and all, he say it ridiculous for us to be waging a war in a place where we can't hardly use our tanks on account of the land is mostly swamp or mountains. I told him about Bubba and all, and he nod his head very sadly and said there will be a lot more Bubbas to die before this thing is over.
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Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Forrest Gump, #1))
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out that the shootin is comin from in front of us, meanin that the gooks is in between us an our own position. In other words, we is out here alone. Sooner or later, he says, if the gooks do not overrun Charlie Company, they will come back this way, an if they find us here, they will not like it one bit. Point is, we got to move our asses. We get our shit together an begin to work back towards the ridge, but as we do, Doyle suddenly look down off our right to the bottom of the saddle an he see an entire busload of new gooks, armed to the teeth, movin up the hill towards Charlie Company. Best thing we coulda done then was to try an make friends with em an forget all this other shit, but that were not in the cards. So we jus hunkered down in some big ole shrubs an waited till they got to the top of the hill. Then Bones let loose with the machine gun and he must of kilt ten or fifteen of them gooks right off. Doyle an me an the other two guys is thowin grenades, an things is goin our way until Bones runs out of ammo an need a fresh belt. I feed
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Winston Groom (Forrest Gump (Vintage Contemporaries))