“
You get hit the hardest when trying to run or hide from a problem. Like the defense on a football field, putting all focus on evading only one defender is asking to be blindsided.
”
”
Criss Jami (Killosophy)
“
Homesickness hits hardest in the middle of a crowd in a large, alien city.
”
”
Christos Tsiolkas (Barracuda)
“
When they bombed Hiroshima, the explosion formed a mini-supernova, so every living animal, human or plant that received direct contact with the rays from that sun was instantly turned to ash.
And what was left of the city soon followed. The long-lasting damage of nuclear radiation caused an entire city and its population to turn into powder.
When I was born, my mom says I looked around the whole hospital room with a stare that said, "This? I've done this before." She says I have old eyes.
When my Grandpa Genji died, I was only five years old, but I took my mom by the hand and told her, "Don't worry, he'll come back as a baby."
And yet, for someone who's apparently done this already, I still haven't figured anything out yet.
My knees still buckle every time I get on a stage. My self-confidence can be measured out in teaspoons mixed into my poetry, and it still always tastes funny in my mouth.
But in Hiroshima, some people were wiped clean away, leaving only a wristwatch or a diary page. So no matter that I have inhibitions to fill all my pockets, I keep trying, hoping that one day I'll write a poem I can be proud to let sit in a museum exhibit as the only proof I existed.
My parents named me Sarah, which is a biblical name. In the original story God told Sarah she could do something impossible and she laughed, because the first Sarah, she didn't know what to do with impossible.
And me? Well, neither do I, but I see the impossible every day. Impossible is trying to connect in this world, trying to hold onto others while things are blowing up around you, knowing that while you're speaking, they aren't just waiting for their turn to talk -- they hear you. They feel exactly what you feel at the same time that you feel it. It's what I strive for every time I open my mouth -- that impossible connection.
There's this piece of wall in Hiroshima that was completely burnt black by the radiation. But on the front step, a person who was sitting there blocked the rays from hitting the stone. The only thing left now is a permanent shadow of positive light. After the A bomb, specialists said it would take 75 years for the radiation damaged soil of Hiroshima City to ever grow anything again. But that spring, there were new buds popping up from the earth.
When I meet you, in that moment, I'm no longer a part of your future. I start quickly becoming part of your past. But in that instant, I get to share your present. And you, you get to share mine. And that is the greatest present of all.
So if you tell me I can do the impossible, I'll probably laugh at you. I don't know if I can change the world yet, because I don't know that much about it -- and I don't know that much about reincarnation either, but if you make me laugh hard enough, sometimes I forget what century I'm in.
This isn't my first time here. This isn't my last time here. These aren't the last words I'll share.
But just in case, I'm trying my hardest to get it right this time around.
”
”
Sarah Kay
“
What about you?You stay by my side day and night and take the hardest hits of them all.Why,Will?Why have you stayed with me all these centuries?You watch me die again and again,yet you never leave. You keep trying to save me, even though you know I'm doomed. All because some angel told you to?Come on.No more secrets,you said.Tell me.
”
”
Courtney Allison Moulton (Angelfire (Angelfire, #1))
“
Sometimes I feel like a tree on a hill, at the place where all the wind blows and the hail hits the tree the hardest. All the people I love are down the side aways, sheltered under a great rock, and I am out of the fold, standing alone in the sun and the snow. I feel like I am not part of the rest somehow, although they welcome me and are kind. I see my family as they sit together and it is like theyh ave a certain way between them that is beyond me. I wonder if other folks ever feel included yet alone.
”
”
Nancy E. Turner (These Is My Words: The Diary of Sarah Agnes Prine, 1881-1901)
“
I had felt the shot coming; I hadn’t realized the bow was loaded with this very quarrel, perfectly calibrated to hit him hardest. What part of me had been studying him, stockpiling knowledge as ammunition?
”
”
Rachel Hartman (Seraphina (Seraphina, #1))
“
Here is the hardest hit of all, O'Malley," Harry said. "Here is the very worst thing I can do to you."
He held out his hand, as if asking for a handshake.
He was asking for a handshake.
Conor responded almost automatically, putting out his own hand and shaking Harry's before he even thought about what he was doing. They shook hands like two businessmen at the end of a meeting.
"Goodbye, O'Malley," Harry said, looking into Conor's eyes. "I no longer see you.
”
”
Patrick Ness (A Monster Calls)
“
When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest, if you must, but don’t you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don’t give up though the pace seems slow-
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than,
It seems to a faint and faltering man,
Often the struggler has given up,
When he might have captured the victor’s cup,
And he learned too late when the night slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out-
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far,
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit-
It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit
”
”
Edgar A. Guest
“
At first I thought common nouns were hardest hit, coffee and doorway and so on, but it soon became clear that the missing were mostly adjectives.
”
”
Leif Enger (Virgil Wander)
“
Because that’s what mothers do. We shelter the hardest truths from our children to keep them safe. We take the hit so they don’t have to feel the pain.
”
”
Stephanie Wrobel (Darling Rose Gold)
“
Here is the hardest hit of all, O’Malley,” Harry said. “Here is the very worst thing I can do to you.”
He held out his hand, as if asking for a handshake.
He was asking for a handshake.
”
”
Patrick Ness (A Monster Calls)
“
Every person has a heart, but we're not always lucky enough to get a glimpse of it. And every heart, even the hardest, has a fragile spot. If you hit it there, it shatters.
”
”
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni (Sister of My Heart (Anju and Sudha #1))
“
Number one: the elevator to success is broken—take the stairs. Number two: it is when you’re hardest hit that you mustn’t quit. Number three: love yourself so that love will not be a stranger when it comes.
”
”
Jenifer Lewis (The Mother of Black Hollywood: A Memoir)
“
A man hits me--I hit the man a little harder--then he won't do it again.' Unfortunately he did do it again--a little harder still. The effort to hit harder carried on the action and reaction till society, hitting hardest of all, set up a system of legal punishment, of unlimited severity. It imprisoned, it mutilated, it tortured, it killed; it destroyed whole families, and razed contumelious cities to the ground.
”
”
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (The Man-Made World)
“
That God is rich in mercy means that your regions of deepest shame and regret are not hotels through which divine mercy passes but homes in which divine mercy abides. It means the things about you that make you cringe most, make him hug hardest. It means his mercy is not calculating and cautious, like ours. It is unrestrained, flood-like, sweeping, magnanimous. It means our haunting shame is not a problem for him, but the very thing he loves most to work with. It means our sins do not cause his love to take a hit. Our sins cause his love to surge forward all the more. It means on that day when we stand before him, quietly, unhurriedly, we will weep with relief, shocked at how impoverished a view of his mercy-rich heart we had.
”
”
Dane C. Ortlund (Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers)
“
There are few codes held more deeply among the poor, the religious, and the uneducated than that it is good and healthy and wholesome parenting to hit your kids. That their kids grow up with anger-management issues, who like hitting almost as much as they like getting hit, is not taken as evidence that maybe they're wrong here. Its right there in the Bible: "Spare the rod, and spoil the child." The Bible also says, "Violence begets violence." But the Bible says a lot of dumb shit.
”
”
Lauren Hough (Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing)
“
Increasingly, we are emptying the connection,
respect, and empathy out of one of the most important and healthy of human experiences and turning it into branding, showmanship, and posturing. In the midst of this epidemic and cultural shift into narcissism, relationships have taken the hardest hit of all.
”
”
Ramani Durvasula (Should I Stay or Should I Go?: Surviving a Relationship with a Narcissist)
“
Sometimes I feel like a tree on a hill, at the place where all the wind blows and the hail hits the hardest. All the people I love are down the side aways, sheltered under a great rock, and I am out of the fold, standing alone in the sun and the snow. I feel like I am not part of the rest somehow, although they welcome me and are kind. I see my family as they sit together and it is like they have a certain way between them that is beyond me. I wonder if other folks ever feel included yet alone.
”
”
Nancy E. Turner (These Is My Words)
“
She taps the Bronx. "This part of the city gets hit the hardest by everything. Gangs, real estate scams, whatever. Hard people, too, if they came through any of that . . . so in a lot of ways, this is the heart of New York. The part of itself that held on to all the attitude and creativity and toughness everybody thinks is the whole city.
”
”
N.K. Jemisin (The City We Became (Great Cities, #1))
“
Stick to the fight when you're hardest hit,
It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.
”
”
Bear Grylls
“
Life happens. I think everyone sort of has a default mode, if you will. When the hardest things in life hit, they throw you back into your default.
”
”
M.E. Carter (Juked (Texas Mutiny #1))
“
For most of my life I've been a bare-knuckle fighter. The one who wins is the one who hits the hardest.
”
”
Jeanette Winterson (Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?)
“
Boys are suffering, in the modern world. They are more disobedient—negatively—or more independent—positively—than girls, and they suffer for this, throughout their pre-university educational career. They are less agreeable (agreeableness being a personality trait associated with compassion, empathy and avoidance of conflict) and less susceptible to anxiety and depression,172 at least after both sexes hit puberty.173 Boys’ interests tilt towards things; girls’ interests tilt towards people.174 Strikingly, these differences, strongly influenced by biological factors, are most pronounced in the Scandinavian societies where gender-equality has been pushed hardest: this is the opposite of what would be expected by those who insist, ever more loudly, that gender is a social construct. It isn’t. This isn’t a debate. The data are in.
”
”
Jordan B. Peterson (12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos)
“
Bellatrix was still fighting too, fifty yards away from Voldemort, and like her master she dueled three at once: Hermione, Ginny, and Luna, all battling their hardest, but Bellatrix was equal to them, and Harry’s attention was diverted as a Killing Curse shot so close to Ginny that she missed death by an inch — He changed course, running at Bellatrix rather than Voldemort, but before he had gone a few steps he was knocked sideways. “NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!” Mrs. Weasley threw off her cloak as she ran, freeing her arms. Bellatrix spun on the spot, roaring with laughter at the sight of her new challenger. “OUT OF MY WAY!” shouted Mrs. Weasley to the three girls, and with a swipe of her wand she began to duel. Harry watched with terror and elation as Molly Weasley’s wand slashed and twirled, and Bellatrix Lestrange’s smile faltered and became a snarl. Jets of light flew from both wands, the floor around the witches’ feet became hot and cracked; both women were fighting to kill. “No!” Mrs. Weasley cried as a few students ran forward, trying to come to her aid. “Get back! Get back! She is mine!” Hundreds of people now lined the walls, watching the two fights, Voldemort and his three opponents, Bellatrix and Molly, and Harry stood, invisible, torn between both, wanting to attack and yet to protect, unable to be sure that he would not hit the innocent. “What will happen to your children when I’ve killed you?” taunted Bellatrix, as mad as her master, capering as Molly’s curses danced around her. “When Mummy’s gone the same way as Freddie?” “You — will — never — touch — our — children — again!” screamed Mrs. Weasley. Bellatrix laughed, the same exhilarated laugh her cousin Sirius had given as he toppled backward through the veil, and suddenly Harry knew what was going to happen before it did. Molly’s curse soared beneath Bellatrix’s outstretched arm and hit her squarely in the chest, directly over her heart. Bellatrix’s gloating smile froze, her eyes seemed to bulge: For the tiniest space of time she knew what had happened, and then she toppled, and the watching crowd roared, and Voldemort screamed.
”
”
J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Harry Potter, #7))
“
There is nothing like young love. It comes at a time before the heart knows to protect itself, when everything important is raw and exposed—the perfect environment for a soul-sucking, heart-crushing burst. It burns brightest, hits hardest, and touches deepest. It’s why Facebook flames erupt two decades later between high school sweethearts. Between two naive and innocent souls, anything can happen. Soulmates or Tragedy. And sometimes, both.
”
”
Alessandra Torre (The Ghostwriter)
“
The nail that sticks out the farthest is hit the hardest.
”
”
Patrick Jones
“
I can't – I don't understand. That's a human being there on the ground, and nobody cares.
”
”
Kelly Kennedy (They Fought for Each Other: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Hardest Hit Unit in Iraq)
“
There is no doubt that sometimes we hit the ground, and we hit the ground hard. When we get hit the hardest, is when we bounce back the strongest.
”
”
Tony Curl
“
The hardest thing to do in baseball is to hit a round baseball with a round bat, squarely
”
”
Ted Williams
“
The same things we were doing when we were 1-13 were the same things we were doing in 1975. But with much better players.
”
”
Chad Millman (The Ones Who Hit the Hardest: The Steelers, the Cowboys, the '70s, and the Fight for America's Soul)
“
..:Life's hardest battles hits us all. @ different places and stages. Yet, at the end, those who win are the ones who think they can and try:..
”
”
Rafael Garcia
“
Yet it’s always the silent games we play with ourselves that hit the hardest.
”
”
Ruth Stilling (Boarded Hearts (Seattle Scorpions, #1))
“
This profound sense of loss is as devastating as the urgent feeling that focus on the future is necessary. The two feelings, loss and hope, hit us simultaneously.
”
”
Kelly Corrigan (Tell Me More: Stories About the 12 Hardest Things I'm Learning to Say)
“
Reality hit the hardest the day I realized everyone will become a memory at some point in my life......
”
”
Arshdeep Singh
“
The Cunninghams are country folks, farmers, and the crash hit them hardest.
”
”
Harper Lee
“
You were the fucking girl that got away, you know that? You were the one who just slipped right through my stupid fingers.
”
”
A.S. Teague (The Hardest Hit)
“
Whatever this is, destiny, fate, some cosmic pull, or just a fuck lot of intense chemistry, we’re connected. We just have to decide what to do with it. And I choose you. I choose us.
”
”
A.S. Teague (The Hardest Hit)
“
Among the hardest hit was Terry the Tramp, who immediately loaded up on LSD and spent the next twelve hours locked in the back of a panel truck, shrieking and crying under the gaze of some god he had almost forgotten, but who came down that night to the level of the treetops “and just stared—man, he just looked at me, and I tell you I was scared like a little kid.
”
”
Hunter S. Thompson (Hell's Angels)
“
If anything, I've taken from this that I am indeed a good natured person, when I love I give it my all, I'm open to compromise and commitment, when something goes wrong, I'll try my hardest to fix it when some people would just walk away. I believe that is a true sign of character, to be willing to not give up when shit hits the fan, and try every possible route to fix things.
”
”
Kyle Jacob Adams
“
The community as a whole is better off or worse off according to whether or not the next generation is raised under circumstances that are more likely to produce productive citizens rather than parasites and criminals. Indeed, the less fortunate are the hardest hit by the consequences when social standards are compromise or jettisoned for the sake of cosmic concepts of equality.
”
”
Thomas Sowell (The Vision Of The Annointed: Self-congratulation As A Basis For Social Policy)
“
Liam tried to imagine what it must be like to have a mother like this. What a power it must grant a person in life to have a place where you could always land softly, even after the hardest hit.
”
”
Kristin Hannah (Angel Falls)
“
There is nothing like young love. It comes at a time before the heart knows to protect itself, when everything important is raw and exposed—the perfect environment for a soul-sucking, heart-crushing burst. It burns brightest, hits hardest, and touches deepest. It’s why Facebook flames erupt two decades later between high school sweethearts. Between two naive and innocent souls, anything can happen. Soulmates or Tragedy. And sometimes, both.
”
”
A.R. Torre (The Ghostwriter)
“
Often the struggler has given up, When he might have captured the victor’s cup. And he learned too late when the night came down, How close he was to the golden crown. Success is failure turned inside out, The silver tint of the clouds of doubt. And you never can tell how close you are, It may be near when it seems afar. So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit, It's when things seem worst that you mustn’t quit. And that’s worth thinking about.
”
”
Vic Johnson (Day by Day With James Allen)
“
What worried him worst at the moment - for it is often little things that are hardest to stand - was that his lip was bleeding where they had hit him and he couldn't wipe the little trickle of blood away although it tickled him.
”
”
C.S. Lewis (The Last Battle (Chronicles of Narnia, #7))
“
When things go wrong as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all up hill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.
Life is strange with its twists and turns
As every one of us sometimes learns
And many a failure comes about
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don't give up though the pace seems slow—
You may succeed with another blow.
Success is failure turned inside out—
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell just how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far;
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit—
It's when things seem worst that you must not quit
”
”
John Greenleaf Whittier
“
All of the questions that had been open when my head had hit the pillow were still pending. But in the intervening hours, my brain had been changing to fit the new shape of my world. I guess that’s why we can’t do anything else when we’re sleeping: it’s when we work hardest.
”
”
Neal Stephenson (Anathem)
“
A good defense was steadfast and strong and straightforward, dominating in a physical and merciless way. Offense could be messy and tricky, full of mistakes that made the ball tumble to and fro, taking the coach’s stomach for a ride along with it. For Noll, like Brown before him, football’s greatness appeared in the finest details, the inches won in the trenches, not the bundles of yards gained by the fleetest feet or the strongest arms. But mostly, to play great defense was practical, and there is logic and beauty in pragmatism. Logic was Noll’s muse.
”
”
Chad Millman (The Ones Who Hit the Hardest: The Steelers, the Cowboys, the '70s, and the Fight for America's Soul)
“
The impact on our health barely rates any media coverage, even though that’s the part of a changing climate that will hit us the hardest in the near future. The United States has neglected to support research into the health consequences of climate change, according to a 2009 report
”
”
Linda Marsa (Fevered: Why a Hotter Planet Will Hurt Our Health -- and how we can save ourselves)
“
It’s a silent war that hits the poor hardest but also hammers the middle class. Its victims, for the most part, lack economic power, access to lawyers, or well-funded political organizations to fight their battles. The result is widespread damage that all too often passes for inevitability.
”
”
Cathy O'Neil (Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy)
“
His hair was especially mussed. So much so that her fingertips tingled with the need to grab and plunder the curls and let her mouth work the wicked quirk of his lips that verged on a smile. But it was his eyes that hit her the hardest. A settled gray that would forever be stamped Happy Place in her mind.
”
”
Taryn Elliott (Uncross Your Heart)
“
..:It's in the hardest situations that we truly get to learn and understand and appreciate life more. It's there that we get to value what we have and what we once had and lost. No doubt.
Sometimes we have to hit rock bottom in order to open our eyes and truly see what life has to offer. Specially of how bless we are on having such a geat and mercyful God. A God that having all the right to judge us and condemm us, He chooses to forgive us and grant us new opportunities. New beginnings.
It's amazing the things we go through in order to become better human beings. More humble, more mercyful and more compassionate:..
”
”
Rafael Garcia
“
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.
”
”
Abdi Nazemian (Only This Beautiful Moment)
“
Meanwhile, Sunny was also traveling to Thailand to set up another swine flu testing outpost. The epidemic had spread to Asia, and the country was one of the region’s hardest hit with tens of thousands of cases and more than two hundred deaths. But unlike in Mexico, it wasn’t clear that Theranos’s activities in Thailand were sanctioned by local authorities.
”
”
John Carreyrou (Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup)
“
We’ve always had this cosmic pull between us. We’ve swapped secrets for years. I’ve told him stuff that no one else knows.”
Her browns shot up.
“Even you. I’ve told him things even you don’t know. I dunno. He’s always just felt… God, I don’t know the word to describe it.”
“Right?” she piped up.
“Yeah,” I nodded. “Yeah. He’s just always felt right. For years now, he’s just felt right.
”
”
A.S. Teague (The Hardest Hit)
“
It’s the photos that hit me the hardest, though. A woman cradling her husband’s limp body. A crowd looking on, emotionless, as police shine a flashlight on a woman’s bloodied corpse. A couple, half on the ground and half tangled in their moped, their blank faces turned toward the camera and sprays of blood on the pavement behind their heads. Sisters gathered around their baby brother’s body lying in its small casket. A body with its head covered in a dirty cloth left in a pile of garbage on the side of the street. Grayish-green corpses stacked like firewood in an improvised morgue. There’s even a short video of grainy security cam footage in which a masked motorcyclist pulls up next to a man in an alleyway, shoots him point-blank in the side of the head, then drives away. In high definition, I see the victims’ wounds, their oddly twisted limbs, their blood and brain matter sprayed across familiar-looking streets. In every dead body, I see Jun. I want to look away. But I don’t. I need to know. I need to see it. These photographers didn’t want to water it down. They wanted the audience to confront the reality, to feel the pain that’s been numbed by a headline culture.
”
”
Randy Ribay (Patron Saints of Nothing)
“
There's an old saying: if something's too cheap, somebody is paying. Maher's workers earn $120 to $140 per month to work six days a week-low wages not only globally, but by Bangladesh's standards-to do jobs that are made more stressful with each acceleration of the fast-fashion cycle. Outside of factory gates, those workers endure environmental consequences of a nation cutting corners to keep its industries competitive. The air in Narayanganj, once known as the 'Dandy of the East," is typically an odorous grey-brown and sometimes makes foreign visitors nauseous-the city is one of those where blue skies appeared like a miracle during the coronavirus lockdowns. Bangladesh is one of the nations hardest hit by climate change, although carbon emissions per person there are radically lower than in richer nations.
”
”
J.B. MacKinnon (The Day the World Stops Shopping: How Ending Consumerism Saves the Environment and Ourselves)
“
When care is pressing you down a bit
Rest if you must, but don’t you quit.
For life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won if he’d stuck it out.
Success is just failure turned inside out,
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt.
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far.
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit,
It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit!
”
”
Brian Tracy (Maximum Achievement: Strategies and Skills that Will Unlock Your Hidden Powers to Succeed)
“
He flapped and hopped until he was up in the air and, frantically looking around, eyed the dining room table again and headed its way. This time he stuck his feet out in front of him and held them open like hands trying to grab solid ground. But it didn’t help. He hit the table, slid on his rear all the way across, and crashed on the floor again. Again I dissolved in laughter and again Wesley stared stonily at the wall. I stopped laughing abruptly when I realized that Wesley was embarrassed. Learning to fly is physically and emotionally very difficult, and human owl mothers should not laugh at their babies. From then on I tried my hardest to keep a straight face. Most pet owners know that animals can read emotions such as anger, approval, affection, and acceptance. But it had never occurred to me that perhaps an animal could feel ridiculed. From that point forward, no one in Wendy’s house was allowed to laugh at Wesley, at least not in front of him, while he was learning to fly. Sometimes we had to run into the bathroom, shut the door, and burst out laughing.
”
”
Stacey O'Brien (Wesley the Owl: The Remarkable Love Story of an Owl and His Girl)
“
Sometimes I feel like a tree on a hill, at the place where all the wind blows and the hail hits the hardest. All the people I love are down the side a ways, sheltered under a great rock, and I am out of the fold, standing alone in the sun and the snow. I feel like I am not part of the rest somehow, although they welcome me and are kind. I see my family as they sit together and it is like they have a certain way between them that is beyond me. I wonder if other folks ever feel included yet alone." - Nancy E. Turner "These is my Words
”
”
Nancy E. Turner
“
I scan through the poem again, and my chest aches at the details he’s included. My white-knuckled grip on yesteryear, the way I hold everyone at arm’s length…But it’s those last few lines that hit me the hardest. Because I don’t know the answer. Who am I? Have I built my own prison, reinforced it with beams of guilt and bricks of loneliness over the months since Mother and Father vanished? Pushed away anyone who wanted to care, bowed my head and resolved to not lean on anyone, not trust anyone besides Lucy since we lost them?
Could things be different?
”
”
Jessica S. Olson (A Forgery of Roses)
“
The economic crisis and subsequent bailout exacerbated inequality by every metric and did not lead to significant reform of the financial sector. Bailed-out banks continued to foreclose on the homes of working-class families while refusing to make new loans to creditworthy borrowers. Under an Ivy League–educated African American president, African American family wealth had collapsed. In fact, it is common knowledge that African American and Latino homeowners were hit hardest by the 2008 financial crisis: by 2018, an African American family owned $5.00 in assets for every $100.00 owned by white families.6 Obama’s identity politics did not translate into economic policies that benefited minorities and working-class people.
”
”
Catherine Liu (Virtue Hoarders: The Case against the Professional Managerial Class)
“
The fate of India showcased the moral logic of climate change at its most grotesque: expected to be, by far, the world’s most hard-hit country, shouldering nearly twice as much of the burden as the next nation, India’s share of climate burden was four times as high as its share of climate guilt. China is in the opposite situation, its share of guilt four times as high as its share of the burden. Which, unfortunately, means it may be tempted to slow-walk its green energy revolution. The United States, the study found, presented a case of eerie karmic balance: its expected climate damages matching almost precisely its share of global carbon emissions. Not to say either share is small; in fact, of all the nations in the world, the U.S. was predicted to be hit second hardest.
”
”
David Wallace-Wells (The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming)
“
440,000 residents were scattered all around the country. But New Orleans did survive. And years later, it continues to recover — building by building, house by house, tree by tree, road by road, family by family. Seventy-five percent of residents have returned. To many visitors, the city seems as vibrant as it always was, with unforgettable music and food, beautiful buildings and gardens, and streets that bustle with energy unlike any other city in America. But in some of the poorest and hardest-hit neighborhoods, recovery has been painfully slow. If Barry were to come back to the Lower Ninth Ward today, he would see few of his neighbors smiling down from their porches. Much of the Lower Nine is still abandoned. Only 19 percent of that neighborhood’s residents have returned.
”
”
Lauren Tarshis (Hurricane Katrina, 2005 (I Survived, #3))
“
By 2026 and certainly thereafter, hundreds more colleges will go defunct. How do we know? Because exactly eighteen years after the baby bust of 2008, the number of American high school graduates will fall off a cliff. Those who had been planning on attending college nearby may pack up and leave for good, joining college employees who have no reason to stick around, together turning once thriving towns into dust bowls. The southern US will be hit hardest, as it represents nearly 45 percent of American high schoolers as well as the most colleges closing shop. (In Texas, only 56 percent of high school students go to college anyway.) The South will only be able to revive its local economies by attracting people—natives or foreigners—willing to uplift these dilapidated communities
”
”
Parag Khanna (Move: Where People Are Going for a Better Future)
“
The winter of 1789 was the hardest within living memory. No one, not even the old people of the district, had ever known anything like it. The cold weather set in early, and, coming on top of a bad harvest, led to great distress among the tenant farmers and the peasants. We were hard hit at the foundry too, for conditions on the road became impossible, what with frost and ice, and then snow; and we were unable to deliver our goods to Paris and the other big cities. This meant that we were left with unsold merchandise on our hands, and little prospect of getting rid of it in the spring, for in the meantime the traders in Paris would be buying elsewhere—if, that is, they ordered at all. There was a general drop in demand for luxury commodities at this time, owing to the unrest throughout the country.
”
”
Daphne du Maurier (The Glass-Blowers)
“
Don't Quit
When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
when the road you're trudging seems all uphill,
when the funds are low and the debts are high,
and you want to smile but you have to sigh,
when care is pressing you down a bit - rest if you must, but don't you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns.
As everyone of us sometimes learns.
And many a fellow turns about when he might have won had he stuck it out.
Don't give up though the pace seems slow - you may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than it seems to a faint and faltering man;
Often the struggler has given up when he might have captured the victor's cup;
and he learned too late when the night came down,
how close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out - the silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
and when you never can tell how close you are,
it may be near when it seems afar;
so stick to the fight when you're hardest hit - it's when things seem worst, you must not quit.
”
”
Edgar A. Guest
“
When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a fellow turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out.
Don't give up though the pace seems slow —
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man;
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor's cup;
And he learned too late when the night came down,
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out —
The silver tint in the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It might be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit —
It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.
”
”
John Greenleaf Whittier
“
For eight fucking years, I’ve been chasing you, Mel. Eight years of me calling and texting, instigating any kind of communication I could get just to keep you in my reach. Eight years of sparing you from the shit show that is my life. Eight years of sitting back knowing that at any minute, another man could walk in and take you from me permanently. Don’t you dare stand there and act like I’ve been the one pushing you away and playing games for the last decade. Because I’ve been on my knees for you since the first time I saw you … It’s about fucking time I got back on my feet.”
… Resting my hand on his thigh, I bent until our noses were nearly touching. His broad shoulders and muscular body turned to stone from the contact. But I didn’t let that slow me. “We’ve both been on our knees for the last eight years. But at least we were there together. You’ve always wanted me, just like I’ve always wanted you. And this is it. We can finally have the chance at something real. Don’t you dare ask me to give that up.
”
”
A.S. Teague (The Hardest Hit)
“
Chimpanzees use between fifteen and twenty-five different tools per community, and the precise tools vary with cultural and ecological circumstances. One savanna community, for example, uses pointed sticks to hunt. This came as a shock, since hunting weapons were thought to be another uniquely human advance. The chimpanzees jab their “spears” into a tree cavity to kill a sleeping bush baby, a small primate that serves as a protein source for female apes unable to run down monkeys the way males do.23 It is also well known that chimpanzee communities in West Africa crack nuts with stones, a behavior unheard of in East African communities. Human novices have trouble cracking the same tough nuts, partly because they do not have the same muscle strength as an adult chimpanzee, but also because they lack the required coordination. It takes years of practice to place one of the hardest nuts in the world on a level surface, find a good-sized hammer stone, and hit the nut with the right speed while keeping one’s fingers out of the way.
”
”
Frans de Waal (Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?)
“
If we combine the mass extinctions in Australia and America, and add the smaller-scale extinctions that took place as homo sapiens spread over Afro-Asia - such as the extinction of all other human species - and the extinctions that occurred when ancient foragers settled remote islands such as Cube, the inevitable conclusion is that the first wave of Sapiens colonisation was one of the biggest and swiftest ecological disasters to befall the animal kingdom. Hardest hit were the large furry creatures. At the time of the Cognitive Revolution, the planet was home to about 200 genera of large terrestrial mammals weighing over fifty kilograms. At the time of the Agricultural Revolution, only about a hundred remained. Homo sapiens drove to extinction about half of the planet's big beasts long before humans invented the wheel, writing or iron tools.
This ecological tragedy was restaged in miniature countless times after the Agricultural Revolution. The archaeological record of island after island tells the same sad story. The tragedy opens with a scene showing a rich and varied population of large animals, without any trace of humans. In scene two, Sapiens appear, evidenced by a human bone, a spear point, or perhaps a potsherd. Scene three quickly follows, in which men and women occupy centre stage and most large animals, along with many smaller ones, are gone. (p. 80)
”
”
Yuval Noah Harari (Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind)
“
If I’m ever tempted to let it get to my head, all I have to do is remember the first time I was recognized in public. I was with Jennie Garth, back in Season 3. She was way more famous than me (Derek Who?) and she was asked to the Eiffel Tower ceremony at the Paris Las Vegas hotel. They shut off half the strip and there were thousands of people outside the hotel lined up to see it. I was onstage supporting her, when I was suddenly hit with a wave of nausea. I knew instantly I had food poisoning from something I’d eaten earlier in the day. I knew if I didn’t get off the stage at that moment, I was going to throw up--and that would be the story on the evening news, not Jennie’s lighting!
I jumped off the stage and just wanted to get back to my room where I could vomit in peace. As I was racing through the hotel lobby, a few people stopped me. “Aren’t you Derek Hough from Dancing with the Stars?” I was trying to be polite, but I just kept eyeing garbage cans in case I couldn’t hold it in any longer.
“Yeah, thanks,” I said. I signed a few autographs and tried to push my way to the elevators.
“Wait! Derek! Can I get you to sign this?” More people started coming at me. I swear, I had to hold my breath so I wouldn’t hurl! When I finally got upstairs, I threw up thirty-two times. I was deathly ill. But somewhere, in that haze of hellish food poisoning, it hit me: This is pretty cool! People know who I am! But I’ve tried my hardest not to let that change me. I’m kind of a free spirit; what you see is what you get. Inside is still that crazy little boy who liked to bounce off his living room walls.
”
”
Derek Hough (Taking the Lead: Lessons from a Life in Motion)
“
It’s like lifting—when you’re deep in a set, your arms are shaking and you’re a melting candle of pain that’s burned down to zero; you got nothing left to give. And in that darkest moment you cry out, ‘Lord, I can’t!’ and a voice comes out of the darkness and says, ‘But I can.’ That’s the still, small voice that comes in the night. That’s the sound of something bigger than yourself. That’s God talking. And he says, ‘You are not alone,’ and enfolds you in wings of the eagle, and he carries you up. But first you have to burn away everything that doesn’t matter. You have to burn away leg warmers and New Age crystals, and Madonna, and aerobics, and New Kids on the Block, and the boy you’re sweet on in school. You burn away your parents, and your friends, and everything you ever cared about, and you burn away personal safety, conventional morality. And when all that is gone, when everything is swept away in the fire and everything around you is ash, what you have left is just a tiny nugget, a little kernel of something that is good, and pure, and true. And you pick that pebble up, and you throw it at the fortress this demon has built in your friend’s soul, this leviathan of hatred and fear and oppression, and you throw this tiny pebble and it hits that wall and it goes ping . . . and nothing happens. That’s when you’ll have the hardest doubts you ever had in your life. But never doubt the truth. Never underestimate it. Because a second later, if you’ve been through the fire, you’ll hear the cracks start to spread, and all those mighty walls and iron gates will collapse like a house of cards because you have harrowed yourself until all that’s left is truth. That’s what that pebble is, Abby. It’s our core.
”
”
Grady Hendrix (My Best Friend's Exorcism)
“
With China and Russia, the ideological contrast is clearer. Putin, the commandant of a petro-state that also happens to be, given its geography, one of the few nations on Earth likely to benefit from continued warming, sees basically no benefit to constraining carbon emissions or greening the economy—Russia’s or the world’s. Xi, now the leader-for-life of the planet’s rising superpower, seems to feel mutual obligations to the country’s growing prosperity and to the health and security of its people—of whom, it’s worth remembering, it has so many. In the wake of Trump, China has become a much more emphatic—or at least louder—green energy leader. But the incentives do not necessarily suggest it will make good on that rhetoric. In 2018, an illuminating study was published comparing how much a country was likely to be burdened by the economic impacts of climate change to its responsibility for global warming, measured by carbon emissions. The fate of India showcased the moral logic of climate change at its most grotesque: expected to be, by far, the world’s most hard-hit country, shouldering nearly twice as much of the burden as the next nation, India’s share of climate burden was four times as high as its share of climate guilt. China is in the opposite situation, its share of guilt four times as high as its share of the burden. Which, unfortunately, means it may be tempted to slow-walk its green energy revolution. The United States, the study found, presented a case of eerie karmic balance: its expected climate damages matching almost precisely its share of global carbon emissions. Not to say either share is small; in fact, of all the nations in the world, the U.S. was predicted to be hit second hardest.
”
”
David Wallace-Wells (The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming)
“
No one acts in a void. We all take cues from cultural norms, shaped by the law. For the law affects our ideas of what is reasonable and appropriate. It does so by what it prohibits--you might think less of drinking if it were banned, or more of marijuana use if it were allowed--but also by what it approves. . . .
Revisionists agree that it matters what California or the United States calls a marriage, because this affects how Californians or Americans come to think of marriage.
Prominent Oxford philosopher Joseph Raz, no friend of the conjugal view, agrees: "[O]ne thing can be said with certainty [about recent changes in marriage law]. They will not be confined to adding new options to the familiar heterosexual monogamous family. They will change the character of that family. If these changes take root in our culture then the familiar marriage relations will disappear. They will not disappear suddenly. Rather they will be transformed into a somewhat different social form, which responds to the fact that it is one of several forms of bonding, and that bonding itself is much more easily and commonly dissoluble. All these factors are already working their way into the constitutive conventions which determine what is appropriate and expected within a conventional marriage and transforming its significance."
Redefining civil marriage would change its meaning for everyone. Legally wedded opposite-sex unions would increasingly be defined by what they had in common with same-sex relationships.
This wouldn't just shift opinion polls and tax burdens. Marriage, the human good, would be harder to achieve. For you can realize marriage only by choosing it, for which you need at least a rough, intuitive idea of what it really is. By warping people's view of marriage, revisionist policy would make them less able to realize this basic way of thriving--much as a man confused about what friendship requires will have trouble being a friend. . . .
Redefining marriage will also harm the material interests of couples and children. As more people absorb the new law's lesson that marriage is fundamentally about emotions, marriages will increasingly take on emotion's tyrannical inconstancy. Because there is no reason that emotional unions--any more than the emotions that define them, or friendships generally--should be permanent or limited to two, these norms of marriage would make less sense. People would thus feel less bound to live by them whenever they simply preferred to live otherwise. . . .
As we document below, even leading revisionists now argue that if sexual complementarity is optional, so are permanence and exclusivity. This is not because the slope from same-sex unions to expressly temporary and polyamorous ones is slippery, but because most revisionist arguments level the ground between them: If marriage is primarily about emotional union, why privilege two-person unions, or permanently committed ones? What is it about emotional union, valuable as it can be, that requires these limits?
As these norms weaken, so will the emotional and material security that marriage gives spouses. Because children fare best on most indicators of health and well-being when reared by their wedded biological parents, the same erosion of marital norms would adversely affect children's health, education, and general formation. The poorest and most vulnerable among us would likely be hit the hardest. And the state would balloon: to adjudicate breakup and custody issues, to meet the needs of spouses and children affected by divorce, and to contain and feebly correct the challenges these children face.
”
”
Sherif Girgis
“
I found out Si was taking naps every day on Kay’s couch! I went to Phil and told him it was a problem.
“Look, I know he’s your brother and he’s my uncle, but he’s not the kind of worker we need to have,” I told Phil, while trying to make a good first impression.
I was trying to instill a new work ethic and culture in Duck Commander, and I couldn’t have Si sleeping on the job!
“Don’t touch Si,” Phil told me. “You leave him alone. He’s making reeds and that’s the hardest thing we do. Si is the only guy who wants to do it, and he’s good at it. Si is fine.”
Amazingly enough, in the ten years I’ve been running Duck Commander, we’ve never once run out of reeds. Six years ago, Si suffered a heart attack. He smoked cigarettes for almost forty years and then quit after his heart attack, so we were all so proud of him. Even before his heart attack, I wasn’t sure about putting Si on our DVDs because I thought he would just come across too crazy. He cracked us up in the duck blind and we all loved him, but I told Jep and the other camera guys to film around him. Honestly, I didn’t think anyone would understand what he was saying. When we finally tried to put him on the DVDs, he clammed up in front of the camera and looked like a frog in a cartoon just sitting there. He wouldn’t perform. Finally, we put a hidden camera under a shirt on Si’s desk. We were near the end of editing a DVD and showed a shooting scene to Si. He always takes credit for shooting more ducks than he really did. He’s said before that he killed three ducks with one shot! We were watching patterns hitting the water, and Si started claiming the ducks like he always does and going off on one of his long tangents. After we recorded him, we ran the DVD back and showed it to him. I think Si saw that he was actually pretty funny and entertaining if he acted like himself. We started putting Si on the DVDs and he got more and more popular. Now he’s the star of Duck Dynasty!
”
”
Willie Robertson (The Duck Commander Family)
“
Looking back from a safe distance on those long days spent alone, I can just about frame it as a funny anecdote, but the reality was far more painful. I recently found my journal from that time and I had written, ‘I’m so lonely that I actually think about dying.’
Not so funny.
I wasn’t suicidal. I’ve never self-harmed. I was still going to work, eating food, getting through the day. There are a lot of people who have felt far worse. But still, I was inside my own head all day, every day, and I went days without feeling like a single interaction made me feel seen or understood. There were moments when I felt this darkness, this stillness from being so totally alone, descend. It was a feeling that I didn’t know how to shake; when it seized me, I wanted it to go away so much that when I imagined drifting off to sleep and never waking up again just to escape it, I felt calm.
I remember it happening most often when I’d wake up on a Saturday morning, the full weekend stretching out ahead of me, no plans, no one to see, no one waiting for me. Loneliness seemed to hit me hardest when I felt aimless, not gripped by any initiative or purpose. It also struck hard because I lived abroad, away from close friends or family.
These days, a weekend with no plans is my dream scenario. There are weekends in London that I set aside for this very purpose and they bring me great joy. But life is different when it is fundamentally lonely.
During that spell in Beijing, I made an effort to make friends at work. I asked people to dinner. I moved to a new flat, waved (an arm’s-length) goodbye to Louis and found a new roommate, a gregarious Irishman, who ushered me into his friendship group. I had to work hard to dispel it, and on some days it felt like an uphill battle that I might not win, but eventually it worked. The loneliness abated.
It’s taken me a long time to really believe, to know, that loneliness is circumstantial. We move to a new city. We start a new job. We travel alone. Our families move away. We don’t know how to connect with loved ones any more. We lose touch with friends. It is not a damning indictment of how lovable we are.
”
”
Jessica Pan (Sorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want to Come: An Introvert's Year of Living Dangerously)
“
It's when I unlock the door and walk inside that the truth of my home life hits the hardest. That's where the shadows live, behind the closed doors and draped windows of houses that look like everyone else's. Skulk past the white-washed exterior and you'll find the rot fast enough. But most don't care to dig even that deep. They may smell the decay, but they don't want to deal with the reality.
”
”
Karpov Kinrade (Vampire Girl 8: Of Dreams and Dragons)
“
When I got home, it was late at night. I walked into my room and it was painfully empty. And then I saw it. On the bed were the engagement ring and a letter. I couldn’t read the letter. I still have it but have never read it. I was too sad and ashamed about hurting her.
Because I’d proposed to her on national television and now had some celebrity status, my management team said that we needed to make a statement. It could be in our own words, but Jamie and I had to make a statement announcing our breakup. We wrote it together over email and then we chose a date and time to post it. We texted each other right before we had decided we would post it, and then we each hit ENTER on our keyboards.
There’s nothing more final than an official statement declaring to the world that your relationship is over. It was the hardest breakup I’ve ever had. And that is not a dig at Brandi or Tracy. I just think I was older, more mature, and more capable or forming a deeper connection with Jamie. And I did. I had a deeper connection to her than to anyone else I’ve ever known. As painful as it was to walk away from her, I know it was for the best for her and for me. And I will forever be thankful for the time I had with her. She made me a better person.
”
”
Noah Galloway (Living with No Excuses: The Remarkable Rebirth of an American Soldier)
“
If it looks like you’re overreacting, you’re probably doing the right thing.”
That’s a quote from Tony Fauci, and I agree. The irony of NPIs (non-pharmaceutical interventions) is that the better they work, the easier it is to criticize the people who put them in place. If a city or state adopts them early enough, the case numbers will stay low, and critics will find it easy to say they weren’t necessary.
For example, in March 2020, officials in the city and county of St. Louis took several steps to limit transmission, including a shelter-in-place order. As a result, the initial outbreak in St. Louis was not as severe as it was in many other U.S. cities, leading some to suggest that the policies were an overreaction. But one study found that if the government had implemented the very same interventions just two weeks later, the number of deaths would have shot up sevenfold. St. Louis would have been on par with some of the hardest-hit areas in the country.
”
”
Bill Gates (How to Prevent the Next Pandemic)
“
Wars in general, and civil wars to a greater degree, have the effect of exacerbating class tensions, because the sacrifices of war are always distributed unequally, and the poor are hit hardest. North and South had staked so much on their class-based definitions of nationhood that it is no exaggeration to say that in the grand scheme of things, Union and Confederate leaders saw the war as a clash of class systems wherein the superior civilization would reign triumphant.
”
”
Nancy Isenberg (White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America)
“
No, it’s the same people who are always in power, Vera. Sometimes they call themselves communists, sometimes capitalists, sometimes devoutly religious—whatever they need to be to hang on to power. The former communists in Russia are the same people who own all the industries now. They’re the real rip-off merchants. But the professional middle classes, people like Valentina’s husband, have been hardest hit.
”
”
Marina Lewycka (A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian)
“
Karl Malden once said the hardest thing he ever had to do as an actor was act as if he didn’t know he was about to be hit in the head with a beer can.
”
”
Roger Ebert
“
When things go wrong, as they sometimes will, When the road you're trudging seems all uphill, When the funds are low and the debts are high, And you want to smile, but you have to sigh, When care is pressing you down a bit, Rest if you must, but don't you quit. Life is queer with its twists and turns, As every one of us sometimes learns, And many a fellow turns about When he might have won had he stuck it out. Don't give up though the pace seems slow — You may succeed with another blow. Often the goal is nearer than It seems to a faint and faltering man; Often the struggler has given up When he might have captured the victor's cup; And he learned too late when the night came down, How close he was to the golden crown. Success is failure turned inside out — The silver tint in the clouds of doubt, And you never can tell how close you are, It might be near when it seems afar; So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit — It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.
”
”
John Greenleaf Whittier
“
On the other hand, many youths report that it was their direct personal observations of the ravages of crack smoking and heroin injection among their older siblings, parents, and members of the community that led them to avoid crack and heroin use.” Despite commonly held beliefs in Black complacency with drugs and crime, it’s also clear that residents of the communities hardest hit by the crack epidemic played some part in its decline. In several cities, they formed neighborhood patrols and watch groups with the specific goal of driving out drug dealers and closing down crack houses, taking the dangerous work of securing their neighborhoods into their own hands. They also founded organizations, launching campaigns and initiatives to provide access to substance-abuse programs and job training, to beautify streets, build playgrounds, and mentor children.
”
”
Donovan X. Ramsey (When Crack Was King: A People's History of a Misunderstood Era)
“
The combination of cutting ties with the McCartneys and losing his father hit Denny hard. “Leaving the band was the hardest decision I ever had to make in my life,” the drummer said, “and it was one that affected my life profoundly. The years that followed were not pretty; for many, many years, they weren’t pretty. I didn’t know what to do with the situation. I had a problem with alcohol over it, which I solved. It was a very, very difficult journey for my wife and I to go through.
”
”
Allan Kozinn (The McCartney Legacy: Volume 1: 1969 – 73)
“
We have to pay attention. See who is the most hurt.
It is the Indigenous communities in Nicaragua and Honduras.
It is those struggling in Puerto Rico.
It was Black communities during Hurricane Katrina when the levees broke and people were left on their rooftops waving flags, with no help in sight.
Who gets hit the hardest? Bangladesh, Manila, Cartagena.
All the places that flood, are flooded.
”
”
Ellen Hagan (Don't Call Me a Hurricane)
“
I bow my head . . . only to see Lucien’s pin fastened over my heart. His silly, bright non-regulation daffodil pin that catches the light obscenely. It always seems to wink at me right when my tiredness hits hardest. My fingers press against the pin, until I feel it cut into my flesh.
”
”
Rebecca Quinn (Entangled (Brutes of Bristlebrook, #2))
“
In my midthirties, I realized that my parents would die soon. Not like a terminal illness. I just mean in the flow of time. It hit me hardest when my mother turned seventy. I did a quick bit of math. I go home to see her twice a year. The average American woman lives to be seventy-six. If that was how it went for her, I might see my mom only twelve more times.
It is a quaking discovery to watch “Mom” becoming an old woman. Not that she looks like one. Or acts like one. Every day she seems to be on some new hike, at some new party, or laughing in a car packed with friends. But that number, seventy, has its connotations. The timeless force of nature, the mother, who exists outside of real human relationships, more an element than a person, will leave you.
”
”
Jedidiah Jenkins (Mother, Nature: A 5,000-Mile Journey to Discover if a Mother and Son Can Survive Their Differences)
“
Mebbe being strong don’t mean being able to hit the hardest. Mebbe being strong means standin’ up even when there ain’t no hope of winning through strength of arms, you dig?
”
”
Alex Jennings (The Ballad of Perilous Graves)
“
I’m the one who taught Seb to play. I’m the one who took him to the courts every day after our mother died, when he was so low that I didn’t see him smile for a year. It was hardest on him and Aida—or at least, that’s what I thought at the time. They were only six and eight, just babies still. But now I wonder if it didn’t hit Nero worst of all. Seb and Aida are okay. They’ve pulled out of it, recovered their happiness again. While Nero just seems so . . . angry. He gets in fight after fight, each one nastier than the one before. I think he’s going to kill somebody.
”
”
Sophie Lark (Bloody Heart (Brutal Birthright, #4))
“
In my experience, it’s always the one in the group whose own position is most precarious, the one who walks the thin, thin line between insider and outcast—you can count on it, it’ll be him who hits the hardest, who laughs the loudest. The other butcherboys don’t particularly care whether I live or die, but this one, this Dowell—he’s the one who really hates me. Because Dowell knows, and he knows I know, that he’s a lot closer to being like me than his so-called friends are.
”
”
Sarah Henstra (We Contain Multitudes)
“
The hardest love is the love that comes after someone betrayed and mistreated you But please... Don’t hit the new love with a bat that belonged to another
”
”
Brittainy C. Cherry (Behind Closed Doors)
“
If we combine the mass extinctions in Australia and America, and add the smaller-scale extinctions that took place as Homo sapiens spread over Afro-Asia – such as the extinction of all other human species – and the extinctions that occurred when ancient foragers settled remote islands such as Cuba, the inevitable conclusion is that the first wave of Sapiens colonisation was one of the biggest and swiftest ecological disasters to befall the animal kingdom. Hardest hit were the large furry creatures. At the time of the Cognitive Revolution, the planet was home to about 200 genera of large terrestrial mammals weighing over 100 pounds. At the time of the Agricultural Revolution, only about a hundred remained. Homo sapiens drove to extinction about half of the planet’s big beasts long before humans invented the wheel, writing, or iron tools.
”
”
Yuval Noah Harari (Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind)
“
Until Mack finally bursts out, “What the hell is going on over there?” There’s no over there. I’m snuggled right up against him. But I know what he means anyway. “Nothing’s going on!” “Then why are you getting all upset for no reason! Are the cramps worse? Or are you sick again? Like yesterday?” It is kind of like yesterday when I was crying in the bathroom. “I’m not sick. I’m fine. I was trying to sleep. I thought you were asleep.” “Well, I was, but then I was getting hit by all these stressed vibes from you. It was very disturbing.” I sigh and give up trying to convince him of something that isn’t true. “I wasn’t really stressed. Just a bad memory. Sometimes they hit me, and I can’t push them away, and I feel it all again.” “Yeah. That happens to everyone, I think. What bad memory are you thinking about right now?” He asks the questions as if he’s absolutely certain that he has a right to the answer. I exhale deeply again. Stroke his hip. His lower back. His tight butt, completely bare as usual. “Honestly, I was thinking about when I broke up with you.” “Why were you thinking about that?” “I don’t know. Just a random, passing thought. But once it was lodged in my brain, it wouldn’t budge.” “And it upset you that much?” “Of course it upset me! It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.” He’s fully awake now. He eases me onto my back and rolls over on top of me, propping himself up on his arms so he can look down at me. “It was hard for me too.” “I know it was. I felt like shit for doing that to you. And I felt like shit for not realizing the way things… things really were a lot sooner.” “No, that part is my fault. All mine. I’m the one who told you all I wanted was the casual thing. I had my own self half-convinced it was the truth. Why wouldn’t you have believed me?” “I don’t know. But I felt guilty anyway. Still do a little.
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Claire Kent (Beacon (Kindled #8))
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The hardest part of raising a child is teaching them to ride bicycles. A shaky child on a bicycle for the first time needs both support and freedom. The realization that this is what the child will always need can hit hard.” —Sloan Wilson
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Bill Strickland (The Quotable Cyclist)
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Nobody tells you that girls hit the hardest, but they do. A good hit from a guy will knock you out, leave a nasty bruise, a black eye – but you’ll wake up, heal up. A girl can cleave your heart in two forever with a slap you barely feel, rip shreds out of your soul and leave you a walking zombie.
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J.D. Hawkins (Brando (Brando, #1))
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A long time ago inside a local ice rink, 15 year olds went to battle to win a game of hockey. They played for themselves, for their teams, for their coaches, for their towns, and for their families. It was a 0-0 tie in the 2nd period. Both goalies were outstanding. But one appeared to be somewhere else. Thinking. The shot came. The antagonist wasn’t aiming to break the scoreless tie. He was living up to his agreement with the other team’s coach. A coach who wanted his son to be the team's goalie. He didn’t want a new goalie that could take his team where they have never been. The playoffs. A goalie that could secure his team at the top. The coach watched the shot he bought. The goalie could have shifted, dodged out of the way, but he was paralyzed. He dropped to the ice when the puck struck his unprotected neck. The player skated over to examine the goalie. He had accomplished his task. And with the money he earned, he can buy the bicycle he always wanted. The goalie’s father was standing amongst the other parents. He was enraged that his son didn’t make the save. He felt the hard work he put into his boy slowly fade, and quickly die out. He knew how good his son was, and would be. He knew the puck struck because the goalie let it. He did not know why. I groaned as the puck hit me in the arm. I had pads, but pads can only soften the blow. I squeezed my arm. My father stood and watched. My friend fired another shot that whacked me in the throat, knocking me down. I felt dizzy. It was frigid on the pond in winter. This is where I learned to play hockey. This is also where I learned it was painful to be a goaltender. I got up slowly, glowering at him. My friend was perplexed at my tenacity. “This time, stay down!” And then he took the hardest slap shot I have ever encountered. The puck tore through the icy air at incredible speed right into my face. My glove rapidly came up and snatched it right before it would shatter my jaw. I took my glove off and reached for the puck inside. I swung my arm and pitched it as fiercely as I could at my friend. Next time we play, I should wear my mask and he should wear a little more cover than a hat. I turned towards my father. He was smiling. That was rare. I was relieved to know that I was getting better and he knew it. The ice cracked open and I dropped through… The goalie was alone at the hospital. He got up and opened the curtains the nurse keeps closing at night so he could see through the clear wall. He eyed out the window and there was nothing interesting except a lonely little tree. He noticed the way the moonlight shined off the grass and radiated everything else. But not the tree. The tree was as colourless as the sky. But the sky had lots of bright little glowing stars. What did the tree have? He went back to his bed and dozed off before he could answer his own question. Nobody came to visit him at the hospital but his mother. His father was at home and upset that his son is no longer on the team. The goalie spot was seized by the team’s original goalie, the coach’s son. The goalie’s entire life had been hockey. He played every day as his father observed. He really wanted a regular father, whatever that was. A father that cares about him and not about hockey. The goalie did like hockey, but it was a game. A sport just like other sports, only there’s an ice surface to play on. But he did not love hockey. It was just something he became very good at, with plenty of practice and bruises. He was silent in his new team’s locker room, so he didn’t assume anyone would come and see how he was doing.
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Manny Aujla (The Wrestler)
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My long-time favorite poem by an anonymous author is worth remembering today: When things go wrong as they sometimes will, When the road you're trudging seems all uphill. When the funds are low and the debts are high, And you want to smile, but you have to sigh. When care is pressing you down a bit, Rest if you must, but don't you quit. Life is queer with its twists and turns, As everyone of us sometimes learns. And many a fellow turns about, When he might have won had he stuck it out. Don't give up though the pace seems slow, You may succeed with another blow. Often the goal is nearer than It seems to a faint and faltering man. Often the struggler has given up, When he might have captured the victor’s cup. And he learned too late when the night came down, How close he was to the golden crown. Success is failure turned inside out, The silver tint of the clouds of doubt. And you never can tell how close you are, It may be near when it seems afar. So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit, It's when things seem worst that you mustn’t quit. And that’s worth thinking about.
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Vic Johnson (Day by Day With James Allen)
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Anyway, I pushed past Dirk the Jerk, and rushed toward the library. I needed to find an ultimate Minecraft guide with tips and tricks, shortcuts and secrets. My plan was simple. I’d buy the game, study the book, and start playing. It couldn’t be that hard, right? I was determined to beat Dirk the Jerk at something, even if it killed me! I headed to the library’s computer books section. I quickly scanned for game guides. They had books on popular games such as Candy Crusher, Angry Birdbrains, and Minion Marathon. But none about Minecraft? Then, I spotted a thin book crammed way at the back of the shelf. It was covered with a thick layer of dust and spiderwebs. (Yuck! I hate spiders!) I yanked it out: Minecraft: Surviving the First Night: An Insider’s Guide. It was more like a journal. Not exactly what I was looking for but it was better than nothing. I looked closer at the book and noticed that there wasn’t a library sticker on it. The best I could figure was that it must be someone’s personal copy. Maybe he was hiding it from his mom who didn’t approve of computer games. (I knew all about that.) At that point, I was really desperate. And since there wasn’t any way for me to check it out, I decided to take it. I was sure the owner wouldn’t miss it because it hadn’t been touched in forever. Maybe he’d forgotten all about it. And anyway, I’d return it after I crushed Dirk the Jerk in the survival challenge. When I got home, I was faced with the hardest part of my whole plan, convincing Mom to buy Minecraft. She thinks computer and video games are a waste of time, except for educational ones. (She grew up back when Pac Man was hi-tech.) I knew I’d need help coming up with reasons to convince Mom. So I checked with my good friend, Google, and I found a ton of information on why Minecraft was considered educational. Once I explained to Mom that Minecraft taught everything from spatial relationships to electrical circuitry to complex machines, she caved in, and bought it. Now that the hard part was over, all I needed to do was learn the game. I sat down in front of the computer in my room, and launched the game. I opened the Minecraft journal, and there was a bright flash of light! That’s the last thing I remember. The next thing I knew, I was sitting in the middle of a strange library. It took me a minute to figure out what the heck was going on. I looked around. Everything was made of blocks. I looked down at my arms... rectangles. I looked down at my legs... Rectangles! I looked down at my body... a RECTANGLE! Then it hit me... I was literally a blockhead IN Minecraft! *gulp* That’s when I flipped out a little bit. For about ten minutes straight. I probably would have freaked out for longer, but it’s exhausting screaming, flapping my arms, and running in circles on stumpy little legs. After I calmed down a bit and caught my breath, I thought of
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Minecrafty Family Books (Trapped in Minecraft! (Diary of a Wimpy Steve, #1))
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You mean on YouTube?” “No, I mean I was watching the game when you got laid out. Hardest hit I’ve ever seen. I don’t know how you survived it, Amos, I really don’t.” “Why’d
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David Baldacci (Memory Man (Amos Decker, #1))