“
Ackx must have owed him big time,” Q said in his drawly Clint Eastwood voice. “A favour like that doesn’t come cheap.”
Bonnyman spat into the fire. “A favour like that is only made between psychosis and a lust for power.
”
”
Frank Lambert (Xyz)
“
My people - before I was changed - they exchanged this as a sign of devotion. It's a Claddagh ring. The hands represent friendship; the crown represents loyalty... and the heart... Well, you know... Wear it with the heart pointing towards you. It means you belong to somebody. Like this.
”
”
Joss Whedon
“
At times he has the sensation that he and Marianne are like figure skaters, improvising their discussions so adeptly and in such perfect synchronisation that it surprises them both. She tosses herself gracefully into the air, and each time, without knowing how he's going to do it, he catches her.
”
”
Sally Rooney (Normal People)
“
Anam is the Irish word for “soul” and Ċara is the word for “friend.” In the Anam-Ċara friendship, you were joined in an ancient way with the friend of your soul. This was a bond that neither space nor time could damage. The friendship awakened an eternal echo in the hearts of the friends; they entered into a circle of intimate belonging with each other. The Anam-Ċara friendship afforded a spiritual space to all the other longings of the human heart.
”
”
John O'Donohue (Eternal Echoes: Celtic Reflections on Our Yearning to Belong)
“
There are good ships and wood ships, ships that sail the sea, but the best ships are friendships, may they always be!
”
”
Irish proverb
“
May the hinges of our friendship never grow rusty.
”
”
Irish Toast
“
I’m very proud of the young woman you’ve become. Your happiness is tantamount to mine, and so I send you off on this matrimonial journey with an Irish blessing: May the saddest day of your future be no worse than the happiest day of your past. May your hands be forever clasped in friendship, and your hearts joined forever in love. To the bride and groom.
”
”
Tracy Brogan (Hold On My Heart)
“
Her favorite Irish saying was 'may your right hand always be stretched out in friendship and never in want,
”
”
Barbara Freethy (Take Me Home (Callaways, #10.5))
“
There are many types of ships. There are wooden ships, and metal ships, and ships that sail the sea. But the best are friendships, and may they always be.” Old Irish
”
”
Penelope Carlevato (Tea on the Titanic: 100 Years Later)
“
We were already growing apart, in the weeks before she died - when I moved to New York, we almost certainly would have lost touch, become just another pair of girls who shared a brief and intense friendship that faded, as friendships usually do, with age and geography. But I believed every one of those old promises. I would have pitied any adult who told me that things would change. For you, I would have though, but not for us. I was going to leave, yes, but she was supposed to come, too. And didn't she? Those early days in New York, August, the city so hot I walked around drenched in its spit, she was with me all the time, in the things I did if not always in my thoughts. I got a job at a bar where all the waitstaff were Irish and wasn't it her who made me louder when I needed to be, who made me brave at night, walking home with all that cash? She's the way I swear and how I let men look at me or not, she's the bit of steel at my center, either her, herself, or the loss of her. Before that year I was nothing but a soft, formless girl, waiting for someone to come along and tell me who to be.
”
”
Julie Buntin (Marlena)
“
There are good ships and there are wood ships, the ships that sail the sea. But the best ships are friendships, and may they always be. A toast to your coffin. May it be made of hundred-year-old oak. And may we plant the tree together tomorrow. Here’s to Eve, the mother of us all, and here’s to Adam, who was Johnny-on-the-spot when the leaf began to fall. Give a man a match and he’ll be warm for a minute, but set him on fire and he’ll be warm for the rest of his life. Leprechauns, castles, good luck, and laughter. Lullabies, dreams, and love ever after. Poems and songs with pipes and drums. A thousand welcomes when anyone comes . . . That’s the Irish for you!
”
”
Stephen Revell (Picture Perfect (Weddings by Design #1))
“
An emblem of a bustling, growing country that was open to those willing to adopt a creed of “Americanism,” Roosevelt partially widened the understanding of the mainstream. “We freely extend the hand of welcome and of good-fellowship to every man, no matter what his creed or birthplace, who comes here honestly intent on becoming a good United States citizen like the rest of us,” Roosevelt said in 1894, adding: Americanism is a question of spirit, conviction, and purpose, not of creed or birthplace. The politician who bids for the Irish or German vote, or the Irishman or German who votes as an Irishman or German, is despicable, for all citizens of this commonwealth should vote solely as Americans; but he is not a whit less despicable than the voter who votes against a good American, merely because that American happens to have been born in Ireland or Germany….A Scandinavian, a German, or an Irishman who has really become an American has the right to stand on exactly the same footing as any native-born citizen in the land, and is just as much entitled to the friendship and support, social and political, of his neighbors.
”
”
Jon Meacham (The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels)
“
I still feel a pang every time I look at her,’ I admitted. ‘That’s it, isn’t it?’ he said enthusiastically. ‘A pang! A quickness in the heart.’ ‘Love,’ I said drily. ‘We’re lucky, you and I,’ he said, smiling. ‘It’s friendship, it’s love, and it’s still something more. It’s what the Irish call anmchara, a soul friend. Who else do you want to talk to at the day’s end? I love the evenings when we can just sit and talk and the sun goes down and moths come in to the candles.’ ‘And we talk of children,’ I said, and wished I had not, ‘and of servants’ quarrels, and whether the cross-eyed kitchen slave is pregnant again, and we wonder who broke the pothook, and whether the thatch needs repair or whether it will last another year, and we try to work out what to do about the old dog that can’t walk any more, and what excuse Cadell will conjure up for not paying his rent again, and we discuss whether the flax has steeped enough, and if we should rub butterwort on the cows’ udders to improve their yield. That’s what we talk of.
”
”
Bernard Cornwell (Enemy of God (The Warlord Chronicles, #2))
“
This is not all. We are prepared to go farther than to love in word and in tongue. There is not one who is called to advocate any article of revealed truth, who will not find a Reformed Presbyterian ready to stand by him and support him, though he may have been in keen controversy with him yesterday, and may be tomorrow. No denominational jealousy shall ever come over the spirit of a true Covenanter, to blind him to the preeminent claims of truth over all sectional interests. About forty years ago, there was a public, a protracted, and an ardent controversy, between the priests of Rome, and the ministers of the Irish Episcopal Church. In conversation with an Episcopal Clergyman, who complained of other Protestant bodies giving them the cold shoulder, I said, we are strongly attached to our own distinguishing profession, but I do not think any of our ministers are capable of looking, without interest, on your argument. He turned full before me and replied, "We never meet with a Covenanter but we meet with a friend." I would not own for a leal-hearted Cameronian one who, in like circumstances, could not extort a like testimony. I don’t know which is more contemptible, the man who would turn away from even an enemy in difficulties, and the man who could forfeit his own good opinion for the sake of any man’s friendship.
”
”
William Sommerville (The Social Position of Reformed Presbyterians or Cameronians)
“
Meeting God Within When people succeed in coming home to themselves and glimpsing their own inner beauty, something amazing happens: they are blessed with a real compassion for who they themselves are, in all their vulnerability. This compassion, in turn, carves out a space where they can welcome God into their hearts. It is as if they must first become aware of the marvel of themselves, and only then are they ready to get in touch with the wonder of God. Their new relationship with themselves ushers in a nourishing friendship with the One who has always been calling them. This journey inward does not take place overnight. Although the heart is only fifteen inches from the head, it can take us years to arrive at our emotional core. I used to imagine that God didn’t particularly like the world because it wasn’t spiritual enough. Only later it dawned on me that God had created the world in love, and had passionately left clues to this fact everywhere. The persons and events of my daily life were already signs of God. Had I paid compassionate attention to my longings and my joys, I would have heard in them the symphony of God’s own infinite joy. God was intimately involved in my life, but I was sadly ignorant of the riches inside me. To find God, I did not have to leave the world, but to come home to it—and to myself—and God would be there, waiting for me.
”
”
The Irish Jesuits (The Irish Province of the Society of Jesus) (Sacred Space: The Prayer Book 2015)
“
Your happiness is tantamount to mine, and so I send you off on this matrimonial journey with an Irish blessing: May the saddest day of your future be no worse than the happiest day of your past. May your hands be forever clasped in friendship, and your hearts joined forever in love. To the bride and groom.
”
”
Tracy Brogan (Hold On My Heart)
“
Around this time a strange sort of friendship developed between Aung San and Dorman-Smith. Aung San tended to become melancholy and sometimes turned to the Irish organic farmer to talk about his loneliness. He had no friends, he said, and found it difficult to make friends. Dorman-Smith asked him how he could say that “when you are the people’s idol?” “I did not seek to be that,” said Aung San, “but only to free my country. But now it is so lonely,” and saying this, he wept. Dorman-Smith tried his best to comfort him, but it was no good. “How long do national heroes last? Not long in this country; they have too many enemies . . . I do not give myself more than another eighteen months of life.
”
”
Thant Myint-U (The River of Lost Footsteps: A Personal History of Burma)
“
Irish Spring," the third book in the
Derry Greene thriller series, is due
out later in 2015.
”
”
Jack Adler (Soulmates from the Pages of History: From Mythical to Contemporary, 75 Examples of the Power of Friendship)
“
Audre explained, “Your pot is a rooibos. I know you usually take Earl Grey, but this will go best with the cheese and berry sponge cake. Which, to be quite honest, will be your favorite treat in London and the entire reason I chose this place.”
“You chose this place because you knew I’d love the cake?” Elizabeth almost teared up. Some people would always know you. . . .
”
”
Juliet Gauvin (The London Flat: Second Chances (The Irish Heart, #2))
“
The male-oriented Western world in which we live is linear and hierarchical. The world of the female is cyclical. The female is moist; the male is dry. The female, like the ancient goddess in whose image she is made, is infinitely generous. Her generosity takes many forms. When Christianity came to Ireland, the Irish hung on to their goddess, carving her into the walls of their churches. Sometimes she is depicted sitting on a pig, sometimes she has a huge vagina that she holds open with her hands. In the 18th and 19th centuries, most of these figures were removed, for what most terrifies the male is the absolute licentiousness of female generosity. It is a power that is completely free, that cannot be bought or sold, manipulated or exploited, and that is continually fueled by the seasons, nature, our friendship with each other, and our bonds to the earth. No wonder our materialistic world has devised ingenious ways of trying to contain women's wildness. Control a woman's hormones, and you may for a time be able to contain her wildness. Yet locked within the wildness of woman is her only true experience of freedom and meaning, as well as her sense of connection to the planet. No woman can live without these things for long. It is my belief that the time has come for the wild female energies to be set free.
”
”
Leslie Kenton (PASSAGE TO POWER)
“
How on earth is it that the Irish are today fighting tooth and nail not to enter the war on England's side, after being subjected to British "protection" and blessing for over 700 years? In this connection, we may recall the Irish national rising in 1916. Instead of giving the Irish self-government, England "protected" them by bombing Dublin, deporting 1,000 national Irish and executing their leaders. It was Churchill who was mainly responsible for the cruel mistreatment of the Irish with burning, looting and killing without law and order, because he had said that the Irish had to be put down like mad dogs. Only de Valera was spared, not out of human kindness, but solely because he was an American citizen, and one was anxious to injure the friendship with the United States
”
”
Gulbrand Lunde
“
The seventeenth-century Spanish Jesuit Baltasar Gracian wrote that “life without friends is like life on a desert island,” adding that to find and keep even one deep friendship in life is the greatest of blessings. Of
”
”
The Irish Jesuits (The Irish Province of the Society of Jesus) (Sacred Space for Advent and the Christmas Season 2016-2017)
“
Why did I throw in with him? I suppose we Irish had a mule-headed loyalty baked into our DNA. I could rely on one bedrock truth. Gerald had my back, no matter how lopsided the odds turned. No truer measure of friendship existed to my way of thinking.
”
”
Ed Lynskey (Death Car (P.I. Frank Johnson Mystery #7))
“
No enemy can match a friend.” Jonathan Swift, Irish author
”
”
Betty G. Birney (Friendship According to Humphrey)
“
Roosevelt said in 1894, adding: Americanism is a question of spirit, conviction, and purpose, not of creed or birthplace. The politician who bids for the Irish or German vote, or the Irishman or German who votes as an Irishman or German, is despicable, for all citizens of this commonwealth should vote solely as Americans; but he is not a whit less despicable than the voter who votes against a good American, merely because that American happens to have been born in Ireland or Germany….A Scandinavian, a German, or an Irishman who has really become an American has the right to stand on exactly the same footing as any native-born citizen in the land, and is just as much entitled to the friendship and support, social and political, of his neighbors.
”
”
Jon Meacham (The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels)
“
A Magic Hour’s Dreaming by Stewart Stafford
Is there a sight more fair than wheaten fields,
Awaiting the sun's ambush to potently ignite?
Colour vibrates beyond the eye revealed,
To live, dance and breathe in honeyed light.
Nature’s palette, painted hues so bright,
Invites the bees to sip and man to dream,
Of engineered art, dazzling to the sight,
Authored lightning in a celestial seam.
The creator’s canvas, mint beyond decay,
Invites the inner child to replenish at source,
Where Nature’s staff casts shadows away,
Friendships bond as a trickling stream's course.
An eyeblink flash carved in history's tree,
Treasured riches pooled of those by our side.
For in sepia’s sunflower memory,
We court the hand of an agreeable bride.
Fading birdsong underscores this bottled time,
In butterfly hearts, the hourglass stilled sublime.
Autumn's leaves, ochre embers, curtsied fall,
Farewell Summer, until roused in New Year's call.
© 2024, Stewart Stafford. All rights reserved.
”
”
Stewart Stafford
“
Girl," Vanessa said. "You're in an Irish bar. It wouldn't surprise me if they mixed whiskey with stout and tried to pass it as Chardonnay.
”
”
Anna Marie Riley (In Plain Sight)