Keeping Me Sane Quotes

What kept me sane was knowing that things would change, and it was a question of keeping myself together until they did.

What is that smell? (Nick) (It was like three-day-old cat vomit mixed with rotten asparagus.) Duck urine. It keeps the zombies from thinking I’m human. (Mark) Yeah, well it keeps me from thinking you’re sane. (Nick)

They spoke almost as loud as Feeling: and that clamoured wildly. "Oh, comply!" it said. "Think of his misery; think of his danger — look at his state when left alone; remember his headlong nature; consider the recklessness following on despair — soothe him; save him; love him; tell him you love him and will be his. Who in the world cares for you? or who will be injured by what you do?" Still indomitable was the reply — "I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad — as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth — so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am quite insane — quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.

Forever," I echo, and for the first time, I know that forever is a promise I can keep. I will love her forever, until the world crumbles and this memory is the only thing keeping me sane.

The kind of madness I had was different. It was quiet, and very, very dangerous. It was a madness designed to keep me sane.

I KNOW THE WAY YOU CAN GET I know the way you can get When you have not had a drink of Love: Your face hardens, Your sweet muscles cramp. Children become concerned About a strange look that appears in your eyes Which even begins to worry your own mirror And nose. Squirrels and birds sense your sadness And call an important conference in a tall tree. They decide which secret code to chant To help your mind and soul. Even angels fear that brand of madness That arrays itself against the world And throws sharp stones and spears into The innocent And into one's self. O I know the way you can get If you have not been drinking Love: You might rip apart Every sentence your friends and teachers say, Looking for hidden clauses. You might weigh every word on a scale Like a dead fish. You might pull out a ruler to measure From every angle in your darkness The beautiful dimensions of a heart you once Trusted. I know the way you can get If you have not had a drink from Love's Hands. That is why all the Great Ones speak of The vital need To keep remembering God, So you will come to know and see Him As being so Playful And Wanting, Just Wanting to help. That is why Hafiz says: Bring your cup near me. For all I care about Is quenching your thirst for freedom! All a Sane man can ever care about Is giving Love!

Power is lost or won, never created or destroyed. Power is a visitor to, not a possession of, those it empowers. The mad tend to crave it, many of the sane crave it, but the wise worry about its long-term side effects. Power is crack cocaine for your ego and battery acid for your soul. Power’s comings and goings, from host to host, via war, marriage, ballot box, diktat, and accident of birth, are the plot of history. The empowered may serve justice, remodel the Earth, transform lush nations into smoking battlefields, and bring down skyscrapers, but power itself is amoral.” Immaculée Constantin now looks up at me. “Power will notice you. Power is watching you now. Carry on as you are, and power will favor you. But power will also laugh at you, mercilessly, as you lie dying in a private clinic, a few fleeting decades from now. Power mocks all its illustrious favorites as they lie dying. ‘Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay, might stop a hole to keep the wind away.

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold the principles received by me when I was sane, not mad -- as I am now. Laws and principles are not for times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth -- so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane -- quite insane, with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations are all I have at this hour to stand; there I plant my foot.

I think the only reason I never lost my mind is that I knew I was innocent. That wasn't a happy thought, so the dementors couldn't suck it out of me...but it kept me sane and knowing who I am...helped me keep my powers...

I know it’s highly unusual for people to get this excited over books. But if you’re a reader, you get me . I don’t need movies. I don’t need TV. But books I can’t live without books. To me, a book is better than any movie. All I need is a good book, my imagination, and I am set free. I’m in literature heaven. And thank God, this may be the only thing that keeps me sane while we’re here.

She's a tangled mess of wild- a forest nymph, a goddess child. She's like the seductive sea - feral and fierce, calm and serene. She's the starfish swimming in my soul, the woman child who keeps me sane, who keeps me whole.

I paint my wrists a pretty red To silence the demons in my head Creating art out of my pain It's the only thing that keeps me sane But why do others cry when they see my art? Is it because I ripped the canvas apart? I never understood why they looked so upset I guess they just don't like the color red

She would keep me sane, and I would keep her safe.

You’re my addiction, Caitlin, keeping me sane at the same time as driving me crazy.

She has had no role in my life except to keep me sane, fed, housed, amused, and protected from unwanted telephone calls, also to restrain me fairly frequently from making a horse's ass of myself in public, to force me to attend to books and ideas from which she knows I will learn something; also to mend my wounds when I am misused by the world, to implant ideas in my head and stir the soil around them, to keep me from falling into a comfortable torpor, to agitate my sleeping hours with problems that I would not otherwise attend to; also to remind me constantly (not by precept but by example) how fortunate I have been to live for fifty-three years with a woman that bright, alert, charming, and supportive.

Music is my therapy and my straitjacket. Music keeps me sane and keeps my mind on something. It's fragile up there.

I love you, Dad. Your words are my lifeline. They keep me sane in an insane world." - Joshua

Find a man that will watch over you. Don’t settle for men who only have one thing in mind. If he doesn’t like to eat, something is wrong with him,” she says, which makes me laugh. “He needs to put you before himself—always,” she would tell me. “He needs to love you more than you love him.” That one confuses me a bit, but I don’t ask... “You mustn’t be afraid of love, Blake. No matter what you go through in life, don’t be afraid to love. Loving is the only thing that keeps us sane. If it weren’t for love, the suffering we experience wouldn’t be worth it. If it weren’t for the suffering, we wouldn’t cherish the good things life gives us. Sometimes it’ll seem as though life only knocks you down, but you have to learn to pick yourself up and fight back. I love you, Blake. I will always love you even when I’m no longer here to tell you,” Aunt Shelley breathes weakly.” Excerpt From: Contreras, Claire. “There Is No Light in Darkness.” Claire Contreras, 2013-01-10T00:00:00+00:00. iBooks. This material may be protected by copyright.

You aren't insane, then." "Heavens no," I said. I eyed her. "You don't accept that." You see people that aren't there Mr. Leeds. It's a difficult fact to get around. "And, yet, I live a good life," I said. "Tell me. Why would you consider me insane, but the man who can't hold a job, who cheats on his wife, who can't keep his temper in check, you call him sane?

American society is uncomfortable with the idea that some people’s lives are difficult past the point of sanity and that they aren’t necessarily to blame. There’s no way you can argue that everyone has a difficult life. This is an incredible culture; the majority of people live in amazing comfort, with real dignity, maybe more comfort and dignity than any other culture in the history of the world. We live relatively safe and sane lives, which, if you’ve ever loved anybody and therefore feared for them, is a wonderful thing. But part of our moral responsibility is to keep in our minds those whose lives are unsafe and insane. In this way, fiction can be like a meditation, a way of saying: Though things are this way for me right now, they could be different later and are different for others this very moment.

Yeah, well, right now? Right now, I think being crazy may be the only thing that’s keeping me sane.

If. 'If' always propelled my thoughts back to the present, because 'if' depended so much on keeping my wits about me. I couldn't properly sense things if I was distracted. 'If' demanded my full presence and participation in 'now. 'If', as much as it scared me, also kept me sane.

I know, baby. I feel the same way about you. Those words never convey what goes through my mind and heart every time I look up and see you sitting in my house. Funny thing is, I always thought my house was full and that there was nothing missing in my life. I had a job I loved. Family who loved me. Good friends to keep me sane. Everything a human could want. And then I met an infuriating, impossible man who added the one thing I didn’t know wasn’t there.” – Tory “Dirty socks on the floor?” – Acheron

The little fantasies of murder are what keep servants sane. They tell themselves they allow me my power. And if ever I become too dreadful, they will do me in and maybe take over. But of course they never do. They procrastinate their vengeance because deep down, they are afraid not just of me, but like all people they fear their own fantasies. Easier to cherish them and keep them inside where they are in control. Possible.

Tell me. Why would you consider me insane, but the man who can't hold a job, who cheats on his wife, who can't keep his temper in check? You call him sane? ... Plenty of sane people can't manage to keep it all under control. Their mental state--stress, anxiety, frustration--gets in the way of their ability to be happy. Compared to them, I think I'm downright stable.

My father told me that it is only a mad man that keeps bushy hairs. I asked him, "what about the great men with bushy hairs?". He replied, "education had made them mad, so study to be wise and sane.

A sound of laughter was heard-they turned sharply. Vera Claythorne was standing in the yard. She cried out in a high shrill voice, shaken with wild bursts of laughter: "Do they keep bees on this island? Tell me that. Where do we go for honey? Ha! ha!" They stared at her uncomprehendingly. It was as though the sane well-balanced girl had gone mad right before their eyes. She went on in that high unnatural voice: "Don't stare like that! As though you thought I was mad. It's sane enough what I'm asking. Bees, hives, bees! Oh, don't you understand? Haven't you read that idiotic rhyme? It's up in all of your bedrooms-put it there for you to study! We might have come here straightaway if we'd had sense. Seven little soldiers chopping up sticks. And the next verse, I know the whole thing by heart, I tell you! Six little soldier boys playing with a hive. And that's why I'm asking-do they keep bees on this island- isn't it damned funny...?

I love you Tory. I know I say it a lot, but..." "I know baby. I feel the same way about you. Those words never convey what goes through my mind and heart every time I look up and see you sitting in my house. Funny thign is, I always thought my house was full and that there was nothing missing in my life. I had a job I loved. Family who loved me. Good friends to keep me sane. Everything a human could want. And t hen I met an infuriating, impossible man who added the one thing I didn't know wasn't there." "Dirty socks on the floor?" She laughed. "No, the other part of my heart. The last face I see before I go to sleep and the first one I see when I get up. I'm so glad it was you." Those words both thrilled and scared him. Mostly because he knew firsthand that if love went untended it turned into profound hatred. --Tory and Acheron

As I’ve been alluding to, my one saving grace is distraction. It keeps me sane. It helps me cope, considering the length of time I’ve been performing this job. The trouble is, who could ever replace me? Who could step in while I take a break in your stock-standard resort-style vacation destination, whether it be tropical or of the ski trip variety? The answer, of course, is nobody, which has prompted me to make a conscious, deliberate decision — to make distraction my vacation. Needless to say, I vacation in increments. In colors.

In this decaying world, these moments with her help keep me sane.

It is only intellect that keeps me sane; perhaps this makes me overvalue intellect against feeling. Bertrand Russell.

Believe me, it’s far more difficult to keep stoking one’s anger than it is to forgive and move on.” “Ah, so that’s how you manage to keep sane with Uncle Imcael.

I love Christmas. A time to slow down and enjoy life and be with my family and friends. In busy years, it keeps me sane. In bad years, it makes me feel whole again.

I'm holding on by a damn thread. Your phone calls and the fact I know she's in nice hotels and eating good food is the only fucking thing keeping me sane.

I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad — as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth — so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am quite insane — quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.

Grief is by nature the most violent of them all. The ancients tore their hair and rent their clothing to express it. Now we keep the dead body in our homes, shaking people’s hands as they pass by to view it and trying to stop ourselves from crying because it’s not socially acceptable. Tell me—which of these mourning practices is least sane?

What I mean is this: Prozac has rather minimal side effects, the lithium has a few more, but basically the pair keep me functioning as a sane human being, at least most of the time. And I can’t help feeling that anything that works so effectively, that’s so transformative, has got to be hurting me at another end, maybe sometime further down the road. I can just hear the words inoperable brain cancer being whispered to me by some physician twenty years from now.

Once intangled with the bondage of drugs, the philosophy was "mind over matter" this belief would help to keep my mind from an abusive or addictive behavior. What a rue--it was actually Jesus over the matter that kept me sane enough to follow Him.

I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man.  I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now.  Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be.  If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?  They have a worth—so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane—quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. 

If you’re some stranger who stumbled over this book by chance—perhaps rotting in some foreign garbage pile or locked in a dusty traveling trunk or published by some small, misguided press and shelved mistakenly under Fiction—I hope to every god you have the guts to do what needs doing. I hope you will find the cracks in the world and wedge them wider, so the light of other suns shines through; I hope you will keep the world unruly, messy, full of strange magics; I hope you will run through every open Door and tell stories when you return. But that’s not really why I wrote this, of course. I wrote it for you. So that you might read it and remember the things you were told to forget. Now at least you can look clear-eyed into your own future, and choose: stay safe and sane at home, as any rational man would—I swear I’ll understand— Or run away with me toward the glimmering, mad horizon. Dance through this eternal green orchard, where ten thousand worlds hang ripe and red for the plucking; wander with me between the trees, tending them, clearing away the weeds, letting in the air. Opening the Doors.

He was dying when I discovered him, you understand? But even in those moments I realised what kind of being I had found. A kindred spirit. Something nigh-immortal, with an intellect I could actually spar with.’ He sighed. ‘So few can match me. Can you blame me for wanting someone to talk to? A confidante to keep me sane?

Racing keeps me sane. Some people say they don’t believe in love at first sight, but to me, that was it. I fell in love with adrenaline—a nasty lover who leaves me as quickly as she came. I chase after her in any way I can have her. Drinking, driving, fucking—all adrenaline-inducing activities to keep the edginess inside of me at bay.

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth—so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane—quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.

Still indomitable was the reply—“I care for myself.  The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself.  I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man.  I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now.  Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be.  If at my individual

Many ideas and habits we thought we had because we were good or bad, smart or dumb, crazy or sane—or because our parents were—are simply the result of subtle distinctions between brains. If my brain works differently from your brain, then some things that are easy for me may be hard for you and vice versa without either of us being stupid, lazy, or crazy.

I shall say nothing Of my insanity, Which is that which Keeps me sane.

I’ve got a large feline to keep me sane, Lovely Layla is her name, Not really wild, but not too tame Queens of the Road!

The irony of talking to animals and an imaginary girlfriend, who keep me sane, even though I know I look like a raving lunatic, isn't lost on me.

I needed someone to tell me that I was sane, that I was special, and that I wasn't all that special.

You drive me crazy, but you keep my sane.

You drive me crazy, but you keep me sane.

I write from that dark place in my mind where all the sad, ugly, and twisted cases I've worked are stored. Writing keeps me sane.

She has the ability to keep me sane--she has the power to ruin me. Oleg--Deadly

While there are memories I wish I could dispose of, sometimes my memories are the only things that keep me sane.

As I’ve been alluding to, my one saving grace is distraction. It keeps me sane. It helps me cope,...

I write because… I write because I love the art and the magic of Literature. I write because it keeps me safe, sane, and connected to you. I write because it takes me to the places I want to go and those who wish to join me in the journey; may grasp my hand and my heart; in this stroll through this moment of time. I write because when no one was there, the word was there: The word has always been and always will be the preeminent being in my universe. I write because it allows me; to allow you to be understood and we are joined for a moment in time. I do not write because it comes from a place of grammatical perfection; free of line breaks in perfected poetry; for my history is one of line breaks and imperfections. I do not come to you from a place of polished and perfected; educated and critiqued. No! I come to you from a place of raw, real, gutsy, and riveting. What I give you is raw, real, gutsy and riveting; with all of its imperfections and inconsistencies. You have been touched, you have been curious, and you have been intrigued; you have come back looking, longing, expecting or not… But then suddenly you were surprised; surprised that you could be moved; surprised that your preconceived ideas had been shattered by one who writes because…

But here let me say one thing: From the moment, I entered the insane ward on the Island, I made no attempt to keep up the assumed role of insanity. I talked and acted just as I do in ordinary life. Yet strange to say, the more sanely I talked and acted the crazier I was thought to be by all except one physician, whose kindness and gentle ways I shall not soon forget.

I sent a clear warning to you, Aidan." There was a hint of censure in his words, although his voice was soft. There was a hard edge to Aidan's mouth. "I received your warning. But this is my city, Gregori, and my family. I take care of my own." Savannah rolled her eyes. "You could just beat on your chests,you know. It probably works just as well." You will show some respect, Gregori ordered. Savannah burst out laughing, then reached up to caress his shadowed jaw. "Keep hoping,my love, and perhaps someday someone will obey you." Aidan's mouth twitched, the golden eyes sliding over Gregori in amusement. "She inherited something besides her mother's good looks,did she not?" Gregori sighed heavily. "She is impossible." Aidan laughed,ignoring the warning flash from Gregori's pale eyes. "I believe they all are." Savannah ducked out from under Gregori's arm and found an overstuffed chair to curl up on. "Of course we're impossible.It's the only way to stay sane." "I would have brought Alexandria to meet you,but Gregori's warning dictated prudence." Aidan sounded smug, as if he had been able to lay down the law to his woman when Gregori was unable to do so. Savannah flashed an impish grin up at the man. "What did you do,leave her sleeping while you ran off to play hero? I'll just bet she has a thing or two to say to you when you wake her." Aidan had the grace to look sheepish. Then he turned to Gregori. "Your lifemate is a mean little thing, healer. I do not envy you." Savannah laughed, unrepentant. "He's crazy about me. Don't let him fool you." "I believe you," Aidan agreed. "Do not encourage her in her rebellion," Gregori tried to sound severe,but she was turning him inside out.She was everything to him, even with her silliness.Where did she get her outrageous sense of humor? How could she ever be happy with someone who hadn't laughed in centuries? She melted his insides. Melted him. He was careful to keep his face expressionless. It was bad enough that Savannah knew he was practically wrapped around her little finger. Aidan didn't need to know,too.

I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth—so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane—quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs.

Kyo: ...I can't help it. I'm...not made for interacting with people. Shigure: People aren't born social. Sure it comes easier to some people...but most people, like you, need to work at it. Some more than others. You're just inexperienced. For example, as a martial artist, you have the strength to break the table with your first. But you also have the self-control to stop your fist right before it hits the table. You weren't born with that control, were you? You had to refine it. That's the result of fighting bears in the mountains. Kyo: I DIDN'T FIGHT BEARS! Shigure: You're missing my point. It's the same as interacting with people. But training for that isn't in the mountains--it has to be in town where people live. Mingling with people, hurting them, getting hurt by them...that's how you learn about others...and about yourself. If you don't, you'll never be able to care about anyone but yourself. You may be a black belt fighter, but you're still a white belt in dealing with people. For the sake of the girl who will one day tell you she loves you...don't run away, keep training. Kyo: As if someone would ever tell me that. Shigure: And if someone did, what would you do? Kyo: I can't even imagine. I guess...I'd ask her if she was sane.

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth—so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane—quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.

I thrust Sophie into a corner, blocking her with my body. She panted and snagged her lower lip in her teeth. “This is not my life,” she insisted. I looked at her solemnly. “I’m afraid it is. But it doesn’t have to be for long. Let’s just get through this. Then things go back to normal for you.” “Like they keep going back to normal for you?” Sophie hissed. “Ghost of your mother, psycho ex-best friend, company agent dating your dad, psychic vampire ex-boyfriend, werewolf current boyfriend—by the way, I can’t blame you for that one,” she confessed, eyes round as she mouthed the word whoa before continuing with her list, “Trip to the asylum, attempts against your life, vigilante father…” “Hey, the last ones are brand new. And the vigilante father thing? He’ll revert.” “Anyhow, I’m not so keen on your concept of normal.” I caught her staring at me.

You want us to hunt down and extract information from the officer?” She shook her head. “Something better.” “Pray tell, little ghost.” “Send me in her place.” He stared. Kestrel said, “I’ll pretend to be her.” “Please understand. When I look at you as if you’re crazy, it’s not that I judge you for your insanity.” “I fit in her armor. I’m her size. I’m Valorian.” “You don’t look like her. Just because you’re Valorian doesn’t mean the officer at the relay station won’t notice that you’re a completely different person.” “It’s night. I can report to the officer while keeping my distance.” “I’m going back to sleep. Wake me when you’re sane.

Bryn,” he said. “Do you know how much I love you?” I smiled and answered with a hint of sarcasm in my tone, “Well, I’m not quite sure.” “No, I’m serious,” Tyler said, turning over onto his side so that he was facing me. His eyes were serious, something that I only saw when he really had something to say. “Yeah, I do. It’s the kind that hurts so good, right? Almost like you can’t breathe without the other person and the only thing that keeps you sane throughout the day is knowing that you’ll see that person soon enough. Nothing can come between you and that person. You would do anything for them. Be anyone they need you to be. Without thinking twice, you know you will be there, no matter what. That’s what loving you is to me.

That’s kept me sane and focused on what really matters—like work, and my friendships—for all the years since. And it’s allowed me to keep work and friendships in their own safe box. I was safe from experiencing that kind of pain again. He was the past.

Your wife,” said Arthur, looking around, “mentioned some toothpicks.” He said it with a hunted look, as if he was worried that she might suddenly leap out from behind a door and mention them again. Wonko the Sane laughed. It was a light easy laugh, and sounded like one he had used a lot before and was happy with. “Ah yes,” he said, “that’s to do with the day I finally realized that the world had gone totally mad and built the Asylum to put it in, poor thing, and hoped it would get better.” This was the point at which Arthur began to feel a little nervous again. “Here,” said Wonko the Sane, “we are outside the Asylum.” He pointed again at the rough brickwork, the pointing, and the gutters. “Go through that door” — he pointed at the first door through which they had originally entered — “and you go into the Asylum. I’ve tried to decorate it nicely to keep the inmates happy, but there’s very little one can do. I never go in there myself. If I ever am tempted, which these days I rarely am, I simply look at the sign written over the door and I shy away.” “That one?” said Fenchurch, pointing, rather puzzled, at a blue plaque with some instructions written on it. “Yes. They are the words that finally turned me into the hermit I have now become. It was quite sudden. I saw them, and I knew what I had to do.” The sign read: “Hold stick near center of its length. Moisten pointed end in mouth. Insert in tooth space, blunt end next to gum. Use gentle in-out motion.” “It seemed to me,” said Wonko the Sane, “that any civilization that had so far lost its head as to need to include a set of detailed instructions for use in a package of toothpicks, was no longer a civilization in which I could live and stay sane.” He gazed out at the Pacific again, as if daring it to rave and gibber at him, but it lay there calmly and played with the sandpipers. “And in case it crossed your mind to wonder, as I can see how it possibly might, I am completely sane. Which is why I call myself Wonko the Sane, just to reassure people on this point. Wonko is what my mother called me when I was a kid and clumsy and knocked things over, and sane is what I am, and how,” he added, with one of his smiles that made you feel, Oh. Well that’s all right then. “I intend to remain.

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad — as I am now.

I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth—so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane

Still indomitable was the reply: ‘I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad – as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?

Shout out to the people on the LitRPG Forum, and especially their Discord server, where they seem to not only put up with my oversharing of my process of writing (and editing in the final days) but also somehow trust me enough to put me in a position of power as a mod! You guys keep me sane!

He won't tell me very much about his war. None of us do. It isn't something to share, you see. What we've seen, what we've done, ought to stay in France. But it didn't, it came home in our memories. They aren't memories we want you to know. You are the world we fought for. Safe and sane and not ugly. Better to keep it that way.

So, I was going to have to spend a few weeks in the psych ward. It’s standard procedure. I have been through it a couple of times. After a few weeks they would give me a certificate certifying me sane, and I would hang it on my wall with the others, apart from the one I keep in my wallet. I make a point of showing it to people when they call me crazy.

Wesley was really the only thing getting me through those weeks. Some part of me was appalled at myself, but what could I say? I needed that escape-that high-more than ever, and he was always just a short drive away. A fix three or four times a week was all it took to keep me sane. God, I was like a fucking druggie. Maybe my sanity was long gone already.

Anxiety might be debilitating, melancholy too heavy a burden, but what is wrong with anger - especially with justified anger? It happens often - at literary festivals, public engagements or university events, someone in the audience, usually someone young, wants to convince me why you should all be enraged, and how rage is the progressive oil that keeps the wheels of fairness turning, a banner which we should wave proudly in the air against political gridlocks as well as economic, social and racial inequalities. I respect the sincerity of this cri de coeur and wholeheartedly recognize its validity. But I equally doubt whether anger by itself is a guiding force and a good friend in the long run. It is not.

You hold this book because of my friends, who are my family; and my family, who are my friends. It exists because I didn’t stop, and I didn’t stop because of the people I’m lucky to know and to love. You keep me safe and sane; you make my life rich. My beloved Bostonians: Laura Q. (my common-law Boston marriage) and Mike Messersmith, Jason and Karen Clarke,

Writing seemed to me to be the most natural thing to do during my college days. I could not open up to others and so I started writing my thoughts in my journal. It gave me a sense of calm and peace And now after so many years to write my thoughts in my journal still seems to me to be the most natural thing to do. I am still not able to open up easily in front of people. And so writing keeps me sane!

Still indomitable was the reply - "I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad - as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth - so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane - quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.

I actually really don't want to know," I admitted. "Up until a few seconds ago I had a lot of illusions about you being this incredible, sane guy and I'd like to keep them, but I'm not going to be satisfied until I do." "Fine then, I won't tell you." I planted my face in my palm and sighed. "It doesn't matter how crazy this is, I'm going to be thinking about it all night." He gave me a purely demonic grin. "Then I definitely won't tell you. " My eyes narrowed. "That's nothing to be proud of." "And why wouldn't I be proud of keeping a pretty girl up all night?" He chuckled and chewed on a French fry. My face and the back of my neck burned. He had to be joking. No one could say something so horrifying and then eat a French fry. Supernatural beings didn't like fast food, I was sure of it. This was all an elaborate hoax and I just hasn't picked up on it yet. It had to be, and even if it wasn't I would pretend it was. Pretend until it became true.

We decided that we should do Shabbos dinner here and we invited the family,” my dad said. “Please tell me you’re joking.” “Gabby, sweetie,” my mom said consolingly. “It’s best to get it over with quickly, trust me.” “Honey, I met them on my first date with your mother.” He looked at Braden. “I married her anyway.” I saw Braden try not to laugh. “It’s okay! You can laugh. We laugh a lot here. It keeps us sane and being sane is what separates us from the rest of Judy’s family.

Speak to me about power. What is it?” I do believe I’m being out-Cambridged. “You want me to discuss power? Right here and now?” Her shapely head tilts. “No time except the present.” “Okay.” Only for a ten. “Power is the ability to make someone do what they otherwise wouldn’t, or deter them from doing what they otherwise would.” Immaculée Constantin is unreadable. “How?” “By coercion and reward. Carrots and sticks, though in bad light one looks much like the other. Coercion is predicated upon the fear of violence or suffering. ‘Obey, or you’ll regret it.’ Tenth-century Danes exacted tribute by it; the cohesion of the Warsaw Pact rested upon it; and playground bullies rule by it. Law and order relies upon it. That’s why we bang up criminals and why even democracies seek to monopolize force.” Immaculée Constantin watches my face as I talk; it’s thrilling and distracting. “Reward works by promising ‘Obey and benefit.’ This dynamic is at work in, let’s say, the positioning of NATO bases in nonmember states, dog training, and putting up with a shitty job for your working life. How am I doing?” Security Goblin’s sneeze booms through the chapel. “You scratch the surface,” says Immaculée Constantin. I feel lust and annoyance. “Scratch deeper, then.” She brushes a tuft of fluff off her glove and appears to address her hand: “Power is lost or won, never created or destroyed. Power is a visitor to, not a possession of, those it empowers. The mad tend to crave it, many of the sane crave it, but the wise worry about its long-term side effects. Power is crack cocaine for your ego and battery acid for your soul. Power’s comings and goings, from host to host, via war, marriage, ballot box, diktat, and accident of birth, are the plot of history. The empowered may serve justice, remodel the Earth, transform lush nations into smoking battlefields, and bring down skyscrapers, but power itself is amoral.” Immaculée Constantin now looks up at me. “Power will notice you. Power is watching you now. Carry on as you are, and power will favor you. But power will also laugh at you, mercilessly, as you lie dying in a private clinic, a few fleeting decades from now. Power mocks all its illustrious favorites as they lie dying. ‘Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay, might stop a hole to keep the wind away.’ That thought sickens me, Hugo Lamb, like nothing else. Doesn’t it sicken you?

I don’t know how I did it,’ he said slowly. ‘I think the only reason I never lost my mind is that I knew I was innocent. That wasn’t a happy thought, so the Dementors couldn’t suck it out of me … but it kept me sane and knowing who I am … helped me keep my powers … so when it all became … too much … I could transform in my cell … become a dog. Dementors can’t see, you know …’ He swallowed. ‘They feel their way towards people by sensing their emotions … they could tell that my feelings were less – less human, less complex when I was a dog … but they thought, of course, that I was losing my mind like everyone else in there,

As I’ve been alluding to, my one saving grace is distraction. It keeps me sane. It helps me cope, considering the length of time I’ve been performing this job. The trouble is, who could ever replace me? Who could step in while I take a break in your stock-standard resort-style vacation destination, whether it be tropical or of the ski trip variety? The answer, of course, is nobody, which has prompted me to make a conscious, deliberate decision—to make distraction my vacation. Needless to say, I vacation in increments. In colors. Still, it’s possible that you might be asking, why does he even need a vacation? What does he need

And I’m changing, never thought I’d be like this But you showed me a better way I’ll do anything for your kiss In all my days I’ve never seen A man who means everything to me I can leave everything else in the dust But it’s you I just can’t give up She has the full attention of every man in the place. But her eyes . . . those stunning onyx eyes . . . are looking right at me. And it makes me feel like a god. I’ve never let anyone get this close to me before Distance keeps me safe and keeps me sane But now you’ve got my heart twisted with yours Better than it’s ever been, there’s a lot to lose But even so much more to win Oh, baby . . .

New Rule: If you're going to have a rally where hundreds of thousands of people show up, you may as well go ahead and make it about something. With all due respect to my friends Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, it seems that if you truly wanted to come down on the side of restoring sanity and reason, you'd side with the sane and the reasonable--and not try to pretend the insanity is equally distributed in both parties. Keith Olbermann is right when he says he's not the equivalent of Glenn Beck. One reports facts; the other one is very close to playing with his poop. And the big mistake of modern media has been this notion of balance for balance's sake, that the left is just as violent and cruel as the right, that unions are just as powerful as corporations, that reverse racism is just as damaging as racism. There's a difference between a mad man and a madman. Now, getting more than two hundred thousand people to come to a liberal rally is a great achievement that gave me hope, and what I really loved about it was that it was twice the size of the Glenn Beck crowd on the Mall in August--although it weight the same. But the message of the rally as I heard it was that if the media would just top giving voice to the crazies on both sides, then maybe we could restore sanity. It was all nonpartisan, and urged cooperation with the moderates on the other side. Forgetting that Obama tried that, and found our there are no moderates on the other side. When Jon announced his rally, he said that the national conversation is "dominated" by people on the right who believe Obama's a socialist, and by people on the left who believe 9/11 was an inside job. But I can't name any Democratic leaders who think 9/11 was an inside job. But Republican leaders who think Obama's socialist? All of them. McCain, Boehner, Cantor, Palin...all of them. It's now official Republican dogma, like "Tax cuts pay for themselves" and "Gay men just haven't met the right woman." As another example of both sides using overheated rhetoric, Jon cited the right equating Obama with Hitler, and the left calling Bush a war criminal. Except thinking Obama is like Hitler is utterly unfounded--but thinking Bush is a war criminal? That's the opinion of Major General Anthony Taguba, who headed the Army's investigation into Abu Ghraib. Republicans keep staking out a position that is farther and farther right, and then demand Democrats meet them in the middle. Which now is not the middle anymore. That's the reason health-care reform is so watered down--it's Bob Dole's old plan from 1994. Same thing with cap and trade--it was the first President Bush's plan to deal with carbon emissions. Now the Republican plan for climate change is to claim it's a hoax. But it's not--I know because I've lived in L.A. since '83, and there's been a change in the city: I can see it now. All of us who live out here have had that experience: "Oh, look, there's a mountain there." Governments, led my liberal Democrats, passed laws that changed the air I breathe. For the better. I'm for them, and not the party that is plotting to abolish the EPA. I don't need to pretend both sides have a point here, and I don't care what left or right commentators say about it, I can only what climate scientists say about it. Two opposing sides don't necessarily have two compelling arguments. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke on that mall in the capital, and he didn't say, "Remember, folks, those southern sheriffs with the fire hoses and the German shepherds, they have a point, too." No, he said, "I have a dream. They have a nightmare. This isn't Team Edward and Team Jacob." Liberals, like the ones on that field, must stand up and be counted, and not pretend we're as mean or greedy or shortsighted or just plain batshit at them. And if that's too polarizing for you, and you still want to reach across the aisle and hold hands and sing with someone on the right, try church.

I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth—so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane—quite insane: with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.

I HAVE to stay here. I simply have to. To be honest, too much of my identity comes from possessing this space. As my job used to define me, living here’s all I have left. This apartment makes it OK that I can’t buy Prada’s newest anymore. I can be content going on lousy interviews and begging for positions that pay half of what I used to earn as long as I know at the end of the day my glorious penthouse awaits. The minute I climb into my Jacuzzi tub, all the day’s unpleasantness is rinsed down the drain. When I step onto my deck and survey the city, I feel like anything is possible. This apartment keeps me centered; it keeps me sane. Without this place, I’m just another nobody from Indiana with a worthless state college degree. Before

Passionate patience—that’s what makes it possible to worship while you wait. It’s what sustained all those folks in Hebrews 11 as they lived out their lives, waiting for God’s promises to be fulfilled. It’s what kept Jerry and me sane and grounded (well, sort of sane and grounded) during that very scary time. It’s what makes it possible to sing in the dark or survive our time in the waiting room. It’s waiting without being resigned or losing hope. It’s choosing to expect a miracle even when all odds seem against it, but also choosing to accept whatever God brings—because whatever God brings into our lives is good, and whatever comes into our lives, period, can be used for good. It’s choosing to praise God even when you can’t see Him. To stay excited about His possibilities even when you’re unsure what will happen or when. It’s not just plodding, grit-your-teeth waiting. (Though, to be honest, sometimes it feels that way.) Instead, it’s moving along with your head up—moving in expectation, because you really expect that something’s going to happen. Because you know that whether you can see it or not, the God of the universe is at work in your life and in the world. He will keep His promises. He will show up when the time is right—when His time is right. And yes, passionate patience is a choice. Sometimes it’s a hard choice, though it’s based on very good evidence. But in those times when everything seems dark and we don’t have a clue where God is or what He’s doing, passionate patience can keep us going.

But I'm pretty sure Mom won't consent to a field trip across the country with my hot boyfriend. Especially not back to Florida." I clamp my mouth shut so fast my teeth should be chipped. He grins. "You think I'm hot?" "My mom thinks you are." Except, Mom's not the one blushing right now. "Hmm," he says, giving me a you're-busted look. "As hot as I am, I don't think she'd buy into my charm on this one. We'll have to call in a professional." Then that fish prince actually winks at me. "You mean Rachel," I say, toeing the sand. "I guess it's worth a shot. Don't expect much, though. I've already missed too much school." "We could fly down on the weekend. Be back before school on Monday." I nod. "She might go for that. If Rachel plays her cards right." Yeah, she might go for that. She might also pierce her tongue, dye her hair cherry red and spike it peacock-style. Ain't happening. I shrug. "I'll just keep practicing while you're gone. Maybe we don't have to go-" "No!" Galen and Toraf shout, startling me. "Why not? I won't go too deep-" "Out of the question," Galen says, standing. "You will not get in the water while I'm gone." I stomp a hole in the sand. "I already told you that you're not ordering me around, didn't I? Now you've pretty much guaranteed that I'm getting in the water, Your Highness." Galen runs a hand through his hair and utters a string of cuss words, courtesy of Rachel, no doubt. he paces in the sane a few seconds, pinching the bridge of his nose. Suddenly he stops. Relaxes. Smiles even. He walks over to his friend, slaps him on the back. "Toraf, I need a favor.

I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad - as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the time when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth? They have a worth - so I have always believed; and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane - quite insane, with my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs. Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to stand by: there I plant my foot.

How to own a smartphone and still be a functioning human being Don’t feel you always have to be there. In the not-so-olden days of letters and landlines, contacting someone was slow and unreliable and an effort. In the age of WhatsApp and Messenger it’s free and easy and instant. The flipside of this ease is that we are expected to be there. To pick up the phone. To get back to the text. To answer the email. To update our social media. But we can choose not to feel that obligation. We can sometimes just let them wait. We can risk our social media getting stale. And if our friends are friends they will understand when we need some headspace. And if they aren’t friends, why bother getting back anyway? Turn off notifications. This is essential. This keeps me (just about) sane. All of them. All notifications. You don’t need any of them. Take back control.

When I tell my undergraduates that I once advised Barack Obama, they’re somewhat impressed. Labor secretary to Bill Clinton? Their eyes begin to glaze over. Worked for Jimmy Carter? Not particularly interested. Interned for Bobby Kennedy? Campaigned for Eugene McCarthy? They look puzzled, as if I’ve entered the misty expanses of ancient history. Sometimes I follow this by telling them I started my career as an assistant to Abraham Lincoln. This used to elicit a laugh. I’m beginning to fear it won’t much longer. But every day I consider myself blessed for having the great good fortune to spend most of my time with these young people. They inspire me. They push me. They make me laugh. They help me play the long game. They’re going to inherit the mess my generation has bequeathed them. Instead of being bitter or angry, they have all sorts of ideas for how to clean it up, fix it, make the world better. They have the energy and determination to succeed. They keep me optimistic and sane. They make me hopeful that the common good can be resurrected.

Power is lost or won, never created or destroyed. Power is a visitor to, not a possession of, those it empowers. The mad tend to crave it, many of the sane crave it, but the wise worry about its long-term side effects. Power is crack cocaine for your ego and battery acid for your soul. Power’s comings and goings, from host to host, via war, marriage, ballot box, diktat, and accident of birth, are the plot of history. The empowered may serve justice, remodel the Earth, transform lush nations into smoking battlefields, and bring down skyscrapers, but power itself is amoral.” Immaculée Constantin now looks up at me. “Power will notice you. Power is watching you now. Carry on as you are, and power will favor you. But power will also laugh at you, mercilessly, as you lie dying in a private clinic, a few fleeting decades from now. Power mocks all its illustrious favorites as they lie dying. ‘Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay, might stop a hole to keep the wind away.’ That thought sickens me, Hugo Lamb, like nothing else. Doesn’t it sicken you?

Everything in Nature ran according to its own nature; the running of grass was in its growing, the running of rivers their flowing, granite bubbled up, cooled, compressed and crumbled, birds lived, flew, sang and died, everything did what it needed to do, each simultaneously running its own race, each by living according to its own nature together, never leaving any other part of the universe behind. The world’s Holy things raced constantly together, not to win anything over the next, but to keep the entire surging diverse motion of the living world from grinding to a halt, which is why there is no end to that race; no finish line. That would be oblivion to all. For the Indigenous Souls of all people who can still remember how to be real cultures, life is a race to be elegantly run, not a race to be competitively won. It cannot be won; it is the gift of the world’s diverse beautiful motion that must be maintained. Because human life has been give the gift of our elegant motion, whether we limp, roll, crawl, stroll, or fly, it is an obligation to engender that elegance of motion in our daily lives in service of maintaining life by moving and living as beautifully as we can. All else has, to me, the familiar taste of that domineering warlike harshness that daily tries to cover its tracks in order to camouflage the deep ruts of some old, sick, grinding, ungainly need to flee away from the elegance of our original Indigenous human souls. Our attempt to avariciously conquer or win a place where there are no problems, whether it be Heaven or a “New Democracy,” never mind if it is spiritually ugly and immorally “won” and taken from someone who is already there, has made a citifying world of people who, unconscious of it, have become our own ogreish problem to ourselves, our future, and the world. This is a problem that we cannot continue to attempt to competitively outrun by more and more effectively designed technological approaches to speed away from the past, for the specter of our own earth-wasting reality runs grinning competitively right alongside us. By developing even more effective and entertaining methods of escape that only burn up the earth, the air, animals, plants, and the deeper substance of what it should mean to be human, by competing to get ahead, we have created a brakeless competition that has outrun our innate beauty and marked out a very definite and imminent “finish” line. Living in and on a sphere, we cannot really outrun ourselves anyway. Therefore, I say, the entire devastating and hideous state of the world and its constant wounding and wrecking of the wild, beautiful, natural, viable and small, only to keep alive an untenable cultural proceedance is truly a spiritual sickness, one that will not be cured by the efficient use of the same thinking that maintains the sickness. Nor can this overly expensive, highly funded illness be symptomatically kept at bay any longer by yet more political, environmental, or social programs. We must as individuals and communities take the time necessary to learn how to indigenously remember what a sane, original existence for a viable people might look like. Though there are marvellous things and amazing people doing them, both seen and unseen, these do not resemble in any way the general trend of what is going on now. To begin remembering our Indigenous belonging on the Earth back to life we must metabolize as individuals the grief of recognition of our lost directions, digest it into a valuable spiritual compost that allows us to learn to stay put without outrunning our strange past, and get small, unarmed, brave, and beautiful. By trying to feed the Holy in Nature the fruit of beauty from the tree of memory of our Indigenous Souls, grown in the composted failures of our past need to conquer, watered by the tears of cultural grief, we might become ancestors worth descending from and possibly grow a place of hope for a time beyond our own.

Recipe for a Perfect Wife, the Novel INGREDIENTS 3 cups editors extraordinaire: Maya Ziv, Lara Hinchberger, Helen Smith 2 cups agent-I-couldn’t-do-this-without: Carolyn Forde (and the Transatlantic Literary Agency) 1½ cup highly skilled publishing teams: Dutton US, Penguin Random House Canada (Viking) 1 cup PR and marketing wizards: Kathleen Carter (Kathleen Carter Communications), Ruta Liormonas, Elina Vaysbeyn, Maria Whelan, Claire Zaya 1 cup women of writing coven: Marissa Stapley, Jennifer Robson, Kate Hilton, Chantel Guertin, Kerry Clare, Liz Renzetti ½ cup author-friends-who-keep-me-sane: Mary Kubica, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Amy E. Reichert, Colleen Oakley, Rachel Goodman, Hannah Mary McKinnon, Rosey Lim ½ cup friends-with-talents-I-do-not-have: Dr. Kendra Newell, Claire Tansey ¼ cup original creators of the Karma Brown Fan Club: my family and friends, including my late grandmother Miriam Christie, who inspired Miriam Claussen; my mom, who is a spectacular cook and mother; and my dad, for being the wonderful feminist he is 1 tablespoon of the inner circle: Adam and Addison, the loves of my life ½ tablespoon book bloggers, bookstagrammers, authors, and readers: including Andrea Katz, Jenny O’Regan, Pamela Klinger-Horn, Melissa Amster, Susan Peterson, Kristy Barrett, Lisa Steinke, Liz Fenton 1 teaspoon vintage cookbooks: particularly the Purity Cookbook, for the spark of inspiration 1 teaspoon loyal Labradoodle: Fred Licorice Brown, furry writing companion Dash of Google: so I could visit the 1950s without a time machine METHOD: Combine all ingredients into a Scrivener file, making sure to hit Save after each addition.

WHOEVER YOU ARE, WHEREVER YOU ARE..I'M STARTING TO THINK WE'RE A LOT ALIKE. HUMAN BEINGS SPINNING ON BLACKNESS. ALL WANTING TO BE SEEN, TOUCHED, HEARD, PAID ATTENTION TO. MY LOVED ONES ARE EVERYTHING TO ME HERE. IN THE LAST YEAR OR 3 I'VE SCREAMED AT MY CREATOR. SCREAMED AT CLOUDS IN THE SKY. FOR SOME EXPLANATION. MERCY MAYBE. FOR PEACE OF MIND TO RAIN LIKE MANNA SOMEHOW. 4 SUMMERS AGO, I MET SOMEBODY. I WAS 19 YEARS OLD. HE WAS TOO. WE SPENT THAT SUMMER, AND THE SUMMER AFTER, TOGETHER. EVERYDAY ALMOST. AND ON THE DAYS WE WERE TOGETHER, TIME WOULD GLIDE. MOST OF THE DAY I'D SEE HIM, AND HIS SMILE. I'D HEAR HIS CONVERSATION AND HIS SILENCE..UNTIL IT WAS TIME TO SLEEP. SLEEP I WOULD OFTEN SHARE WITH HIM. BY THE TIME I REALIZED I WAS IN LOVE, IT WAS MALIGNANT. IT WAS HOPELESS. THERE WAS NO ESCAPING, NO NEGOTIATING WITH THE FEELING. NO CHOICE. IT WAS MY FIRST LOVE, IT CHANGED MY LIFE. BACK THEN, MY MIND WOULD WANDER TO THE WOMEN I HAD BEEN WITH, THE ONES I CARED FOR AND THOUGHT I WAS IN LOVE WITH. I REMINISCED ABOUT THE SENTIMENTAL SONGS I ENJOYED WHEN I WAS A TEENAGER.. THE ONES I PLAYED WHEN I EXPERIENCED A GIRLFRIEND FOR THE FIRST TIME. I REALIZED THEY WERE WRITTEN IN A LANGUAGE I DID NOT YET SPEAK. I REALIZED TOO MUCH, TOO QUICKLY. IMAGINE BEING THROWN FROM A PLANE. I WASN'T IN A PLANE THOUGH. I WAS IN A NISSAN MAXIMA, THE SAME CAR I PACKED UP WITH BAGS AND DROVE TO LOS ANGELES IN. I SAT THERE AND TOLD MY FRIEND HOW I FELT. I WEPT AS THE WORDS LEFT MY MOUTH. I GRIEVED FOR THEM, KNOWING I COULD NEVER TAKE THEM BACK FOR MYSELF. HE PATTED MY BACK. HE SAID KIND THINGS. HE DID HIS BEST, BUT HE WOULDN'T ADMIT THE SAME. HE HAD TO GO BACK INSIDE SOON, IT WAS LATE AND HIS GIRLFRIEND WAS WAITING FOR HIM UPSTAIRS. HE WOULDN'T TELL ME THE TRUTH ABOUT HIS FEELINGS FOR ME FOR ANOTHER 3 YEARS. I FELT LIKE I'D ONLY IMAGINED RECIPROCITY FOR YEARS. NOW IMAGINE BEING THROWN FROM A CLIFF. NO, I WASN'T ON A CLIFF, I WAS STILL IN MY CAR TELLING MYSELF IT WAS GONNA BE FINE AND TO TAKE DEEP BREATHS. I TOOK THE BREATHS AND CARRIED ON. I KEPT UP A PECULIAR FRIENDSHIP WITH HIM BECAUSE I COULDN'T IMAGINE KEEPING UP MY LIFE WITHOUT HIM. I STRUGGLED TO MASTER MYSELF AND MY EMOTIONS. I WASN'T ALWAYS SUCCESSFUL. THE DANCE WENT ON.. I KEPT THE RHYTHM FOR SEVERAL SUMMERS AFTER. IT'S WINTER NOW. I'M TYPING THIS ON A PLANE BACK TO LOS ANGELES FROM NEW ORLEANS. I FLEW HOME FOR ANOTHER MARRED CHRISTMAS. I HAVE A WINDOWSEAT. IT'S DECEMBER 27, 2011. BY NOW I'VE WRITTEN TWO ALBUMS, THIS BEING THE SECOND. I WROTE TO KEEP MYSELF BUSY AND SANE. I WANTED TO CREATE WORLDS THAT WERE ROSIER THAN MINE. I TRIED TO CHANNEL OVERWHELMING EMOTIONS. I'M SURPRISED AT HOW FAR ALL OF IT HAS TAKEN ME. BEFORE WRITING THIS I'D TOLD SOME PEOPLE MY STORY. I'M SURE THESE PEOPLE KEPT ME ALIVE, KEPT ME SAFE.. SINCERELY. THESE ARE THE FOLKS I WANNA THANK FROM THE FLOOR OF MY HEART. EVERYONE OF YOU KNOWS WHO YOU ARE.. GREAT HUMANS, PROBABLY ANGELS. I DON'T KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NOW, AND THAT'S ALRITE. I DON'T HAVE ANY SECRETS I NEED KEPT ANYMORE. THERE'S PROBABLY SOME SMALL SHIT STILL, BUT YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN. I WAS NEVER ALONE, AS MUCH AS I FELT LIKE IT. AS MUCH AS I STILL DO SOMETIMES. I NEVER WAS. I DON'T THINK I EVER COULD BE. THANKS. TO MY FIRST LOVE, I'M GRATEFUL FOR YOU. GRATEFUL THAT EVEN THOUGH IT WASN'T WHAT I HOPED FOR AND EVEN THOUGH IT WAS NEVER ENOUGH, IT WAS. SOME THINGS NEVER ARE.. AND WE WERE. I WON'T FORGET YOU. I WON'T FORGET THE SUMMER. I'LL REMEMBER WHO I WAS WHEN I MET YOU. I'LL REMEMBER WHO YOU WERE AND HOW WE'VE BOTH CHANGED AND STAYED THE SAME. I'VE NEVER HAD MORE RESPECT FOR LIFE AND LIVING THAN I HAVE RIGHT NOW. MAYBE IT TAKES A NEAR DEATH EXPERIENCE TO FEEL ALIVE. THANKS. TO MY MOTHER, YOU RAISED ME STRONG. I KNOW I'M ONLY BRAVE BECAUSE YOU WERE FIRST.. SO THANK YOU. ALL OF YOU. FOR EVERYTHING GOOD. I FEEL LIKE A FREE MAN. IF I LISTEN CLOSELY.. I CAN HEAR THE SKY FALLING TOO. - FRANK

Didn’t you ever notice that whatever you wanted or whatever you set out to do, Cora wanted to do it too?” Noah asked. “She wasn’t like that.” “She was, Mer. And it’s okay to admit it. One of the hardest things about Cora dying is that everyone wants to erase her—the real Cora. They talk about her as though she were perfect. She wasn’t. ‘Don’t talk ill of the dead,’ people say. But if we aren’t truthful about who our loved ones were, then we aren’t really remembering them. We’re creating someone who didn’t exist. Cora loved you. She loved me. But what she did was not okay. And I’m pissed off about it.” Mercedes reeled back, stunned. “Geez, Noah. Tell me how you really feel. She still deserves our compassion,” she rebuked. He nodded. “Everyone deserves compassion. And I know suicide isn’t always a conscious act. Most of the time it’s sheer desperation. It’s a moment of weakness that we can’t come back from. But regardless of illness or weakness, if we don’t own our actions and don’t demand that others own theirs, then what’s the point? We might as well give up now. We have to expect better of ourselves. We have to. I expect more of my patients, and when I expect more—lovingly, patiently—they tend to rise to that expectation. Maybe not all the way up, but they rise. They improve because I believe they can, and I believe they must. My mom was sick. But she didn’t try hard enough to get better. She found a way to cope—and that’s important—but she never varied from it. Life has to be more than coping. It has to be.” Mercedes nodded slowly, her eyes clinging to his impassioned face. She’d struck a nerve, and he wasn’t finished. “I know it’s not something we’re supposed to say. We’re supposed to be all-loving and all-compassionate all the time. But sometimes the things we aren’t supposed to say are the truths that keep us sane, that tether us to reality, that help us move the hell on! I know some of my colleagues would be shocked to hear it. But pressure—whether it’s the pressure of society, or the pressure of responsibility, or the pressure that comes with being loved and being needed—isn’t always a bad thing. You’ve heard the cliché about pressure and diamonds. It’s a cliché because it’s true. Pressure sometimes begets beautiful things.” Mercedes was silent, studying his handsome face, his tight shoulders, and his clenched fists. He was weary, that much was obvious, but he wasn’t wrong. “Begets?” she asked, a twinkle in her eye. He rolled his eyes. “You know damn well what beget means.” “In the Bible, beget means to give birth to. I wouldn’t mind giving birth to a diamond,” she mused. “You ruin all my best lectures.” There was silence from the kitchen. Silence was not good. “Gia?” Noah called. “What, Daddy?” she answered sweetly. “Are you pooping in your new princess panties?” “No. Poopin’ in box.” “What box?” His voice rose in horror. “Kitty box.” Noah was on his feet, racing toward the kitchen. Mercedes followed. Gia was naked—her Cinderella panties abandoned in the middle of the floor—and perched above the new litter box. “No!” Noah roared in horror, scooping her up and marching to the toilet. “Maybe it won’t be a turd, Noah. Maybe Gia will beget a diamond,” Mercedes chirped, trying not to laugh. “I blame you, Mer!” he called from the bathroom. “She was almost potty-trained, and now she wants to be a cat!

While other people regularly drive me mad, after lockdown, I now appreciate they also keep me sane.

I shall say nothing of my insanity, which keeps me sane.

It’s the only thing that keeps me sane. I think I’d go crazy if I couldn’t hit people.” He gives a small laugh. “I know that sounds crazy, but it’s the truth. Even before Alina was taken, I’ve always felt like I had something dark inside me, something that needed to come out. If I don’t let it out from time to time, I think I’d fucking explode.

Whitehouse Road" Early in the morning when the sun does rise Layin' in the bed with bloodshot eyes Late in the evenin' when the sun sinks low Well that's about time my rooster crows I got women up and down this creek And they keep me going and my engine clean Run me ragged but I don't fret Cause there ain't been one slow me down none yet Get me drinking' that moonshine Get me higher than the grocery bill Take my troubles to the highwall Throw 'em in the river and get your fill We been sniffing that cocaine Ain't nothin' better when the wind cuts cold Lord it's a mighty hard livin' But a damn good feelin' to run these roads I got people try to tell me, Red Keep this livin' and you'll wind up dead Cast your troubles on the Lord of Lord's Or wind up laying on a coolin' board But I got buddies up White House Road And they keep me strutting when my feet hang low Rotgut whiskey gonna ease my pain 'N all this runnin's gonna keep me sane Get me drinking' that moonshine Get me higher than the grocery bill Take my troubles to the highwall Throw 'em in the river and get your fill We been sniffing that cocaine Ain't nothin' better when the wind cuts cold Lord it's a mighty hard livin' But a damn good feelin' to run these roads It's a damn good feelin' to run these roads When they lay me in the cold hard clay Won't ya sing them hymns while the banjo plays You can tell them ladies that they ought not frown Cause there ain't been nothing ever held me down Lawmen, women or a shallow grave Same ol' blues just a different day Get me drinking' that moonshine Get me higher than the grocery bill Take my troubles to the highwall Throw 'em in the river and get your fill We been sniffing that cocaine Ain't nothin' better when the wind cuts cold Lord it's a mighty hard livin' But a damn good feelin' to run these roads It's a damn good feelin' to run these roads It's a damn good feelin' to run these roads Tyler Childers, Purgatory (2017)

For my girls, Alida and Britny. You’re true badasses, and I couldn’t imagine my life without either of you in it. You keep me sane! Love you both. Dildos not Drama Forever!

The kind of madness I had was different. It was quiet, and very, very dangerous. It was a madness designed to keep me sane. My mind struggled to build across the gap, make a new and inhabitable world. The problem was that it had nothing to work with.

They keep me sane. And the devil knows that's hanging on by a goddamn thread.

eye combination my mother always made a fuss about. Maybe that’s why my skin crawled every time someone commented on how attractive a couple we were. It was more a reflection on me than us. He lifts his hand and moves my hair off my forehead. The gesture is intimate, but I’m too stunned to stop him. He brushes his thumb over the scar on my temple. “I was worried about you. You wouldn’t let me see you in the hospital. Or after?” A sigh escapes before I can school my features into something a little more… regretful. “Well, I was embarrassed.” That’s a lie. I just didn’t want to face whatever the fuck emotional roller coaster I was riding the last six months. Seriously. My life went from normal to shit in a split second. Adding Jack—and the life that I thought I had, the one that seemed to go up in a puff of smoke when I woke up in the hospital—would’ve been more pain than I was ready to accept. “Violet!” I step away from Jack, ignoring his wounded expression, and turn to my other friends. Half the dance team is here, and they all crowd around me. Someone pulls at my coffee-stained blouse, and another swoops in to clean the floor where my cup dropped. I had forgotten, in my Jack-shock. “Lucky it wasn’t hot.” Willow nudges me. “Luck and I aren’t on speaking terms.” She visited faithfully every day while I was stuck in the hospital. Kept me sane, kept me looped in to the gossip. She’s the only one who knows what I went through, and I’m keeping it that way. I’m not in the habit of airing my dirty laundry—or my newfound nightmares. I’ve been plagued by bright lights, crunching metal, and snapping bones. She rolls her eyes at my luck comment. “You need to change. We’re taking you out.” Oh boy. My first instinct is to say no, but honestly? I could use a bit of normalcy. My therapist—the talk one, not the physical one—said something about getting back into a routine. Well, for the last two years, I’ve gone out with my girls on Friday nights. There’s nothing more normal than that. I’m actually looking forward to it. She leads the way to the bedroom I haven’t been in since… before. She steps aside and lets me do the honors. Opening the door is like cracking into a time capsule. Fucking devastating. Willow stands behind me, her hand on my shoulder, as I stare around at the remnants of the person I used to be. If I wasn’t aware of how different I was after six months away, I am now. Mentally, physically. There are still clothes that I left on the floor. My chair is pulled out and covered in clothes. There’s a pile of books that I had planned to conquer over the summer in the center of the desk. My bed is made. “I kept the door open

But with you, there is nothing that scares me.  No matter what happens, no matter what madness the world may throw at me, you’re always there.  I can look into the future and see you, always you, constant and unchanging.  Hell or high water, widespread fires, plagues of the worst kind…none of it would matter, because you’re always there.  I could break and fall victim to the most mind-shattering horrors of life, but you would be there, and everything always comes back to that.  You keep me real, you keep me alive.  You rearrange me till I’m sane.

For now, to keep myself sane, let me focus instead on the bluebells carpeting the forest floor; the misty sunlight that broke through the clouds, blurring the edges of things and turning the world to watercolors. The occasional glint of silver from the treetops. These are indeed baubles--- I climbed up into one of the oaks to check--- but larger than the ones mortals place on Yuletide trees, globes of delicate silver, hollow and light as eggshells. Something about them put me in mind of faerie stones, and I hastily released the bauble to drift back into the trees, among which it hovered like a puff of mist, disdaining the notion of gravity.

They're absolute pains in my ass most days, but I wouldn't trade them for the world. They keep me sane. And the devil knows that's hanging on by a goddamn thread.

Darkness welcomed me during a time that I needed to feel safe, now I bathe in it to keep me sane. Light doesn't give a fuck about the damned, so with the damned, I stayed.

You’re lucky I love you little assholes because you guys are fucking messy,” I complain to the snorting pigs, wrinkling my nose when I spot a chunk of flesh on the floor outside their pen.  They're absolute pains in my ass most days, but I wouldn't trade them for the world. They keep me sane. And the devil knows that's hanging on by a goddamn thread. Molly Fifteen Years Ago

Stay, be ours. Keep Ryder sane, melt that ice and give him the love he never had but deserved. Love Garrett, even though he struggles to love himself. Love Diesel, even though it might kill you… and love me, even though I don’t deserve it. Be my greatest win.

I think the only reason I never lost my mind is that I knew I was innocent. That wasn’t a happy thought, so the dementors couldn’t suck it out of me . . . but it kept me sane and knowing who I am . . . helped me keep my powers . . . so when it all became . . . too much . . . I could transform in my cell . . . become a dog. Dementors can’t see, you know. . . .” He swallowed. “They feel their way toward people by sensing their emotions. . . . They could tell that my feelings were less — less human, less complex when I was a dog . . . but they thought, of course, that I was losing

Think of how much better life will be once you get the hell out of this town. That's the thought that keeps me sane in a world built on nothing but haunted memories and broken dreams.

Yet another earthly pleasure that would arguably help to keep me sane, and yet…” “We’re not earthly?” he asked. “Me and the girls?” “The girls and I,” she corrected. “No. You’re ethereal. My intangible everything.

There was no reason for us to be friends; we liked different music, different films and even different boys, but when we get together everything just clicks. She keeps me sane. She was, and still is, the yin to my yang. Remembering

Freckles, focus on me,” Torin said. I did and the love in his eyes pulled me into that place where nothing else mattered but us. I heard music. Saw candles floating in the air. Inhaled the scent of flowers swirling around us. Then Torin spoke, and every word was an affirmation of our love. Of us. “Lorraine Cooper, you are the love of my life, the keeper of my soul, and the realization of my dreams. My life would be empty if you weren’t in it. You drive me crazy, yet you keep me sane. You are the reason I wake up in the morning and spend sleepless nights, yet you complete me. I dreamed of you before I ever met you. Loved the idea of you before I knew you. Wished for you without hope of ever finding you. Then we met and I couldn’t see beyond making you love me, want me, and need me. Sometimes I wonder if I’m worthy of your love, and think up ways to prove that I deserve you. But you keep showing me that worth and proof have no place when it comes to love. Love is selfless. Love is kindness. Love is you, Freckles.

Sometimes I think you're the only thing keeping me sane.

My creativity keeps me from starving. Humanity keeps my life mundane. Loving secures my love for life, but my imagination keeps me sane.

Ha, ha,” Ivy intoned, rolling her eyes. She pulled up short when she neared her father, uncertain. “Are you still mad at me?” Michael didn’t hesitate to respond. “Yes.” “You still love me, though, right?” Michael’s expression softened. “Yes.” He grudgingly leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I will always love you, even when you do things I don’t like.” “That’s what makes you a good father.” “That’s what keeps me sane even though my children are crazy,” Michael shot back, turning to his wife with expectant eyes. “There. We made up. When can we eat?” Luna’s smile was indulgent. “Five

Katie: Yes. Keep it simple, and just turn it around. Charles: I need Deborah to … Katie: “I need me …” Charles: I need me to love myself as I am, warts and all. I haven’t been loving myself that way. But I’m starting to. Katie: And it’s the story you tell of the wart that keeps you from loving it. The wart just waits for a sane mind to see it clearly. It doesn’t do any harm. It’s just there like … like a leaf on a tree. You don’t argue with a leaf and say, “Yo! Let’s talk. Look at your shape. You need to do something about it.

I Love Her and Hate Her I Wish Her Happiness I Wish Her Unhappiness I Hope She Is Happy I Hope She Is Never Happy I Curse Her I Bless Her She Drives Me Insane She Keeps Me Sane She is My Angel Dark She is My Demon Bright

vulnerable when I met up with Elise at the Costa Coffee near the radio station for our regular mid-afternoon natter. Both being Stream FM employees, this daily time-out is much needed, and as far as I’m concerned, the only thing that keeps me sane. Working in local radio is rather like trying to herd cats, while someone

Writing keeps me sane.

I'm back in the old attic again, writing to relieve my pains. Pen and Paper keeps me sane.

When you come in here and pick up one of these,” he gestured at Hamlet, “or even watch one of the crappy holos out in the main room, you’re not just an orphaned kid marooned on a dustbowl planet anymore, with no more rights than any slave might have. It’s a way out of here. You’re a hero, or a villain, or anything else you could imagine, and a lot of things you probably can’t. Every time you turn a page you can go somewhere, even someplace that’s never been. But anywhere you go is somewhere far away from here. And the best part about it, the part that keeps me alive and sane, is that the words in the books leave a lot of blanks that your mind has to fill in. It makes your mind work without you forcing it to, and you get better and better at it without killing yourself like you have to sometimes in the fields.

Not yet, Baird,” the one beside him cautioned. He was as tall as his friend and just as muscular but he had short, spiky blond hair that complimented his pale blue eyes. “Can’t wait much longer.” Long, strong fingers curled into a fist as though the amber-eyed male could grasp the slender figure in his hand and hold her through sheer force of will. “Been dreaming about her every night, Sylvan. I ache for her.” “What does she look like?” There was genuine curiosity in the question. Though Baird had never seen her outside his dreams, Sylvan had no doubt he could describe his chosen female to the last detail. “So fuckin’ beautiful it hurts to look at her. Yellow hair like yours but longer—more golden. And her eyes…” Baird shook his head. “Like jewels. A pale grey that’s almost silver.” “You find these human women appealing then?” “Only her—she’s the only one I can see.” The amber eyes stared hungrily across the road. “I need her soon. Need to be with her. In her.” “You’re sure she’s the one?” Sylvan stared doubtfully at the woman silhouetted in the window. She was humming softly to herself but despite the distance and the pane of glass between them he could hear her perfectly and knew Baird could too. As attuned as his half brother was to this human female, he could probably hear her heartbeat even from across the street. “I know she’s the one.” There wasn’t a shred of doubt in the deep, rumbling voice. “Didn’t I tell you we’ve been dream-sharing? And her scent…” He inhaled deeply and his dark gold eyes were suddenly half-lidded with desire. “It’s her all right and she’s ripe for bonding. I want her.” “I know you do, but Baird…” The other male shifted from foot to foot uneasily. “You haven’t been back that long—only three days and it’s a miracle you escaped alive. Don’t you think it might be a good idea to wait a while? To take some time to recover?” “Waited long enough,” was the rumbling reply. “Six months in that hell hole and the only thing keeping me alive and sane were the dreams I had of her. I won’t wait any longer—she’s mine, whether she knows it yet or not.” “You’ll scare her,” his half-brother objected. “Human women are frightened enough of us as it is.” “I won’t hurt her. Just need to take her—bond her.

I’m not interested in your past, I’m interested about what makes you tick, what makes you angry, what keeps you sane - tell me those things. You have my undivided attention. People waste so much time on reputation that they simply forget that you aren’t the same person who did those things back then, this is you. This is now… I want to watch you happen in this single moment now. Everything else is time wasted.

Against you, Doctor! How could I have it in for you when you’re so nice to me? Against poor Leonard, who does everything he can so that I don’t get worked up, so that I get along here as well as possible? Against anyone else? Well, that’s another story! I have to say that I can’t stand that quack Bid’homme. Of course, I feel sorry for him—as he deserves—but I am tired of seeing this ridiculous fool, who should be put in a straightjacket, intimidate, act like a tyrant, rant and rave, yell and insult everyone. He should be washed with Niagara jets until he bursts, which would not be a great loss to humanity! That Bid’homme! Argh! Him, yes, I hate! He’s a constant danger to the patients, whom he knows nothing about, and whom he might kill with his stupid brutality! Why don’t you lock up this dangerous lunatic, Doctor—or, at least, send him back to Franche-Comté, to his family, if they agree to be responsible for such an evil creature and keep him tied up 24 hours a day?” What was I saying? Doctor Froin looked different; he shrugged his shoulders sadly. I saw him—his mind was made up now: I was a monomaniacal madman with delusions of persecution. All my ideas, all my preoccupations and all my anger, was focused on Bid’homme. I was acting exactly like someone who was crazy. I would keep saying that he hounded his patients and hated them all—me, first and foremost! His doubts about his assistant might even have been erased by my angry outburst. He could blame it all on my madness. I tried desperately to redeem myself, to save myself. What should I do? What should I say? Wouldn’t I be cleverer to tell him everything I was thinking—however uncomfortable it might be? I cried out—as unloudly as possible: “Doctor! No! Don’t write me off like that with a flick of your hand. I know what you’re thinking; you think I’m obsessed! Don’t deny it: I’m sure of it! But it’s nothing like that! To show you I’m not the least bit deranged, let me say that I was a little hard just now—even though I hate your colleague Bid’homme, and think he’s dangerous and harmful to your patients, I have absolutely no problem thinking about other things. Why, today, I thought about a thousand things that had nothing to do with him. Do you want me to tell you about waking up this morning in this room? About what went on inside my head—pointing out the difference between the sane ideas and those that are still a little…off? Do you want to be sure that I am not sneaky or vindictive, like most of the mental patients? Well! You just told me that my relatives are coming on Monday, but you didn’t say whom, probably because you were concerned about making me angry. I’m going to tell you: it’s Roffieux—the one who brought me here. I swear to you that I have no hard feelings against him. I can honestly say that he is close to my heart, but if I leave Vassetot, no harm will come to him from me, I guarantee it. I will do what any good man would do in the same situation: I will go as far away as possible. True enough, he disgusts me and I don’t want him to have any more control over me, but it would never enter my mind to play a dirty trick on him!

We've never said I love you. That's not what we do. He says you keep me sane. I say you keep me focused. We talk around our feelings. We've planned a future together, but that's not new. We've always had a future together, ever since we were kids. Wherever he went, I was always going to follow.

Oh, tedious things. That they could cave my skull in with a wine bottle or slit my throat as I sleep or throw me out a window. The little fantasies of murder are what keep servants sane. They tell themselves they allow me my power. And if ever I become too dreadful, they will do me in and maybe take over. But of course they never do. They procrastinate their vengeance because deep down, they are afraid not just of me, but like all people they fear their own fantasies. Easier to cherish them and keep them inside where they are in control. Possible.

Stay, be ours. Keep Ryder sane, melt that ice and give him the love he never had but deserved. Love Garrett, even though he struggles to love himself. Love Diesel, even though it might kill you…and love me, even though I don’t deserve it. Be my greatest win.

Fucking you is the only thing that keeps me sane, Lilia.

I tore my eyes from the bright lights accompanying Neosordess, as he’d called it, and stared at the few stars twinkling overhead, flickering in acknowledgement of my attention. “Thank you,” I whispered only loud enough for me and the stars to hear, “for keeping me sane and for reminding me of who I once was.” I shifted my gaze back down to the city again and closed my eyes to shut out its light.

So I'm living this life. Maybe, someday, I'll be able to choose another. For now, I can't. What keeps me sane - so to speak - is that I can listen. And you should too. You might think you can ignore people like me. But there are a lot of us. It's in your interest to hear what we're saying.

For approximately the first six months, I was somewhat uncomfortable talking with non-human intelligence. You question yourself; you question your sanity; you ask what it is I'm talking with? You don't share what you are doing. You are already known as being eccentric. While you don't care what people think, you tend not to go out of your way to make them laugh at you. So, you keep to yourself. You also stick close to the source. You watch, you OBSERVE, you evaluate. You are evaluating. Them, friend or foe? Me, sane or crazy?

I light a smoke and tell myself stories that I hope will keep me sane.

I don't fit in because I am changeable, restless, a dreamer. I watch the sky for answers. I seek messages from the angels. Who does that? I do. Because, it seems, I am waiting for something to happen. something great to shake me up and take me home. But, it hasn't arrived yet. So, I watch and wait and pray that I survive these strange conditions with my adaptability and resourcefulness to keep me sane.

It was about this time a kind of madness drifted in. Looking back, I think I was never truly mad. More mad north-north-west. I could tell a hawk from a handsaw always, but simetimes it was striking to me how similar they were. I knew I wasn’t mad mad because I’d seen people in the grips of psychosis before, and that was madness as obvious as the taste of blood in the mouth. The kind of madness I had was different. It was quiet and bery, very dangerous. It was a madness designed to keep me sane. My mind struggled to buold across the gap, make a new and inhabitable world. The problem was that it had nothing to work with. There was no partner, no children, no home. No nine-to-five job either. So It grabbed anything it could. It was desperate, and it read the world wrong.

I WANDER THE film criticism district, formulating theories, grinding axes; it keeps me sane in these insane times to return to my roots, to praise those films and filmmakers worthy of an audience’s attention, to destroy those filmmakers who loose self-satisfied garbage onto the world. Consider Stranger Than Fiction, I say to my imagined lecture hall full of cinephiles: a wonderfully quirky film starring William Ferrell and the always adorkable Zooey Deschanel. The work done here by director Marc Forster (who directed the unfortunately misguided, misogynistic, and racistic Monster’s Ball) and screenwriter Zachary H. Elms is stellar in that all the metacinematic techniques work, its construction analogous to that of a fine Swiss watch (no accident that a wristwatch figures so prominently into the story!). Compare this to any mess written by Charlie Kaufman. Stranger Than Fiction is the film Kaufman would’ve written if he were able to plan and structure his work, rather than making it up as he goes along, throwing in half-baked concepts willy-nilly, using no criterion other than a hippy-dippy “that’d be cool, man.” Such a criterion might work if the person making that assessment had even a shred of humanism within his soul. Kaufman does not, and so he puts his characters through hellscapes with no hope of them achieving understanding or redemption. Will Ferrell learns to live fully in the course of Stranger Than Fiction. Dame Emily Thomson, who plays his “author,” learns her own lessons about compassion and the value and function of art. Had Kaufman written this film, it would have been a laundry list of “clever” ideas culminating in some unearned emotional brutality and a chain reaction of recursional activity wherein it is revealed that the author has an author who has an author who has an author who has an author, et chetera, thus leaving the audience depleted, depressed, and, most egregiously, cheated. What Kaufman does not understand is that such “high concepts” are not an end in themselves but an opportunity to explore actual mundane human issues. Kaufman is a monster, plain and simple, but a monster unaware of his staggering ineptitude (Dunning and Kruger could write a book about him!). Kaufman is Godzilla with dentures, Halloween’s Mike Myers with a rubber knife, Pennywise the Clown with contact dermatitis from living in a sewer. He is a pathetic—

I could watch you count every grain of sand on the beach and it would be exciting.” I wasn’t a patient man, nor was I one who dealt well with restlessness. That was why I enjoyed puzzles so much. They fed me the stimulation I required to stay sane, because God knew I couldn’t rely on other people to keep me interested. Stella was the only exception. Her mere presence fascinated me more than any rambling monologue on film, travel, or whatever the fuck people liked to talk about.

You, in that dress, is evil. Pure evil, blondie. And I think you knew how much it would drive me crazy when you bought it. No man, no sane man, would be able to keep his hands off of you while you’re wearing that dress.” “I didn’t buy it with the hopes it would stay on all night.

Hey, it’s no problem, blondie. That guy was a tool and way too close. I would have laid him out if you asked me to.” “Blondie?” Her voice perked up and she raised an eyebrow at me. “What?” Oh shit, I didn't mean to let that slip. “You called me blondie.” “Oh yeah, uhh…” “It’s Bailey.” “What?” She laughed as she slid a plate onto the end of the barbell and I had to try to keep my dick from giving me away. Hearing her laugh was like music to my ears. “My name is Bailey.” Her eyebrows were arched and she was still giving me that wide smile of hers that would cause any sane man to drop to his knees in front of her.

Real love is reassuring. Real love is having the comfort of knowing that in your darkest hour someone will love you the same. I was away from real love for some time and became dependent on self-love to keep me sane. It wasn't until real love came back around that I noticed that it was missing. It was that family love that, even though I said I was okay, knew what I needed all off of intuition. I've had people love me in my success and turn their backs on me in my momentary failures. I've worked very hard in order to impress the social standards and did all of this just for my familv to still love me for me. When society asks, "How are you doing?", they usually mean your accomplishments. When real love asks, "How are you doing?", they usually mean your soul. Real love is addictive. I hope you find it. Love is forever.

I wasn’t a patient man, nor was I one who dealt well with restlessness. That was why I enjoyed puzzles so much. They fed me the stimulation I required to stay sane, because God knew I couldn’t rely on other people to keep me interested. Stella was the only exception. Her mere presence fascinated me more than any rambling monologue on film, travel, or whatever the fuck people liked to talk about.

If you’re not going to have a life with me in California I want you to have a life here. I want you to have time to see your friends and go to the gym and sleep. Things that keep you sane and healthy. Maybe we’ll just have to be okay with quality instead of quantity.

It’s nothing, sir. Tessia has helped me several times as well.” “Oh? Like how?” He tilted his head. I had to think for a second before responding. “In keeping me sane at times.

I can read your thoughts. The amusement was soft and caressing, wrapping her up in strong arms. I was perfectly sane and sensible until I met you. Now look at me. I’m crawling around inside a mountain. Suddenly she stopped and held herself perfectly still. I’m hearing something. Tell me you are not taking me into a cave full of bats. Say it right now, Jacques, or I’m out of here. I am not taking you into cave filled with bats. Shea relaxed visibly. She was not squeamish about very many things, but bats were creatures that were on the earth to remain a safe distance away from her. Miles away. Bats were one of those things she could stare up at in the night sky and think how interesting and wonderful they were, as long as they stayed high above her and nowhere close. Her nose wrinkled. The sounds she was trying to ignore were getting louder. Her heart began to pound in alarm. The walls of the passageway were so narrow, she had no way to move fast. All at once she felt trapped, as if she was suffocating. I’m going back, Jacques. I’m not a cave person. She did her best to sound firm and matter-of-fact, not at all as if she were seconds from screaming her head off. She turned her head cautiously to keep from scraping her face on the jutting surfaces. His fingers circled her wrist like a vise. There must be no disturbance. If any creatures exit the cave or warn others of our existence here, we could be found. A piece of paper couldn’t fit in here, certainly not a person. No one is going to look for us here. A vampire would know the moment bats flew from the cave. Bats can’t fly out of here if there aren’t any in here, now, can they? She was sweetly reasonable.

I just sit and write in my diary and draw a lot. It keeps me sane.

I knew I wasn’t mad mad because I’d seen people in the grip of psychosis before, and that was madness as obvious as the taste of blood in the mouth. The kind of madness I had was different. It was quiet, and very, very dangerous. It was a madness designed to keep me sane.

It can’t work. I have obligations. I can’t afford a relationship right now. And you’re looking for something intense, passionate, forever, some eternal bond. I’m just not like that. I don’t have all that much to give anyone.” Her fingers twisted together in agitation; he felt his heart twist in answer. The smile deep in his soul at her foolish words never found its way to his face. Shea had a passionate nature, and her need for him was as great as his need for her. She knew it, and it terrified her. More than anything, that knowledge was what made her determined to run from him. She had taught herself to be a solitary person, had no idea how to share her life. She would never, could never be like her mother. “Are you listening to me, Jacques?” He moved closer, crowded her slender body. His arms swept her to him, nearly crushing her. “Of course I am listening. I hear that you are afraid. I feel it.” His warm breath caressed her neck. The way he held her was completely protective, gentle, tender. “I am afraid, too. I have no past, Shea. Only a living hell that shaped a madman. Those people you call my family mean nothing to me. I do not trust them. Any one of them could be the betrayer.” He laid his head over hers, a soothing gesture of unity. “I cannot always distinguish reality from the madness. There is only you, my love, to keep me sane. If you choose to desert me, I fear for myself and any who dare to come near.

I cannot always distinguish reality from the madness. There is only you, my love, to keep me sane. If you choose to desert me, I fear for myself and any who dare to come near.” Shea blinked back tears, found his wrist with trembling fingers, the lightest contact, a connection between them. “We make such a perfect pair, Jacques. At least one of us should be stable, don’t you think?” He brought her hand to the warmth of his mouth. “You came for me, from thousands of miles away. You came for me.” She managed a smile. “A few years late.” Something eased in the vicinity of his heart. He knew there was no escape for either of them. He might not understand fully, but he knew he had bound them irrevocably together for all time. “Is there not a saying, ‘Better late than never’?” His thumb feathered over her wrist, found her pulse. Her mind was calmer now, more accepting of their union. She rested her head in the niche of his sternum. “I feel so terrible that I didn’t listen to my dreams. If only…” His hand covered her mouth, stopping her words. “You saved my sanity. You came for me. That is all that matters. Now we have to find our way together.

She couldn’t look at Jacques, who had somehow made his large body thin and weird looking. Carpathians were capable of doing things she didn’t want to think about. How had she gotten herself into this mess? Sex. A good-looking intense man with black, hungry eyes, and she fell like a lovesick calf. Sex. It ruined many otherwise sane women. I can read your thoughts. The amusement was soft and caressing, wrapping her up in strong arms. I was perfectly sane and sensible until I met you. Now look at me. I’m crawling around inside a mountain. Suddenly she stopped and held herself perfectly still. I’m hearing something. Tell me you are not taking me into a cave full of bats. Say it right now, Jacques, or I’m out of here. I am not taking you into cave filled with bats. Shea relaxed visibly. She was not squeamish about very many things, but bats were creatures that were on the earth to remain a safe distance away from her. Miles away. Bats were one of those things she could stare up at in the night sky and think how interesting and wonderful they were, as long as they stayed high above her and nowhere close. Her nose wrinkled. The sounds she was trying to ignore were getting louder. Her heart began to pound in alarm. The walls of the passageway were so narrow, she had no way to move fast. All at once she felt trapped, as if she was suffocating. I’m going back, Jacques. I’m not a cave person. She did her best to sound firm and matter-of-fact, not at all as if she were seconds from screaming her head off. She turned her head cautiously to keep from scraping her face on the jutting surfaces. His fingers circled her wrist like a vise. There must be no disturbance. If any creatures exit the cave or warn others of our existence here, we could be found. A piece of paper couldn’t fit in here, certainly not a person. No one is going to look for us here. A vampire would know the moment bats flew from the cave. Bats can’t fly out of here if there aren’t any in here, now, can they? She was sweetly reasonable. Trust me, little red hair, it is only a short distance farther. You aren’t going to make me sleep in the ground, are you? Because I won’t do it, not even if there are ten vampires stalking us.

You aren’t going to make me sleep in the ground, are you? Because I won’t do it, not even if there are ten vampires stalking us. Vampires cannot stand even the dawn, Shea. Killing his prey does something to the blood. The sun would fry him immediately. He might betray us to the human servants he is in league with if he marked the entrance to this cave. Or they might be watching for just such a sign as bats flying unexpectedly into the early sun. You’re telling me there are bats in here. He tugged at her wrist. Stop being such a baby. I can control the bats, and they will serve to warn us of any danger. Shea made a face but followed him. With every moment Jacques’ abilities, his knowledge and power, seemed to be growing. He was confident almost to the point of arrogance. Sometimes it grated and made her want to throw something at him, but she was proud of his growing strength. The passage began to widen and slowly move downward, as if they were going into the very bowels of the earth. Shea could feel sweat beading on her body and her lungs laboring. She concentrated on breathing, the only thing that would keep her sane. Jacques realized she was trembling, her fingers twisting nervously in his. His mind pushed through her natural barrier and found her uneasiness, her ridiculous fear of bats and closed-in places. She was uneasy with the Carpathian ability to shape-shift. Even his thinness, as he moved through the cave, made her uncomfortable. Used to being in control of every situation, she was finding it hard to follow his lead so blindly. I am sorry, little one. I am introducing you to things that seem so perfectly natural to me yet must be confusing ad frightening to you. His voice was a soft caress, sending warmth curling through her body.

The passage began to widen and slowly move downward, as if they were going into the very bowels of the earth. Shea could feel sweat beading on her body and her lungs laboring. She concentrated on breathing, the only thing that would keep her sane. Jacques realized she was trembling, her fingers twisting nervously in his. His mind pushed through her natural barrier and found her uneasiness, her ridiculous fear of bats and closed-in places. She was uneasy with the Carpathian ability to shape-shift. Even his thinness, as he moved through the cave, made her uncomfortable. Used to being in control of every situation, she was finding it hard to follow his lead so blindly. I am sorry, little one. I am introducing you to things that seem so perfectly natural to me yet must be confusing ad frightening to you. His voice was a soft caress, sending warmth curling through her body. Just his voice could give her strength. She straightened her shoulders and followed him. There’s a bed in here somewhere, right? She tried to inject some humor into the moment. The passageway widened enough to allow Jacques to resume his true form. He immediately did so, hoping to alleviate Shea’s distress. He also sought a comfortable topic for conversation. “What do you think of Raven?” “I thought we had to be quiet.” Shea was looking in every direction for bats.

Witch," said Sarah Brown, "I have got to say something." "Oh, have you?" said the witch, a little disappointed at being interrupted. "Oh, well, I can sympathise, I know what that feels like. Get on and say it." The Dog David, who was really a good and attentive son to Sarah Brown, came and laid his chin, with an exaggerated look of interest, on her knee-cap. "Is it any use," said Sarah Brown, "fighting against the Habits in the world, there are so many. Who set these strange and senseless deceivers at large? Religion which has forgotten ecstasy.... Law which has forgotten justice.... Charity which has forgotten love.... Surely magic has suffered at the stake for saner ideals than these?" "Why, of course," said the witch impatiently. "Magic generally suffered because it was so sane. I thought everybody knew that." "All habits. All habits," chanted Sarah Brown. "What is this Charity, this clinking of money between strangers, and when did Charity cease to be a comforting and secret thing between one friend and another? Does Love make her voice heard through a committee, does Love employ an almoner to convey her message to her neighbour?" "Not that I know of," sighed the witch. "Sarah Brown, how long do you want me to keep quiet, while you say things that everybody surely knows?" ~ from Chapter IV 'The Forbidden Sandwich' of 'Living Alone' by Stella Benson, published 1919.

Thomas is very important to me. Not only do I love him, but he keeps me… grounded. Sane. Without him, I get lost in my head and cannot find my way out again. It is hard to explain. But I am terrified of losing him.” “I don’t want to take Thomas away from you.” “I know, puppy. But things are changing. You have noticed we are chipping away at the sexual limits we set months ago? Pretty soon, we will give up on the ‘no fucking’ rule.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “I am a bottom, in case you have not noticed.” “I’ve noticed,” Hans replied, smiling in spite of himself

The only thing keeping me sane is the hope.

Your mom and I have been talking a lot since I got back here. She’s been one of the only things keeping me sane. I was here the day she got the call. She was a wreck. I drove her and your father to the hospital. They were both emotional, and I was worried about them driving. Your dad’s back isn’t great yet.

But here let me say one thing: From the moment I entered the insane ward on the Island, I made no attempt to keep up the assumed role of insanity. I talked and acted just as I do in ordinary life. Yet strange to say, the more sanely I talked and acted the crazier I was thought to be by all except one physician, whose kindness and gentle ways I shall not soon forget.

Apparently, trying to keep me happy is the only thing that’s keeping him sane right now.

I was scared today, and what did I do? I called you. That’s how it’s always been. Whenever everything got to be too much, whenever I feel like everything is crashing down on me, I turn to you. You’re the one who keeps me safe, keeps me sane. At least I thought you did.

Real love is reassuring. Real love is having the comfort of knowing that in your darkest hour someone will love you the same. I was away from real love for some time and became dependent on self-love to keep me sane. It wasn't until real love came back around that I noticed that it was missing. It was that family love that, even though I said I was okay, knew what I needed all off of intuition. I've had people love me in my success and turn their backs on me in my momentary failures. I've worked very hard in order to impress the social standards and did all of this just for my family to still love me for me. When society asks, "How are you doing?", they usually mean your accomplishments. When real love asks, "How are you doing?", they usually mean your soul. Real love is addictive. I hope you find it. Love is forever.

Real love is reassuring.Real love is having the comfort of knowing that in your darkest hour someone will love you the same. I was away from real love for some time and became dependent on self-love to keep me sane. It wasn't until real love came back around that I noticed that it was missing. It was that family love that, even though I said I was okay, knew what I needed all off of intuition. I've had people love me in my success and turn their backs on me in my momentary failures. I've worked very hard in order to impress the social standards and did all of this just for my family to still love me for me. When society asks, "How are you doing?", they usually mean your accomplishments. When real love asks, "How are you doing?", they usually mean your soul. Real love is addictive. I hope you find it. Love is forever.

Darkness welcomed me during a time that I needed to feel safe, now I bathe in it to keep me sane. Light doesn't give a fuck about the damned, so with the damned I stayed.

To my friends who help me keep sane while I’m playing in imaginary worlds.

I'd been a fool. I'd been a clown. I loved being a fool. I loved being a clown. It helped keep me sane—but my sanity was revered in a different universe, as if forcing my desires to be real. I realized at that moment that what I was doing was wrong, and it was finally time to open my shell of pride and bloated ego.

I need them to know. Because you help me function. You keep me going. You’re what keeps me sane and makes me happy and they need to know that you’re a permanent part of my life. A necessity. I want you there with me. I’m not hiding you or me anymore.

Have to maintain the schedule. The schedule keeps me sane. The schedule keeps me human.

will keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles received by me when I was sane, and not mad—as I am now. Laws and principles are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break them, what would be their worth?

I'm almost always premeditated and hardly spontaneous, and my insanities keep me sane.

Meditation is better than counseling. It keeps me sane in this crazy world.

Barry thinks this obsession with my ex is unhealthy. I disagree. It’s the only thing keeping me sane in my world.

I'm back in the old attic again, writing to relieve my pains. Pen and paper keep me sane.

You’re the only thing keeping me sane