My Heart Is Reserved Quotes

For a long time, she held a special place in my heart. I kept this special place just for her, like a "Reserved" sign on a quiet corner table in a restaurant. Despite the fact that I was sure I'd never see her again.

I've essentially handed my heart over to the person who's had it on reserve for half my life, and I'm terrified that he doesn't realize what he's holding.

I want to say one last thing, and it’s important. Though I am a generally happy person who feels comfortable in my skin, I do beat myself up because I am influenced by a societal pressure to be thin. All the time. I feel it the same way anybody who picks up a magazine and sees Keira Knightley’s elegantly bony shoulder blades poking out of a backless dress does. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen my shoulder blades once. Honestly, I’m dubious that any part of my body could be so sharp and firm as to be described as a “blade.” I feel it when I wake up in the morning and try on every single pair of my jeans and everything looks bad and I just want to go back to sleep. But my secret is: even though I wish I could be thin, and that I could have the ease of lifestyle that I associate with being thin, I don’t wish for it with all of my heart. Because my heart is reserved for way more important things.

My dear, if heaven is truly a place, then it is situated in your heart, that special place, that was reserved for me.

I step up to the hostess and feel my face flush when she asks for the name my reservation is under. “I’m actually meeting the other member of my party here. The name is under…” I hesitate and think about how absurd the pseudo name Noel gave is. “Um, it’s under Dong, Long-Dick Dong.

We were dreamers, both of us, unpractical, reserved, full of great theories never put to test, and like all dreamers, asleep to the waking world. Disliking our fellow men, we craved affection; but shyness kept impulse dormant until the heart was touched. When that happened the heavens opened, and we felt, the pair of us, that we have the whole wealth of the universe to give. We would have both survived, had we been other men.

Every morning the maple leaves. Every morning another chapter where the hero shifts from one foot to the other. Every morning the same big and little words all spelling out desire, all spelling out You will be alone always and then you will die. So maybe I wanted to give you something more than a catalog of non-definitive acts, something other than the desperation. Dear So-and-So, I’m sorry I couldn’t come to your party. Dear So-and-So, I’m sorry I came to your party and seduced you and left you bruised and ruined, you poor sad thing. You want a better story. Who wouldn’t? A forest, then. Beautiful trees. And a lady singing. Love on the water, love underwater, love, love and so on. What a sweet lady. Sing lady, sing! Of course, she wakes the dragon. Love always wakes the dragon and suddenly flames everywhere. I can tell already you think I’m the dragon, that would be so like me, but I’m not. I’m not the dragon. I’m not the princess either. Who am I? I’m just a writer. I write things down. I walk through your dreams and invent the future. Sure, I sink the boat of love, but that comes later. And yes, I swallow glass, but that comes later. Let me do it right for once, for the record, let me make a thing of cream and stars that becomes, you know the story, simply heaven. Inside your head you hear a phone ringing and when you open your eyes only a clearing with deer in it. Hello deer. Inside your head the sound of glass, a car crash sound as the trucks roll over and explode in slow motion. Hello darling, sorry about that. Sorry about the bony elbows, sorry we lived here, sorry about the scene at the bottom of the stairwell and how I ruined everything by saying it out loud. Especially that, but I should have known. Inside your head you hear a phone ringing, and when you open your eyes you’re washing up in a stranger’s bathroom, standing by the window in a yellow towel, only twenty minutes away from the dirtiest thing you know. All the rooms of the castle except this one, says someone, and suddenly darkness, suddenly only darkness. In the living room, in the broken yard, in the back of the car as the lights go by. In the airport bathroom’s gurgle and flush, bathed in a pharmacy of unnatural light, my hands looking weird, my face weird, my feet too far away. I arrived in the city and you met me at the station, smiling in a way that made me frightened. Down the alley, around the arcade, up the stairs of the building to the little room with the broken faucets, your drawings, all your things, I looked out the window and said This doesn’t look that much different from home, because it didn’t, but then I noticed the black sky and all those lights. We were inside the train car when I started to cry. You were crying too, smiling and crying in a way that made me even more hysterical. You said I could have anything I wanted, but I just couldn’t say it out loud. Actually, you said Love, for you, is larger than the usual romantic love. It’s like a religion. It’s terrifying. No one will ever want to sleep with you. Okay, if you’re so great, you do it— here’s the pencil, make it work … If the window is on your right, you are in your own bed. If the window is over your heart, and it is painted shut, then we are breathing river water. Dear Forgiveness, you know that recently we have had our difficulties and there are many things I want to ask you. I tried that one time, high school, second lunch, and then again, years later, in the chlorinated pool. I am still talking to you about help. I still do not have these luxuries. I have told you where I’m coming from, so put it together. I want more applesauce. I want more seats reserved for heroes. Dear Forgiveness, I saved a plate for you. Quit milling around the yard and come inside.

My heart, independent of my logic, had reserved a place for my tormentor and my solace.

I can't believe my reserve of water—from my nose and eyes. I have dormant fluid in my body, every woman does. I don't know if I am a cavern or a river. Once, you said I was a geyser: a hole in the ground—bursting.

Yes, such has been my lot since childhood. Everyone read signs of non-existent evil traits in my features. But since they were expected to be there, they did make their appearance. Because I was reserved, they said I was sly, so I grew reticent. I was keenly aware of good and evil, but instead of being indulged I was insulted and so I became spiteful. I was sulky while other children were merry and talkative, but though I felt superior to them I was considered inferior. So I grew envious. I was ready to love the whole world, but no one understood me, and I learned to hate. My cheerless youth passed in conflict with myself and society, and fearing ridicule I buried my finest feelings deep in my heart, and there they died. I spoke the truth, but nobody believed me, so I began to practice duplicity. Having come to know society and its mainsprings, I became versed in the art of living and saw how others were happy without that proficiency, enjoying for free the favors I had so painfully striven for. It was then that despair was born in my heart--not the despair that is cured with a pistol, but a cold, impotent desperation, concealed under a polite exterior and a good-natured smile. I became a moral cripple; I had lost one half of my soul, for it had shriveled, dried up and died, and I had cut it off and cast it away, while the other half stirred and lived, adapted to serve every comer. No one noticed this, because no one suspected there had been another half. Now, however, you have awakened memories of it in me, and what I have just done is to read its epitaph to you. Many regard all epitaphs as ridiculous, but I do not, particularly when I remember what rests beneath them.

In my world, reserved Italians, heterosexual hairdressers, clouds without silver linings, ignoble savages, hard-hearted whores, advantageous ill-winds, sober Irishmen, and so on, are not permitted to exist.

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded… sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.

On many nights I have availed myself of these very gentlemen, in the adjoining room. Each time, I wondered if you might arrive and see me, as I took my pleasure, allowing their hands to explore my body. There is no part of me that has not been kissed and enjoyed. I opened myself in welcome, encouraging my suitors to bury themselves deep and hard, to obliterate all reserve and find the heart of me.” Mademoiselle Noire - The Gentlemen's Club

And if the readers of this book should ever chance to see the poverty, the hopelessness, and the squalor of a modern Indian reservation, they may find it possible to truly understand the reasons why.

God, I scream for time to let go, to write, to think. But no. I have to exercise my memory in little feats just so I can stay in this damn wonderful place which I love and hate with all my heart. And so the snow slows and swirls, and melts along the edges. The first snow isn't good for much. It makes a few people write poetry, a few wonder if the Christmas shopping is done, a few make reservations at the skiing lodge. It's a sentimental prelude to the real thing. It's picturesque & quaint.

My task is to explain to you as quickly as possible my essence, that is, what sort of man I am, what I believe in, and what I hope for, is that right? And therefore I declare that I accept God pure and simple. But this, however, needs to be noted: if God exists and if he indeed created the earth, then, as we know perfectly well, he created it in accordance with Euclidean geometry, and he created human reason with a conception of only three dimensions of space. At the same time there were and are even now geometers and philosophers, even some of the most outstanding among them, who doubt that the whole universe, or, even more broadly, the whole of being, was created purely in accordance with Euclidean geometry; they even dare to dream that two parallel lines, which according to Euclid cannot possibly meet on earth, may perhaps meet somewhere in infinity. I, my dear, have come to the conclusion that if I cannot understand even that, then it is not for me to understand about God. I humbly confess that I do not have any ability to resolve such questions, I have a Euclidean mind, an earthly mind, and therefore it is not for us to resolve things that are not of this world. And I advise you never to think about it, Alyosha my friend, and most especially about whether God exists or not. All such questions are completely unsuitable to a mind created with a concept of only three dimensions. And so, I accept God, not only willingly, but moreover I also accept his wisdom and his purpose, which are completely unknown to us; I believe in order, in the meaning of life, I believe in eternal harmony, in which we are all supposed to merge, I believe in the Word for whom the universe is yearning, and who himself was 'with God,' who himself is God, and so on and so forth, to infinity. Many words have been invented on the subject. It seems I'm already on a good path, eh? And now imagine that in the final outcome I do not accept this world of God's, created by God, that I do not accept and cannot agree to accept. With one reservation: I have a childlike conviction that the sufferings will be healed and smoothed over, that the whole offensive comedy of human contradictions will disappear like a pitiful mirage, a vile concoction of man's Euclidean mind, feeble and puny as an atom, and that ultimately, at the world's finale, in the moment of eternal harmony, there will occur and be revealed something so precious that it will suffice for all hearts, to allay all indignation, to redeem all human villainy, all bloodshed; it will suffice not only to make forgiveness possible, but also to justify everything that has happened with men--let this, let all of this come true and be revealed, but I do not accept it and do not want to accept it! Let the parallel lines even meet before my own eyes: I shall look and say, yes, they meet, and still I will not accept it.

Are you seeing anyone, Maggie?” My mother’s voice is low, the whisper reserved for talk of scandal—like premarital cohabitation and non-procreative sex. “Are you even trying to find love? Or do you intend to continue fornicating with random men outside the sanctity of marriage?” “So if I were married I’d have your blessing to fornicate with random men? Maybe I should reconsider my stance on marriage.” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. I’m batting zero on the New Me plan.

Against insurmountable obstacles and without a clue as to the outcome, the trusting heart says, 'Abba, I surrender my will and my life to you without any reservation and with boundless confidence, for you are my loving Father.

You’re a survivor. Voron put you on the edge of that cliff again and again until he conditioned you to claw onto life. You’ll do whatever you have to do to survive, and I’m your only chance of getting out. At first you’ll balk, but with every passing hour my offer will look better and better. You’ll convince yourself that dying will accomplish nothing and you should at least go out with a bang. You’ll tell yourself that you’re accepting my offer just so you can stick that broken sword into my chest and feel it cut through my heart. Even if you die afterward, the fact that I’ll stop breathing makes your death mean something. So you’ll call me. And you’ll try to kill me. Except you’ve gone three days without food, and that body . . .” He tilted his head and looked me over slowly. “That body burns through calories like fire goes through gasoline. You’re running out of reserves. I can put you down with one hit.” “You’re right about the sword. You broke mine. I owe you one.” He tapped his naked chest over his heart. “This is the spot. Give it a shot, Kate. Let’s see what happens.

But my secret is: even though I wish I could be thin, and that I could have the ease of lifestyle that I associate with being thin, I don’t wish for it with all of my heart. Because my heart is reserved for way more important things.

I want to say that further you are not a great chief of this country. That you have no following, no power, no control." Logan continued, "You are on an Indian reservation merely at the sufferance of the government. You are fed by the government, clothed by the government, your children are educated by the government, and all you have and are today is because of the government. If it were not for the government you would be freezing and starving today in the mountains. I merely say these things to notify you that you cannot insult the people of the United States of America or its committees ...the government feeds and clothes and educates your children now, and desires to teach you to become farmers, and to civilize you, and make you as white men. -Senator John Logan, 1883

It's like he has emotional amnesia... I think you have to accept that the person you knew isn't there at the moment. I was witness to how much he loved you. I have the photos. This isn't the person we knew. I don't recognize this person. He's shed his skin." Her heart is broken too. She has to say the thing that will give me back my life. She draws on every reserve. I see how much it hurts her and it hurts me too. I came from her joy and her pain, I lived in it and I live in it now.

my secret is: even though I wish I could be thin, and that I could have the ease of lifestyle that I associate with being thin, I don’t wish for it with all of my heart. Because my heart is reserved for way more important things. I will leave you with one last piece of advice, which is: If you’ve got it, flaunt it. And if you don’t got it? Flaunt it. ’Cause what are we even doing here if we’re not flaunting it?

Some years ago I had a conversation with a man who thought that writing and editing fantasy books was a rather frivolous job for a grown woman like me. He wasn’t trying to be contentious, but he himself was a probation officer, working with troubled kids from the Indian reservation where he’d been raised. Day in, day out, he dealt in a concrete way with very concrete problems, well aware that his words and deeds could change young lives for good or ill. I argued that certain stories are also capable of changing lives, addressing some of the same problems and issues he confronted in his daily work: problems of poverty, violence, and alienation, issues of culture, race, gender, and class... “Stories aren’t real,” he told me shortly. “They don’t feed a kid left home in an empty house. Or keep an abusive relative at bay. Or prevent an unloved child from finding ‘family’ in the nearest gang.” Sometimes they do, I tried to argue. The right stories, read at the right time, can be as important as shelter or food. They can help us to escape calamity, and heal us in its aftermath. He frowned, dismissing this foolishness, but his wife was more conciliatory. “Write down the names of some books,” she said. “Maybe we’ll read them.” I wrote some titles on a scrap of paper, and the top three were by Charles de lint – for these are precisely the kind of tales that Charles tells better than anyone. The vital, necessary stories. The ones that can change and heal young lives. Stories that use the power of myth to speak truth to the human heart. Charles de Lint creates a magical world that’s not off in a distant Neverland but here and now and accessible, formed by the “magic” of friendship, art, community, and social activism. Although most of his books have not been published specifically for adolescents and young adults, nonetheless young readers find them and embrace them with particular passion. I’ve long lost count of the number of times I’ve heard people from troubled backgrounds say that books by Charles saved them in their youth, and kept them going. Recently I saw that parole officer again, and I asked after his work. “Gets harder every year,” he said. “Or maybe I’m just getting old.” He stopped me as I turned to go. “That writer? That Charles de Lint? My wife got me to read them books…. Sometimes I pass them to the kids.” “Do they like them?” I asked him curiously. “If I can get them to read, they do. I tell them: Stories are important.” And then he looked at me and smiled.

Quite pure, quite free of future planning, I mounted the tangled funeral pyre built for my suffering, so sure of nothing more to buy for future needs, while in my heart the stored reserves kept silent.

If the Poncas were permitted to leave their new reservation in Indian Territory and walk away as free American citizens, this would set a precedent which might well destroy the entire military-political-reservation complex.

But my secret is: even though I wish I could be thin, and that I could have the ease of lifestyle that I associate with being thin, I don't wish for it with all of my heart. Because my heart is reserved for more important things.

I can hide my heart, and my past, and my future plans, from those around me, but I cannot hide anything from God. I can talk in a way that deceives my fellow creatures as to what I really am, but nothing I say or do can deceive God. He sees through all my reserve and pretense; he knows me as I really am, better indeed than I know myself. A God whose presence and scrutiny I could evade would be a small and trivial deity. But the true God is great and terrible, just because he is always with me and his eye is always upon me. Living becomes an awesome business when you realize that you spend every moment of your life in the sight and company of an omniscient, omnipresent Creator.

His gaze meandered along my chest. "Hey!" I crossed my arms over my breasts. "Those are…" "Patrick's?" "Well, his name isn't tattooed on them, but yeah, currently they are reserved for him." I peered at him and noted the similarities between him and his sons. "Ruadan, I presume?" "Got it in one," he said, silver eyes twinkling. "You scared the shit out of me." One corner of his mouth lifted into a grin. He picked up the parchment and tapped on it. "So, you're Patrick's soul mate." "No." "But you read the scroll. Only his sonuachar can do that." "Let me explain." I paused. "No, there is too much. Let me sum up." " The Princess Bride!" Ruadan exclaimed in happy surprise. "I love that movie. 'Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die!'" He leapt off the bed and made fencing motions. "Ruadan, we're in a bit of crisis around here." "Hey! My swords." He practically skipped to the dresser where I had left them when I got ready for my bath. He whirled the half-swords like a master swordsman, which, of course, he was. "My mother really knows how to smith a weapon, doesn't she? Real fairy gold." He stabbed an invisible foe's chest with one and his stomach with the other. "Die, evil one! Die!" He jumped up and down, the swords held above his head, and did a victory dance. "You're like a big puppy!" I exclaimed. "A big, dumb puppy.

The Age Of Reason 1. ‘Well, it’s that same frankness you fuss about so much. You’re so absurdly scared of being your own dupe, my poor boy, that you would back out of the finest adventure in the world rather than risk telling yourself a lie.’ 2. “ I’m not so much interested in myself as all that’ he said simply. ‘I know’, said Marcelle. It isn’t an aim , it’s a means. It helps you to get rid of yourself; to contemplate and criticize yourself: that’s the attitude you prefer. When you look at yourself, you imagine you aren’t what you see, you imagine you are nothing. That is your ideal: you want to be nothing.’’ 3. ‘In vain he repeated the once inspiring phrase: ‘I must be free: I must be self-impelled, and able to say: ‘’I am because I will: I am my own beginning.’’ Empty, pompous words, the commonplaces of the intellectual.’ 4. ‘He had waited so long: his later years had been no more than a stand-to. Oppressed with countless daily cares, he had waited…But through all that, his sole care had been to hold himself in readiness. For an act. A free, considered act; that should pledge his whole life, and stand at the beginning of a new existence….He waited. And during all that time, gently, stealthily, the years had come, they had grasped him from behind….’ 5. ‘ ‘It was love. This time, it was love. And Mathiue thought:’ What have I done?’ Five minutes ago this love didn’t exist; there was between them a rare and precious feeling, without a name and not expressible in gestures.’ 6. ‘ The fact is, you are beyond my comprehension: you, so prompt with your indignation when you hear of an injustice, you keep this woman for years in a humiliating position, for the sole pleasure of telling yourself that you are respecting your principles. It wouldn’t be so bad if it were true, if you really did adapt your life to your ideas. But, I must tell you once more…you like that sort of life-placid, orderly, the typical life of an official.’ ‘’That freedom consisted in frankly confronting situations into which one had deliberately entered, and accepting all one’s responsibilities.’ ‘Well…perhaps I’m doing you an injustice. Perhaps you haven’t in fact reached the age of reason, it’s really a moral age…perhaps I’ve got there sooner than you have.’ 7. ‘ I have nothing to defend. I am not proud of my life and I’m penniless. My freedom? It’s a burden to me, for years past I have been free and to no purpose. I simply long to exchange it for a good sound of certainty….Besides, I agree with you that no one can be a man who has not discovered something for which he is prepared to die.’ 8. ‘‘I have led a toothless life’, he thought. ‘ A toothless life. I have never bitten into anything. I was waiting. I was reserving myself for later on-and I have just noticed that my teeth have gone. What’s to be done? Break the shell? That’s easily said. Besides, what would remain? A little viscous gum, oozing through the dust and leaving a glistering trail behind it.’ 9.’’ A life’, thought Mathieu, ‘is formed from the future just like the bodies are compounded from the void’. He bent his head: he thought of his own life. The future had made way into his heart, where everything was in process and suspense. The far-off days of childhood, the day when he has said:’I will be free’, the day when he had said: ’I will be famous’, appeared to him even now with their individual future, like a small, circled individual sky above them all, and the future was himself, himself just as he was at present, weary and a little over-ripe, they had claims upon him across the passage of time past, they maintained their insistencies, and he was often visited by attacks of devastating remorse, because his casual, cynical present was the original future of those past days.

Running my fingers into his thick hair, I wallow in the strength and heat surrounding me before he pulls away, giving me such a happy smile it makes my heart rattle inside my chest. There's nothing better in this whole world than to be held in someone's loving stare. A stare they reserve for you.

You know, sleeping outdoors isn’t all bad. You get to stare up at the stars and cool breezes ruffle your fur after a hot day. The grass smells sweet and,” he made eye contact with me, “so does your hair.” I blushed and grumbled, “Well, I’m glad someone enjoyed it.” He smiled smugly and said, “I did.” I had a quick flash of him as a man snuggled up next to me in the forest, imagined him resting his head on my lap while I stroked his hair, and decided to focus on the matter at hand. “Well, listen, Ren, you’re changing the subject. I don’t appreciate the way you manipulated me into being here. Mr. Kadam should’ve told me at the circus.” He shook his head. “We didn’t think you’d believe his story. He made up the trip to the tiger reserve to get you to India. We figured once you were here, I could change into a man and clarify everything.” I admitted, “You’re probably right. If you had changed to a man there, I don’t think I would have come” “Why did you come?” “I wanted to spend more time with…you. You know, the tiger. I would have missed him. I mean you.” I blushed. He grinned lopsidedly. “I would have missed you too.” I wrung the hem of my shirt between my hands. Misreading my thoughts, he said, “Kelsey. I’m truly sorry for the deception. If there’d been any other way-“ I looked up. He hung his head in a way that reminded me of the tiger. The frustration and awkwardness I felt about him dissipated. My instincts told me that I should believe him and help him. The strong emotional connection that drew me to the tiger tugged at my heart even more powerfully with the man. I felt pity for him and his situation. Softly, I asked, “When will you change into a tiger?” “Soon.” “Does it hurt?” “Not as much as it used to.” “Do you understand me when you are a tiger? Can I still speak to you?” “Yes, I’ll still be able to hear and understand you.” I took a deep breath. “Okay. I’ll stay here with you until the shaman comes back. I still have a lot of questions for you though.” “I know. I’ll try to answer them as best I can, but you’ll have to save them for tomorrow when I’ll be able to speak with you again. We can stay here for the night. The shaman should be back around dusk.” “Ren?” “Yes?” “The jungle frightens me, and this situation frightens me.” He let go of the apron string and looked into my eyes. “I know.” “Ren?” “Yes?” “Don’t…leave me, okay?” His face softened into a tender expression, and his mouth turned up in a sincere smile. “Asambhava. I won’t.” I felt myself responding to his smile with one of my own when a shadow fell across his face. He clenched his fists and tightened his jaw. I saw a tremor pass through his body, and the chair fell forward as he collapsed to the ground on his hands and knees. I stood to reach out to him and was amazed to see his body morph back into the tiger form I knew so well. Ren the tiger shook himself, then approached my outstretched hand and rubbed his head against it.

The white woman across the aisle from me says 'Look, look at all the history, that house on the hill there is over two hundred years old, ' as she points out the window past me into what she has been taught. I have learned little more about American history during my few days back East than what I expected and far less of what we should all know of the tribal stories whose architecture is 15,000 years older than the corners of the house that sits museumed on the hill. 'Walden Pond, ' the woman on the train asks, 'Did you see Walden Pond? ' and I don't have a cruel enough heart to break her own by telling her there are five Walden Ponds on my little reservation out West and at least a hundred more surrounding Spokane, the city I pretended to call my home. 'Listen, ' I could have told her. 'I don't give a shit about Walden. I know the Indians were living stories around that pond before Walden's grandparents were born and before his grandparents' grandparents were born. I'm tired of hearing about Don-fucking-Henley saving it, too, because that's redundant. If Don Henley's brothers and sisters and mothers and father hadn't come here in the first place then nothing would need to be saved.' But I didn't say a word to the woman about Walden Pond because she smiled so much and seemed delighted that I thought to bring her an orange juice back from the food car. I respect elders of every color. All I really did was eat my tasteless sandwich, drink my Diet Pepsi and nod my head whenever the woman pointed out another little piece of her country's history while I, as all Indians have done since this war began, made plans for what I would do and say the next time somebody from the enemy thought I was one of their own.

I received in a kiss my mother’s heart, complete, without the reservation of an afterthought,

Apostrophes, however, I love with all my heart. I support the correctly used apostrophe with that kind of fierce emotional investment in an irrelevance that most people reserve for football.

The problem is, I don’t know how to do that, either. I’ve essentially handed my heart over to the person who’s had it on reserve for half my life, and I’m terrified that he doesn’t realize what he’s holding.

He couldn’t love me—I’m convinced of this to my bones. He couldn’t share his anguish, his loss, or anything of his heart. He closed himself off—and he’s still closed off, because his heart is reserved for someone else. So I closed myself off too—because something I’ve learned these last few weeks is self-preservation. I couldn’t let myself get hurt. Not now, not after everything that’s happened. I’ve been hurt enough by life; I’m still mending.

Culturally, though not theologically, I’m a Christian. I was born a Protestant of the white Anglo-Saxon persuasion. And while I do love that great teacher of peace who was called Jesus, and while I do reserve the right to ask myself in certain trying situations what indeed He would do, I can’t swallow that one fixed rule of Christianity insisting that Christ is the only path to God. Strictly speaking, then, I cannot call myself a Christian. Most of the Christians I know accept my feelings on this with grace and open-mindedness. Then again, most of the Christians I know don’t speak very strictly. To those who do speak (and think) strictly, all I can do here is offer my regrets for any hurt feelings and now excuse myself from their business. “Traditionally, I have responded to the transcendent mystics of all religions. I have always responded with breathless excitement to anyone who has ever said that God does not live in a dogmatic scripture or in a distant throne in the sky, but instead abides very close to us indeed—much closer than we can imagine, breathing right through our own hearts. I respond with gratitude to anyone who has ever voyaged to the center of that heart, and who has then returned to the world with a report for the rest of us that God is an experience of supreme love. In every religious tradition on earth, there have always been mystical saints and transcendents who report exactly this experience. Unfortunately many of them have ended up arrested and killed. Still, I think very highly of them. “In the end, what I have come to believe about God is simple. It’s like this—I used to have this really great dog. She came from the pound. She was a mixture of about ten different breeds, but seemed to have inherited the finest features of them all. She was brown. When people asked me, “What kind of dog is that?” I would always give the same answer: “She’s a brown dog.” Similarly, when the question is raised, “What kind of God do you believe in?” my answer is easy: “I believe in a magnificent God

Major Trapp was never there. Instead he remained in Jozefow because he allegedly could not bear the sight. We men were upset about that and said we couldn't bear the sight either." Indeed, Trapp's distress was a secret to no one. At the marketplace one policeman remembered hearing Trapp say, "Oh God, why did I have to be given these orders," as he put his hand on his heart. Another policeman witnessed him at the schoolhouse. "Today, I can still see exactly before my eyes Major Trapp there in the room pacing back and forth with his hands behind his back. He said something like, 'Man, ... such jobs don't suit me. But orders are orders.' " Another man remembered vividly "how Trapp, finally alone in our room, sat on a stool and wept bitterly. The tears really flowed." Another also witnessed Trapp at his headquarters. "Major Trapp ran around excitedly and then suddenly stopped dead in front of me, stared and asked if I agreed with this. I looked him straight in the eye and said 'No, Herr Major!' He then began to run around again and wept like a child." The doctor's aide encountered Trapp weeping on the path from the marketplace to the forest and asked if he could help. "He answered me only to the effect that everything was very terrible." Concerning Jozefow, Trapp later confined to his driver, "If this Jewish business is ever avenged on earth, then have mercy on us Germans.

without a reservation without some romantic backstory. Even if it wasn’t my job, I wouldn’t have had the heart. Her father doesn’t like him.” “I don’t like him either.” “Yes, you do. Or you would. I’m really sorry, but—” “What is that?” he interrupted, moving back toward the door. “Was that somebody screaming?” “They’re at it again.” When he glanced back at her, frowned, she lifted her shoulders. “They really wanted a room.” “That’s . . . wow.” Head tilted, he listened another minute.

It is Never Too Late to Mend." Since it can never be too late To change your life, or else renew it, Let the unpleasant process wait Until you are compelled to do it. The State provides (and gratis too) Establishments for such as you. Remember this, and pluck up heart, That, be you publican or parson, Your ev'ry art must have a start, From petty larceny to arson; And even in the burglar's trade, The cracksman is not born, but made. So, if in your career of crime, You fail to carry out some "coup", Then try again a second time, And yet again, until you do; And don't despair, or fear the worst, Because you get found out at first. Perhaps the battle will not go, On all occasions, to the strongest; You may be fairly certain tho' That He Laughs Last who laughs the Longest. So keep a good reserve of laughter, Which may be found of use hereafter. Believe me that, howe'er well meant, A Good Resolve is always brief; Don't let your precious hours be spent In turning over a new leaf. Such leaves, like Nature's, soon decay, And then are only in the way. The Road to—-well, a certain spot, (A Road of very fair dimensions), Has, so the proverb tells us, got A parquet-floor of Good Intentions. Take care, in your desire to please, You do not add a brick to these. For there may come a moment when You shall be mended willy-nilly, With many more misguided men, Whose skill is undermined with skilly. Till then procrastinate, my friend; "It Never is Too Late to Mend!

since one has doubts of them at the moment when one believes in them, and never can possess their hearts as I used to receive, in her kiss, the heart of my mother, complete, without scruple or reservation, unburdened by any liability save to myself)

I took good care not to tell anybody that I had resolved never to love without restraint a man who would not return this love in full; such was my disposition that my heart would have belonged entirely and without reserve to a husband who loved only me.

We were dreamers, both of us, unpractical, reserved, full of great theories never put to test, and, like all dreamers, asleep to the waking world. Disliking our fellow men, we craved affection; but shyness kept impulse dormant until the heart was touched.

I have never united myself to any church because I have found difficulty in giving my assent without mental reservation to the long complicated statements of Christian doctrine which characterize their articles of belief and confessions of faith. When any church will inscribe over its altar as the sole qualification for membership the Savior's condensed statement of the substance of both law and gospel: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind, and love thy neighbor as thyself," that church I will join with all my heart.

He wondered why he cared so desperately about the fate of his adopted country and others seemingly so little. "To see the character of the government and the country so sported with, exposed to so indelible a blot, puts my heart to the torture. Am I then more of an American than those who drew their first breath on American ground? Or what is it that thus torments me at a circumstance so calmly viewed by almost everybody else? Am I a fool, a romantic Quixote, or is there a constitutional defect in the American mind? Were it not for yourself and a few others, I . . . would say . . . there is something in our climate which belittles every animal, human or brute. . . . I disclose to you without reserve the state of my mind. It is discontented and gloomy in the extreme. I consider the cause of good government as having been put to an issue and the verdict against it.

A man can be beautiful, I see that now. It’s not just a woman’s term, not a word reserved for romantic, virtuous, elegant things. I don’t think beauty is neat anymore. It’s unordered. It’s unbrushed hair and a torn back pocket. It’s bright and strange and lovely, and if I were to paint him, I’d use all the warm colours - ochre, gold, plum, terracotta, scarlet, burnt orange. I want him to see me as I saw him then, I want him to find me alone at the end of the day with the sun in my hair. I want his heart to buckle, too. I want him to stop someone out in the square and say, who’s that? Do you know her? Where is she from?” — - from Eve Green’s mother’s account. “It is written on a piece of thin, yellow paper, and is folded in half. I like this account. I like it because it’s true, she’s right. We all want out lovers to see us that way - unaware, natural, serene. We want to change their world with one glance, to stop their breath at the sight of us.

Mucize Mülteci (Divine Refugee Sonnet) Call me misafir, call me göçmen, This heart of mine is always migrant. Şan ve şöhrete ben muhtaç değilim, Benim derdim dünya, dünya dermanım. Call me gypsy, or call me refugee, This heart of mine is always migrant. I've got no use for silicon or gold, World is my bane, world, my ointment. In Sanskrit I am Abhijit, In English I am Victor. In Arabic I am Ghalib, In History I am Reformer. Call me whatever you like, Befitting your culture. I have no reservations, Above my human nature. So many tongues, as many names - Some call agua, some call pani. Conquer the tongue, spirit is the same - Some dub it divine, I live as humanity.

I’m so ridiculously happy in this moment that when I begin to silently cry next to him, I don’t know what to think besides what I’m now willing to admit to myself. I’m crazy in love with this man. I love everything about him. From the tiniest detail like the little lines next to his eyes and the slit that runs down his bottom lip, to the way I can only seem to be able to take a full breath when he’s near me. I love the words he says to me and the look he reserves only for me; even if that look is one that’s a preamble to a Reese style flip out. I love the way I can sense his presence and the way my heart beats in my chest when I finally lock eyes with him. I love him. Just him.

Even after we stopped seeing each other, I thought of her with great fondness. Memories of her encouraged me, soothed me, as I passed through the confusion and pain of adolescence. For a long time, she held a special place in my heart. I kept this special place just for her, like a Reserved sign on a quiet corner table in a restaurant. Despite the fact that I was sure I’d never see her again.

Whenever I’m away from him I get this terrible ache in my chest, always in the same spot. It’s true. There’s a place in my heart reserved just for him. But at the same time I have this strong urge inside me to try something else, to come into contact with all kinds of people. Call it curiosity, a thirst to know more. More possibilities. It’s a natural emotion and I can’t suppress it, no matter how much I try.

The German puts strength before beauty, and truth before convention, both in life and in literature. There is a vehement, sledge-hammer vigour about everything that he does. When he speaks, it is not to impress others, but because his heart would burst if he did not find an outlet for the thoughts that burn in his soul. Then, too, there is in German literature a fine reserve which I like; but its chief glory is the recognition I find in it of the redeeming potency

Father, I abandon myself into your hands. Do with me what you will. Whatever you may do, I thank you, I am ready for all, I accept all. Let only your will be done in me and in all your creatures. I wish no more than this, O Lord. Into your hands I commend my soul. I offer it to you with all the love of my heart, for I love you, Lord, and so need to give myself, to surrender myself into your hands without reserve and with boundless confidence, for you are my Father.4 —CHARLES DE FOUCAULD

I love music. It sets everything in me alive. Every hair stands out on end. I feel like there's a box in my heart, a secret, hidden part of myself. I keep so many things locked inside that box so that no one else will ever see. And when I listen to music, alone in my room with my giant headphones on, the box flies open and all of the colours spill out and somehow merge with the music. I love the feeling. All of my masking and my reservations leave and the hidden parts of my soul come out.

Anxiety isn’t an attack that explodes out of me; it’s not a volcano that lies dormant until it’s triggered by an earth-shattering event. It’s a constant companion. Like a blowfly that gets into the house in the middle of summer, flying around and around. You can hear it buzzing, but you can’t see it, can’t capture it, can’t let it out. My anxiety is invisible to others, but often it’s the focal point of my mind. Everything that happens on a day-to-day basis is filtered through a lens colored by anxiety. That nervousness that makes your palms sweat and your heart race before you get up and make a speech in front of an audience? That’s what I feel in a normal conversation at a dinner table. Or just thinking about having a conversation at a dinner table. The fear that other people feel on rare occasions, reserved only for when they jump out of a plane or hear a strange noise in the middle of the night—that’s my normal. That’s what I feel when the phone rings. When someone knocks on my door. When I go outside. When I’m alone. When I’m in line at a store. Everything feels like I’m on a stage, spotlight on me, all eyes on me, watching, judging. Like I’m one second away from total disaster. It’s invisible, it’s irrational, it’s never-ending. I could be standing there, smiling and chatting like everything is totally fine, while secretly wanting to scream and cry and run away. No one would ever know. In my mind, no one can hear me scream. I hide it because I know it’s not understood or acceptable—because I’m not understood or acceptable.

But before I got in the ring, I’d won it out here on the road. Some people think a Heavyweight Championship fight is decided during the fifteen rounds the two fighters face each other under hot blazing lights, in front of thousands of screaming witnesses, and part of it is. But a prizefight is like a war: the real part is won or lost somewhere far away from witnesses, behind the lines, in the gym and out here on the road long before I dance under those lights. I’ve got another mile to go. My heart is about to break through my chest, sweat is pouring off me. I want to stop but I’ve marked this as the day to test myself, to find out what kind of shape I’m in, how much work I have to do. Whenever I feel I want to stop, I look around and I see George Foreman running, coming up next to me. And I run a little harder. I’ve got a half-mile more to go and each yard is draining me, I’m running on my reserve tank now, but I know each step I take after I’m exhausted builds up special stamina and it’s worth all the other running put together. I need something to push me on, to keep me from stopping, until I get to the farmer’s stable up ahead, five miles from where I started. George is helping me. I fix my mind on him and I see him right on my heels. I push harder, he’s catching up. It’s hard for me to get my breath, I feel like I’m going to faint. He’s starting to pull ahead of me. This is the spark I need. I keep pushing harder till I pull even with him. His sweat shirt’s soaking wet and I hear him breathing fast and hard. My heart is pounding like it’s going to explode, but I drive myself on. I glance over at him and he’s throwing himself in the wind, going all out. My legs are heavy and tight with pain but I manage to drive, drive, drive till I pass him, Till he slowly fades away. I’ve won, but I’m not in shape. I’ve still got a long way to go. I’m gasping for breath. My throat’s dry and I feel like I’m going to throw up. I want to fall on my face but I must stay up, keep walking, keep standing. I’m not there yet but I know I’m winning. I’m winning the fight on the road . . .

We dropped in one evening, and found the ladies at home. My long friend engaged his favourites, the two younger girls, at the game of "Now," or hunting a stone under three piles of tappa. For myself, I lounged on a mat with Ideea the eldest, dallying with her grass fan, and improving my knowledge of Tahitian. The occasion was well adapted to my purpose, and I began. "Ah, Ideea, mickonaree oee?" the same as drawling out—"By the bye, Miss Ideea, do you belong to the church?" "Yes, me mickonaree," was the reply. But the assertion was at once qualified by certain, reservations; so curious that I cannot forbear their relation. "Mickonaree ena" (church member here), exclaimed she, laying her hand upon her mouth, and a strong emphasis on the adverb. In the same way, and with similar exclamations, she touched her eyes and hands. This done, her whole air changed in an instant; and she gave me to understand, by unmistakable gestures, that in certain other respects she was not exactly a "mickonaree." In short, Ideea was "A sad good Christian at the heart— A very heathen in the carnal part." The

Studying the history of our ancestors is instructive. I understand some of my parents’ struggles and sacrifices. I am acquainted with my grandparents and great grandparents’ way of life. The common denominator that runs through their lifeblood is a hardpan of resiliency, courage, and work ethic. They also shared a phenomenal degree of competency essential to make due in an open land where the pioneering spirit meets nature under a big sky full of endless possibilities for triumph and setback. My forebears took care of their family members and tended their ancestral land before the word caretaker was a recognized term for a loving man, woman, or child. Self-reliant people who master the skills essential for survival in a harsh clime also value helping other people who are in a fix. All my predecessors were quick to lend a hand to a neighbor in need. Their ability to see life through the heart was the decisive feature of their pioneering pluck. How we start a day, presages how the day shall unfold. Each day when I awaken, I feel clobbered by the preceding day. At days end, I feel comparable to a chewed on piece of masticated beef. I devote all available personal energy reserves to simply getting by and muss over how I can engender the energy to make it through today’s pulp works. In reality, I go on because akin to every generation that preceded me and every generation that succeeds me, I must continue onward or I will expire. The one fact that keeps me going is the realization that all generations of people struggle. What we share with preceding generations is our heartaches and our willingness to struggle in order to make the world a better place for the next generation.

Orthodoxy and orthopraxy are both important and are both things that Jesus spoke to, but I no longer believe that either of these things belongs in the center of our circles. I think that spot should be reserved for the exact representation of love: Jesus. By erasing my central pursuit of orthodoxy and orthopraxy and replacing it with Jesus, the essence of love, I realized that perhaps Jesus was inviting us to pursue something even better than right thinking or right doing: he was inviting us to pursue a heart that is constantly increasing in is capacity to love.

You're my first love. I knew that when you would always smile when you saw me, and it was like staring into the sun. You're my heart. You are my soul. I love Mom. She taught me kindness. I love Dad. He taught me how to be a good wolf. I love Joe. He taught me that strength comes from within. But you were my greatest teacher. Because with you I understood life. What it meant to love someone so blindingly and without reservation. To have a purpose. To have hope. I have been a big brother fro most of my life, and it's the best thing I could ever be. Without you, I would be nothing.

To the night version of her (mother) I owe free-floating anxiety. I am no longer a child in an unsafe home, but anxiety became habit. My brain is conditioned. I worry. I recheck everything obsessively. Is the seat belt fastened, are the reservations correct, is my passport in my purse? Have I done something wrong? Have I said something wrong? I'm sorry - whatever happened must be my fault. Is everyone all right, and if they aren't, how can I step in? That brilliant serenity prayer: God give me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. To all the children of alcoholics I want to say, Good luck with that. If I don't do it myself, it won't get done (this belief is often rewarded in this increasingly incompetent world). Also, I panic easily. I am not the person you want sitting in the exit row of an airplane. And distrust. Just in general, distrust. Irony. Irony, according to the dictionary, is the use of comedy to distance oneself from emotion. I developed it as a child lickety-split. Irony was armor, a way to stick it to Mom. You think you can get me? Come on, shoot me, aim that arrow straight at my heart. It can't make a dent because I'm wearing irony.

It will be long before everyone is wiped out. People live in war time, they always have. There was terror down through history - and the men who saw the Spanish Armada sail over the rim of the world, who saw the Black death wipe out half of Europe, those men were frightened, terrified. But though they lived and died in fear, I am here; we have built again. And so I will belong to a dark age, and historians will say "We have few documents to show how the common people lived at this time. Records lead us to believe that a majority were killed. But there were glorious men." And school children will sigh and learn the names of Truman and Senator McCarthy. Oh, it is hard for me to reconcile myself to this. But maybe this is why I am a girl - - - so I can live more safely than the boys I have known and envied, so I can bear children, and instill in them the biting eating desire to learn and love life which I will never quite fulfill, because there isn't time, because there isn't time at all, but instead the quick desperate fear, the ticking clock, and the snow which comes too suddenly upon the summer. Sure, I'm dramatic and sloppily semi-cynical and semi-sentimental. But in leisure years I could grow and choose my way. Now I am living on the edge. We all are on the brink, and it takes a lot of nerve, a lot of energy, to teeter on the edge, looking over, looking down into the windy blackness and not being quite able to make out, through the yellow, stinking mist, just what lies below in the slime, in the oozing, vomit-streaked slime; and so I could go on, into my thoughts, writing much, trying to find the core, the meaning for myself. Perhaps that would help, to synthesize my ideas into a philosophy for me, now, at the age of eighteen, but the clock ticks, ah yes, "At my back I hear, time's winged chariot hovering near." And I have too much conscience, too much habit to sit and stare at snow, thick now, and evenly white and muffling on the ground. God, I scream for time to let go, to write, to think. But no. I have to exercise my memory in little feats just so I can stay in this damn wonderful place which I love and hate with all my heart. And so the snow slows and swirls, and melts along the edges. The first snow isn't good for much. It makes a few people write poetry, a few wonder if the Christmas shopping is done, a few make reservations at the skiing lodge. It's a sentimental prelude to the real thing. It's picturesque & quaint.

The Lingerer by Stewart Stafford Another lonely start, O shadow companion, My twin bereft of heart, On grief’s stormy galleon. Each step disbelief, Strangers pass in proximity, In motion an artist’s relief, Abstract as infinity. The quickening pulse of streets, Tears on cheeks reflective, This scarred heart missing beats, Damaged and defective. Home now just where memory sits, Perspective greatly shifted, This shapeless form no longer fits, The body it was gifted. And if, my love, you see me now, I beg you, look away, Love’s blush departed with a bow, Then withered and decayed. © Stewart Stafford, 2021. All rights reserved.

The warmth of your heart is tauntingly near, but you reserve it as you shut me out in the blizzard of your doubt. Is it because you don't understand the freakish assembly of my soul, a soul that was once broken? In some ways I guess I don't blame you. if I had the opportunity to avoid the vague horizon of my future, I would. But these are the cards I've been dealt and I still don't know all the rules of the game. My burden is heavy and becomes harder to bear each day. I know I have the ability to endure it alone if I really persevere, but I prefer a steady hand to help guide me along the way and maybe even hold me in times of uncertainty.

Lincoln grinned. “The Academy owns a number of buildings. There are walkways between them.” I couldn’t take my eyes off the sky folk. “There are people wandering around in the sky, Linc. Explain this to me.” He laughed one of his low, secretive laughs. One that echoed through my entire body. One that told me he adored me. One that somehow I knew, out of everyone in the world, was reserved for me. The laugh that broke my heart. Breathe. “I’m glad you find me amusing. Less laughing, more telling!” He laughed again and I was about a second away from either throwing a punch or throwing myself at him when a woman’s voice caught our attention. “I

Marjory Gengler (white American) to Mark Mathabane (black South African) in the late 1970s-- Marjory: Why don't blacks fight to change the system [apartheid] that so dehumanizes them? Mark's Response, from his memoirs: I told her [Marjory] about the sophistication of apartheid machinery, the battery of Draconian laws used to buttress it, the abject poverty in which a majority of blacks were sunk, leaving them with little energy and will to agitate for their rights. I told her about the indoctrination that took place in black schools under the guise of Bantu Education, the self-hatred that resulted from being constantly told that you are less than human and being treated that way. I told her of the anger and hatred pent-up inside millions of blacks, destroying their minds. I would have gone on to tell Marjory about the suffering of wives without husbands and children without fathers in impoverished tribal reserves, about the high infant mortality rate among blacks in a country that exported food, and which in 1987 gave the world its first heart transplant. I would have told them about the ragged black boys and girls of seven, eight and nine years who constantly left their homes because of hunger and a disintegrating family life and were making it on their own; by begging along the thoroughfares of Johannesburg; by sleeping in scrapped cars, gutters and in abandoned buildings; by bathing in the diseased Jukskei River; and by eating out of trash cans, sucking festering sores and stealing rotting produce from the Indian traders on First Avenue. I would have told her about how these orphans of the streets, some of them my friends--their physical, intellectual and emotional growth dwarfed and stunted--had grown up to become prostitutes, unwed mothers and tsotsis, littering the ghetto streets with illegitimate children and corpses. I would have told her all this, but I didn't; I feared she would not believe me; I feared upsetting her.

Oh Time! the beautifier of the dead, Adorner of the ruin, comforter And only healer when the heart hath bled— Time! the corrector where our judgments err, The test of truth, love,—sole philosopher, For all beside are sophists, from thy thrift, Which never loses though it doth defer— Time, the avenger! unto thee I lift My hands, and eyes, and heart, and crave of thee a gift: Amidst this wreck, where thou hast made a shrine And temple more divinely desolate, Among thy mightier offerings here are mine, Ruins of years— though few, yet full of fate:— If thou hast ever seen me too elate, Hear me not; but if calmly I have borne Good, and reserved my pride against the hate Which shall not whelm me, let me not have worn This iron in my soul in vain— shall they not mourn?

She canted her wings and soared toward the top of it, where she could see a never-ending line of trees tossing violently in the wind. The hurricane made one more effort to throw her back into the sea, but she fought with her last reserves until she felt earth beneath her talons. She collapsed forward, clutching the wet soil for a moment, grateful to be alive. Keep going. They’re not safe yet. Clearsight pushed herself up and faced the trees. They were coming. The first two dragons she would meet in this strange new world. What would it be like to face unfamiliar tribes, completely different from the ones she knew? There wouldn’t be any NightWings like her here. No sand dragons, no sea dragons, no ice dragons. She’d glimpsed what these new dragons would look like, but she didn’t know anything yet about their tribes . . . or whether they would trust her. They stepped out of the trees, eyeing her with wary curiosity. Oh, they’re beautiful, she thought. One was dark forest green, the color of the trees all around them. His wings curved gracefully like long leaves on either side of him, and mahogany-brown underscales glinted from his chest. But it was the other who took Clearsight’s breath away. His scales were iridescent gold layered over metallic rose and blue, shimmering through the rain. He outshone even the RainWings she’d occasionally seen in the marketplace, and those were the most beautiful dragons in Pyrrhia. Not only that, but his wings were startlingly weird. There were four of them instead of two; a second pair at the back overlapped the front ones, tilting and dipping at slightly different angles from the first pair to give the dragon extra agility in the air. Like dragonflies, she realized, remembering the delicate insects darting across the ponds in the mountain meadows. Or butterflies, or beetles. She sat up and spread her front talons to show that she was harmless. “Hello,” she said in her very least threatening voice. The green one circled her slowly. The iridescent one sat down and gave her a small smile. She smiled back, although her heart was pounding. She knew she had to wait for them to make the first move. “Leefromichou?” said the green dragon finally, in a deep, calm voice. “Wayroot?” Take a breath. You knew it would be like this at first. “My name is Clearsight,” she said, touching her forehead. “I am from far over the sea.” She pointed at the churning ocean stretching way off to the east behind her. “Anyone speak Dragon?

No. It couldn’t be. I shook my head, still disbelieving. Maybe the poison had warped my brain and I was delusional after all. I pulled myself to my feet, swaying against Drake, allowing his warm, hard body to prop me up. “You know what that means.” “I do.” His jaw tightened, his eyes flashing with intermingled anger and passion. My heart, leaden and sick, suddenly was enveloped in a gentle warmth that did much to dispel the ills that had possessed it. “Are you sure? Really sure? It’s not something else? Maybe you’re sick.” His face grew harder. “Do you think I’m a fool that I could mistake it?” “No, but you don’t look very happy about it.” “I’m not,” he snapped, irritation rampant on his handsome features. A smile curved my lips as I kissed the corners of his mouth, ignoring the presence of those around us. “Are you going to say it?” “No.” “Come on. I want to hear it.” “No!” I allowed all the love I had for him to show in my eyes as I rubbed my nose on his. “Please?” His face took on the most martyred expression I’d ever seen. “If I say it once, do I have to say it again?” “Yes. With increasing frequency. It gets easier with time, honest.” He sighed again. “I knew this would not come to a good end. Very well, I’ll say it. But I reserve the right to refer you to this conversation on occasions when you wish me to say it again. Aisling, I love you.” I fought hard to keep the smile off my face. Drake’s declaration of love was delivered in such a brusque tone, I knew it had to be costing him a lot to admit the truth. “I love you, too,” I answered, and welcomed his mouth when it came to claim mine, my heart singing a joyous song of happiness and fulfillment.

Leave him alone.” I’ve spun and headed toward them before I can stop myself. My voice comes up from some black reserve of courage inside me, a place usually saved for speech class, or going to the dentist on my own. My face crumples in on itself; my legs shake. My heart beats like I just sprinted a mile. Travis and Deshawn both turn to me and smile—well, Deshawn doesn’t really smile, and all of Travis’s smiles look like leers. God, I remember when those smiles used to be nice. Wallace stares at me, expression unreadable. Does he realize how futile this is? Maybe I can at least give him a few seconds to run. The only thing I can’t do is stand idly by while a fan—if not a fan of Monstrous Sea, then definitely a fan of something—gets ridiculed for what he likes. LadyConstellation wouldn’t stand for that, and for this exact moment now, neither do I.

When I Find It Difficult to Trust Him Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding. PROVERBS 3:5 HAS YOUR HUSBAND ever done something you feel has violated your trust in him? It doesn’t have to be anything as terrible as infidelity. It could be financial irresponsibility, or some kind of lie or deception, or hurtful treatment of you, or a confidence he shared with someone else. Whatever it is, you can find yourself wary—always suspecting he may do the same thing again. Yet there must be trust in your marriage relationship or you can never move forward. Living in such a close relationship without trust is not living at all. It’s remarkably sad to not be able to trust the one we are supposed to trust the most. If this has happened to you, it must be remedied, rectified, and resolved. Only God can truly restore the kind of trust you need to have. If your husband has done something to lose your trust, pray that God will lead him to complete repentance. Pray also that your heart will be willing to forgive him. This can be especially hard if he is a repeat offender, but it is not too hard for God to work forgiveness in your heart if you are willing. Ask God to set you free of all anger, frustration, disappointment, fear, and resentment. The most important thing to do after you have prayed for your husband’s repentance and your forgiveness is to pray you will trust God to work a miracle in your husband’s heart and yours as well. You have to first decide that You will trust God with all your heart and not lean on your own understanding. Then He will enable you to trust your husband again. My Prayer to God LORD, I confess any time when I have lost faith in my husband and don’t have full trust in him. I know that is not the way You want me to live. Help us both to have faith in each other and not live in constant distrust, bracing ourselves for what violation of trust is going to happen next. Where my distrust is unfounded, I pray You would help me to see that and enable me to step out in trust of him again. Where my distrust is legitimate because he has truly violated that trust, I ask for a miracle of restoration. First of all, I pray You would lead my husband to total repentance. Bring him to his knees before You in confession so he can be restored. I pray he will be sincerely apologetic to me as well. Second, help me to forgive him so completely that I can trust him fully without reservation again. And last, but most important of all, help me to trust You with all my heart to rectify this situation. Work powerfully in my husband to make him trustworthy, and do a work in me to make me trusting. Help me to not depend on my own reasoning, but rather to depend on Your ability to transform us both. In Jesus’ name I pray.

Such fatigues and hardship as these serve to wean me more from the earth; and, I trust, will make heaven the sweeter. Formerly, when I was thus exposed to cold, rain, etc., I was ready to please myself with the thoughts of enjoying a comfortable house, a warm fire, and other outward comforts; but now these have less place in my heart (through the grace of God) and my eye is more to God for comfort. In this world I expect tribulation; and it does not now, as formerly, appear strange to me; I don’t in such seasons of difficulty flatter myself that it will be better hereafter; but rather think how much worse it might be; how much greater trials others of God’s children have endured; and how much greater are yet perhaps reserved for me. Blessed be God that he makes the comfort to me, under my sharpest trials; and scarce ever lets these thoughts be attended with terror or melancholy; but they are attended frequently with great joy.

Technically, according to the ancient enigma of quantum physics, I am now neither dead nor alive. I am in the suspended state of overlapping probability waves once reserved for the cat in Schrödinger’s thought experiment. Because the hull of the cat box is little more than position-fused energy ready to explode at the slightest intrusion, no one will ever look inside to see if I am dead or alive. Theoretically, no one is directly responsible for my execution, since the immutable laws of quantum theory pardon or condemn me from each microsecond to the next. There are no observers. But I am an observer. I am waiting for this particular collapse of probability waves with something more than detached interest. In the instant after the hissing of cyanide gas begins, but before it reaches my lungs and heart and brain, I will know which way the universe has chosen to sort itself out. At least, I will know so far as I am concerned. Which, when it comes right down to it, is the only aspect of the universe’s resolution with which most of us are concerned.

Season's Greetings by Stewart Stafford Season's Greetings To those we are needing, While I am leading The Festive charge. Christmas love is fleeting, The snow is sleeting, And there's every chance of feeling, A thaw in my cold heart. Season's Greetings everywhere, Let War cease and all be fair, A heart that's full of Christmas cheer, Bravely faces the New Year. And so, we feast and celebrate, For those we've lost, we contemplate, Christmas is an emotional stocktake, Of those still here and those that are late. The year winds down to that last date, Resolutions tempting fate, New Fear's Eve, many hate, And choose to socially-isolate. Season's Greetings while you can, To every woman, child, and man, Season's Greetings, don't you wait Hold back now, and it's too late. And in the end, all we do, Is create memories for the few, Who mattered while we strode this earth, Then back to the place before our birth. Season's Greetings, decorations down, Bittersweet crunching sounds, Topple the tree to live again, Twelfth Night, the inevitable end. © Stewart Stafford, 2020. All rights reserved.

Something More Fragile Than This" Quick before our bodies turn themselves in, with a reverence reserved for the dead touch me because I want to remember how beautiful I am. While Spring snows around us, cracking her eggs on our windows, in her meager dress of yellowing-white, because I want to rise into today. So why the urge to render something more fragile than this? Why, always, the soul blowing glass? The soul, once again, filling the lungs with smoke because a memory of regret sweats in the plastic sleeve of a family album. Because there’s a snapshot caught between the pages of some thick book: my heavy 20 year old frame setting off the 60lb weight of a dying mother. Because somewhere, there’s a negative slide of my heart. Because and because and because I’m sure there’s a photo in some drawer that shows me dressed in black. But I want to devote myself to the mystery of this afternoon. I want to honor this falling night, worship the hour vanishing between six and seven. This moment where I’m standing against myself and against you with a taste in my mouth that’s yolk. With Bob Marley taking that one long drag on the refrigerator door.

Dear—Prince,” she started haltingly. She’d never prayed to a Fate, and she didn’t want to get it wrong. “I’m here because my parents are dead.” Evangeline cringed. That was not how she was supposed to start. “What I meant to say was, my parents have both passed away. I lost my mother a couple of years ago. Then I lost my father last season. Now I’m about to lose the boy that I love. “Luc Navarro—” Her throat closed as she said the name and pictured his crooked smile. Maybe if he’d been plainer, or poorer, or crueler, none of this would have happened. “We’ve been seeing each other in secret. I was supposed to be in mourning for my father. Then, a little over two weeks ago, on the day that Luc and I were going to tell our families we were in love, my stepsister, Marisol, announced that she and Luc were getting married.” Evangeline paused to close her eyes. This part still made her head spin. Quick engagements weren’t uncommon. Marisol was pretty, and although she was reserved, she was also kind—so much kinder than Evangeline’s stepmother, Agnes. But Evangeline had never even seen Luc in the same room as Marisol. “I know how this sounds, but Luc loves me. I believe he’s been cursed. He hasn’t spoken to me since the engagement was announced—he won’t even see me. I don’t know how she did it, but I’m certain this is all my stepmother’s doing.” Evangeline didn’t actually have any proof that Agnes was a witch and she’d cast a curse on Luc. But Evangeline was certain her stepmother had learned of Evangeline’s relationship with Luc and she’d wanted Luc, and the title he’d someday inherit, for her daughter instead. “Agnes has resented me ever since my father died. I’ve tried talking to Marisol about Luc. Unlike my stepmother, I don’t think Marisol would ever intentionally hurt me. But every time I try to open my mouth, the words won’t come out, as if they’re also cursed or I’m cursed. So I’m here, begging for your help. The wedding is today, and I need you to stop it.” Evangeline opened her eyes. The lifeless statue hadn’t changed. She knew statues didn’t generally move. Yet she couldn’t help but think that it should have done something—shifted or spoken or moved its marble eyes. “Please, I know you understand heartbreak. Stop Luc from marrying Marisol. Save my heart from breaking again.

Fathers and sons, probably one of the most emotionally deep, human relationships. Probably one of the most intense human equations. Words alone cannot describe what a father and son feel for each other, simply because there are such few words in this relationship. So much is left unsaid between the two of them. Communication, or rather a lack of it, always broadens the gap between the two of them. There’s always a gap between a father and son, always a gap between a name and a surname. I’ve always asked myself and today I address this question to all of you sons out there: Why did you stop hugging your father after a certain age? Why did you stop expressing, and being affectionate to your father after a certain age? Why is there this inexplicable awkwardness between a father and son? Why are all your emotions, your innermost thoughts, your tears, always reserved for your mother, your sister and then your wife? Why? Because you then become a father, and then you bottle up, just like your father did, and this vicious circle continues. Who is going to break this vicious circle? I realized, and I’m sure this applies to all of you as well, that, like everybody else, I too had issues, minor issues with my father, like every other son. You could call it a generation gap, you could call it a difference of opinion, you could call it anything. But what I also realized was that I was subconsciously being the man my father is. I was talking like him, feeling like him, loving like him—I was just being him. I then realized that a father not only gives his son his name, he also gives him his personality. So somewhere, if you have a problem with your father, you actually have a problem with yourself. Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve had this realization and this opportunity to express myself, and I wish with all my heart, that one day you do too. My father is my conscience, my father is my strength, my father is my support, my father is my hero. I don’t say it often enough to you, Dad, but what better than this global platform to say, I love you. I love you very, very, very much. And I wish I could love you as much as you love me, but I don’t think I’m capable of such unconditional love. I love you. You are my world. And then Amit uncle, who was there, said: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I think whatever needed to be said about Mr Yash Johar, his son Karan has very ably done.

I am sitting alone in my old English classroom at my old desk, reading from Shakespeare’s Macbeth. The only sounds in the room are the ticking of the clock and the occasional rustling of the pages of the book. Then, Martina Reynaud, the most beautiful girl in the Class of ’83, walks in. She’s tall, graceful, and absolutely breathtaking. She’s wearing a black dress, one that shows off her long dancer’s legs. Her peaches-and-cream complexion is flawless; there is no sign of a pimple anywhere. Her long chestnut hair cascades down over her shoulders. In short, she is the personification of feminine elegance from the top of her head to her high-heeled shoes. I try to get back to my reading assignment, but the scent of her perfume, a mixture of jasmine and orange blossoms, is beguiling. I look to my right; she is sitting at the desk right next to mine. She gives me a smile. My heart skips a beat. I know guys who would kill for one of Marty’s smiles. She has that effect on most men. Her smile is full of genuine warmth and affection; I can tell by the look in her hazel eyes. “Hi, Jimmy,” she says. Her voice is soft and melodious; she speaks with a lilting British accent. From what I’ve heard, her family is from England. London, actually. “Hi,” I reply, feeling about as articulate as your average mango. Then, mustering my last reserves of willpower, I focus my attention on Shakespeare’s play.

[THE DAILY BREATH] Blaise Pascal, the famous mathematician, once said: "To those who wish to see, God gives them sufficient light. To those who doesn't wish to see, God gives them sufficient darkness." Seeing the Truth is a choice. Listening to my words is a choice. Healing is a choice. If want scientific evidence about the existence of God, there is a wealth of data to support it. Dr. Jeffrey Long, M.D. used the best scientific techniques available today to study more than 4,000 people who had near-death experiences and found themselves face to face with our Heavenly Father. Read the book "God and the Afterlife" and you will find it. If you want scientific evidence about Jesus being the Son of God, Lee Strobel, an atheist investigative journalist discovered it. Read the book "The Case for Christ" and you will find it. If you want scientific evidence about Jesus still healing today, study the ministries of Dr. Charles Ndifon, T.L. Osborn, Kathryn Kuhlman among others, and you will find it. But most importantly, if you want to fill the emptiness within you, and experience the perfect love, mercy and forgiveness, if you want to live in the peace of our Heavenly Father, give your body, your mind and your heart to Christ. Give your life to Jesus. The empty place you feel in your heart is reserved only for the spirit of Christ and nothing from this world will fill it. Look up to heaven, behold Jesus and Live.

He and Powell would be celebrating their twentieth wedding anniversary a few days later, and he admitted that at times he had not been as appreciative of her as she deserved. “I’m very lucky, because you just don’t know what you’re getting into when you get married,” he said. “You have an intuitive feeling about things. I couldn’t have done better, because not only is Laurene smart and beautiful, she’s turned out to be a really good person.” For a moment he teared up. He talked about his other girlfriends, particularly Tina Redse, but said he ended up in the right place. He also reflected on how selfish and demanding he could be. “Laurene had to deal with that, and also with me being sick,” he said. “I know that living with me is not a bowl of cherries.” Among his selfish traits was that he tended not to remember anniversaries or birthdays. But in this case, he decided to plan a surprise. They had gotten married at the Ahwahnee Hotel in Yosemite, and he decided to take Powell back there on their anniversary. But when Jobs called, the place was fully booked. So he had the hotel approach the people who had reserved the suite where he and Powell had stayed and ask if they would relinquish it. “I offered to pay for another weekend,” Jobs recalled, “and the man was very nice and said, ‘Twenty years, please take it, it’s yours.’” He found the photographs of the wedding, taken by a friend, and had large prints made on thick paper boards and placed in an elegant box. Scrolling through his iPhone, he found the note that he had composed to be included in the box and read it aloud: "We didn’t know much about each other twenty years ago. We were guided by our intuition; you swept me off my feet. It was snowing when we got married at the Ahwahnee. Years passed, kids came, good times, hard times, but never bad times. Our love and respect has endured and grown. We’ve been through so much together and here we are right back where we started 20 years ago—older, wiser—with wrinkles on our faces and hearts. We now know many of life’s joys, sufferings, secrets and wonders and we’re still here together. My feet have never returned to the ground."  By the end of the recitation he was crying uncontrollably. When he composed himself, he noted that he had also made a set of the pictures for each of his kids. “I thought they might like to see that I was young once.

I had been telling him how the devil was God’s enemy in the hearts of men, and used all his malice and skill to defeat the good designs of Providence, and to ruin the kingdom of Christ in the world, and the like. “Well,” says Friday, “but you say God is so strong, so great; is He not much strong, much might as the devil?” “Yes, yes,” says I, “Friday; God is stronger than the devil—God is above the devil, and therefore we pray to God to tread him down under our feet, and enable us to resist his temptations and quench his fiery darts.” “But,” says he again, “if God much stronger, much might as the wicked devil, why God no kill the devil, so make him no more do wicked?” I was strangely surprised at this question; and, after all, though I was now an old man, yet I was but a young doctor, and ill qualified for a casuist or a solver of difficulties; and at first I could not tell what to say; so I pretended not to hear him, and asked him what he said; but he was too earnest for an answer to forget his question, so that he repeated it in the very same broken words as above. By this time I had recovered myself a little, and I said, “God will at last punish him severely; he is reserved for the judgment, and is to be cast into the bottomless pit, to dwell with everlasting fire.” This did not satisfy Friday; but he returns upon me, repeating my words, “‘Reserve at last!’ me no understand—but why not kill the devil now; not kill great ago?” “You may as well ask me,” said I, “why God does not kill you or me, when we do wicked things here that offend Him—we are preserved to repent and be pardoned.” He mused some time on this. “Well, well,” says he, mighty affectionately, “that well—so you, I, devil, all wicked, all preserve, repent, God pardon all.” Here I was run down again by him to the last degree; and it was a testimony to me, how the mere notions of nature, though they will guide reasonable creatures to the knowledge of a God, and of a worship or homage due to the supreme being of God, as the consequence of our nature, yet nothing but divine revelation can form the knowledge of Jesus Christ, and of redemption purchased for us; of a Mediator of the new covenant, and of an Intercessor at the footstool of God’s throne; I say, nothing but a revelation from Heaven can form these in the soul; and that, therefore, the gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, I mean the Word of God, and the Spirit of God, promised for the guide and sanctifier of His people, are the absolutely necessary instructors of the souls of men in the saving knowledge of God and the means of salvation.

Unqualified Champions Consider these individuals from the Bible. Each person was aware of a personal shortcoming which should have rendered him disqualified for service. God, however, saw champion potential … Moses struggled with a speech impediment: “Then Moses said to the LORD, ‘Please, Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither recently nor in time past, nor since You have spoken to Your servant; for I am slow of speech and slow of tongue’” (Exodus 4:10). Yet God served as Moses’ source of strength. God used him to deliver the Israelites from bondage. Jeremiah considered himself too young to deliver a prophetic message to an adult population: “Then I said, ‘Alas, Lord GOD! Behold, I do not know how to speak, because I am a youth’” (Jeremiah 1:6). God’s reply: “Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you,” (Jeremiah 1:8). Isaiah, whose encouragement I quoted earlier, had reservations of his own. Perhaps his vocabulary reflected my own—especially my vocabulary as a teenager: “I am a man of unclean lips” (Isaiah 6:5). Despite Isaiah’s flaws, God saw him as a man He could use to provide guidance to the nation of Judah. Paul the Apostle had, in his past, persecuted the very people to whom God would send him later. To most of us, Paul’s track record would disqualify him for use. But God brought change to Paul’s heart and redemption to his fervency. Samson squandered his potential through poor life choices. As I read about him, I can’t help but think, “The guy acted like a spoiled brat.” But God had placed a call on his life. Though Samson sank to life’s darkest depths—captors blinded him and placed him in slavery—at the end of his life, he turned his heart toward God and asked to be used for God’s purposes. God used Samson to bring deliverance to the Israelites. Do you feel like the least qualified, the least important, the least regarded? Perhaps your reward is yet to come. God has high regard for those who are the least. Jesus said, “For the one who is least among all of you, this is the one who is great” (Luke 9:48) and “But many who are first will be last; and the last, first” (Matthew 19:30). If heaven includes strategic positioning among God’s people, which I believe it will, that positioning will be ego-free and based on a humble heart. Those of high position in God’s eyes don’t focus on position. They focus on hearts: their own hearts before God, and the hearts of others loved by God. When we get to heaven, I believe many people’s positions of responsibility will surprise us. What if, in heaven, the some of today’s most accomplished individuals end up reporting to someone who cried herself to sleep at night—yet kept her heart pure before God? According to Jesus in Matthew 6:5, some rewards are given in full before we reach heaven. When He spoke those words, He referred to hypocritical religious leaders as an example. Could we be in for a heavenly surprise? I believe many who are last today—the ultimate servants—will be first in heaven. God sees things differently than we do.

I'm waiting at the door with the dying roses singing, "If I could turn back time" by Cher, I'm waiting at the door with a basket of carrots and cheddar cheese a few loaves of bread, I wish you would only touch my heart and paint your worries onto my body today I'm waiting at the door with 7 stories to tell you love, despair and that grace that seemed like a race I'm waiting at the door drunk on fire, on fire, tired of life I'm waiting at the door for you dancing and singing for you in the rain with a ring that could make your pretty fingers turn into rain, I am waiting at the door for you with a banquet for you but the only love I could see was the dances I wished could be with you, and sometimes we ain't the lucky kind but we don't mind since we got a picnic that makes God jealous of you. Written by Jeremy Limn All Rights Reserved

But my secret is: even though I wish I could be thin, and that I could have the ease of the lifestyle that I associate with being thin, I don't wish for it with all of my heart. Because my heart is reserved for way more important things.

It is too often the case,” Crook said, “that border newspapers … disseminate all sorts of exaggerations and falsehoods about the Indians, which are copied in papers of high character and wide circulation, in other parts of the country, while the Indians’ side of the case is rarely ever heard. In this way the people at large get false ideas with reference to the matter. Then when the outbreak does come public attention is turned to the Indians, their crimes and atrocities are alone condemned, while the persons whose injustice has driven them to this course escape scot-free and are the loudest in their denunciations. No one knows this fact better than the Indian, therefore he is excusable in seeing no justice in a government which only punishes him, while it allows the white man to plunder him as he pleases.

Joseph stopped and suddenly his vision seemed to memorize her face. Not once did he move his eyes from her. “Miss Campbell, would you think me too forward if I—” “Joseph!”  Nathaniel’s voice and sudden presence made Kitty gasp. Her eyes shot open wide and she clamped her teeth together to keep her mouth from following suit. What in mercy’s name was he doing here? Unfazed, Nathaniel smacked Joseph on the shoulder and nodded approval as he scanned the man’s suit and breeches. “You are always my inspiration for proper fashion, Joseph, I must say. You are dressed far finer than any other gentleman here, including myself. I’m surprised you don’t have a chorus of women clamoring for your attention.” Joseph grinned as if well acquainted with Nathaniel’s humor, then his smile rested slightly and he looked toward Kitty. “That honor is reserved for you Nathaniel, for I am much more content with only one.”  Kitty’s heart tapped against her ribs. Raising her lips in the most tantalizing smile she could create, she turned her head. Flirtatiousness was never her strong suit, but somehow at this moment the ability proved almost innate. And not, she told herself, because it might make Nathaniel wish he’d come to speak to her sooner.  The music began again and Joseph bowed, offering his hand. “It appears another dance is beginning, Miss Campbell. Would you do me the honor?” Kitty stepped forward, brushing her fingers across Joseph’s, bursting to life with all the charm she knew how to use but so rarely did. “I’d be honored, Mr. Wythe.” Quickly shooting Nathaniel a smile she hoped would broil him, Kitty followed Joseph onto the dance floor.  Nathaniel dodged in front of them, his expression drawn. “Forgive me but I’m afraid your brother-in-law sent me looking for you, Miss Campbell.” Kitty frowned. “Is Eliza unwell?” He shook his head. “Thomas is with her at the fainting couch and asked me to see if you would be available to bring her something to drink.” Worry replaced every other emotion as she gently gripped Joseph’s firm hand. “Forgive me, Mr. Wythe, but I need to see to my sister. May we postpone this dance until a later time?” Joseph nodded, his mouth tipped at one side. “Of course, Miss Campbell. Another time then, and I shall look forward to it.

Cold, cold Ronan laughed and played along. It seemed he had a warm heart after all, even if it was reserved for some people over others. I couldn’t stop myself from softening to him as I leaned against the wall by the door, watching them quietly play. Then again, I didn’t exactly try and stop myself. Ronan, despite our rocky first meeting and his casual way of implying I wanted to sleep my way through the inhabitants of the island, was weirdly growing on me.

For an example of what the first step involves, look at Psalm 139, where the psalmist meditates on the infinite and unlimited nature of God’s presence, and knowledge, and power, in relation to people. We are always in God’s presence, he says. You can cut yourself off from your fellow human beings, but you cannot get away from your Creator. “You hem me in—behind and before. . . . Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens [the sky], you are there; if I make my bed in the depths [the underworld], you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea,” I still cannot escape from the presence of God: “even there your hand will guide me” (vv. 5-10). Nor can darkness, which hides me from human sight, shield me from God’s gaze (vv. 11-12). And just as there are no bounds to his presence with me, so there are no limits to his knowledge of me. Just as I am never left alone, so I never go unnoticed. “O LORD, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise [all my actions and movements]; you perceive my thoughts [all that goes on in my mind] from afar. . . . You are familiar with all my ways [all my habits, plans, aims, desires, as well as all my life to date]. Before a word is on my tongue [spoken, or meditated] you know it completely, O LORD” (vv. 1-4). I can hide my heart, and my past, and my future plans, from those around me, but I cannot hide anything from God. I can talk in a way that deceives my fellow creatures as to what I really am, but nothing I say or do can deceive God. He sees through all my reserve and pretense; he knows me as I really am, better indeed than I know myself.

So here’s something I know to be true, although it’s a little corny, and I don’t quite know what to do with it: What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded…sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness. Those moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded…sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly.

She started coughing and water burst from her mouth like she’d been drowning. I pulled her forward, slapping her back to help her get it all up and the tremors rocking her body reverberated through mine as she pressed against my chest. More cold water flooded from her, drenching her as she cried out in panic and I pulled her against me more firmly. “You need to wake up,” I commanded. “I don’t want to die like this,” she breathed and my heart lurched as the ice thickened around us again. This wasn’t a dream she was having. It was a nightmare. And I got the sinking feeling that I knew exactly what it was about. The ice kept thickening and I was shivering now too. If she didn’t snap out of this soon she could really hurt herself and it would be my fucking fault. “Shit,” I breathed, taking her hand in mine and squeezing her cold fingers as I pushed my magic into hers. For once the well of her power didn’t burn with overwhelming magic and I thanked the stars that she’d obviously gotten through a good amount of her reserves today. The display she was currently putting on was clearly burning through her power and I’d only topped mine up after class so I was confident that I could wrangle hers under control. I pressed my magic into her body, expecting the fight she’d put up when we trained together but to my surprise, her power welcomed mine like greeting an old friend. The surge of excited energy I felt when power sharing with her zipped through me but this was even more intense than usual because she wanted it. On some base level, at this moment in time, she fully trusted me. I tried not to focus on how good that felt and shifted my attention to helping her reshape her magic instead. I had to fight to pull her away from her water magic which clearly wasn’t helping anything right now but she started to writhe in my arms, looking for an outlet for this panic that gripped her. My natural inclination was to encourage her towards fire but if she managed to overwhelm my control with that Element then it could be disastrous. I’d had a little practice with the other Heirs in power sharing and had managed to help them wield the Elements I didn’t possess more than once even though it wasn’t as easy. Essentially as I wasn’t the one shaping the power, it was doable, so all I had to do was encourage her towards it. I decided that Earth magic was probably the safest bet while she was so out of control and fought to push her towards that. My grip on her tightened and I ground my teeth as I twisted my power in the unnatural direction but all of a sudden, Roxy grabbed onto my suggestion and I felt the magic flooding from her. I opened my eyes, glancing around to find the entire Orb springing to life with flowers of every colour imaginable. (Darius)

He stared at me for a long moment as if he was trying to figure me out and I dropped my eyes before he could. I didn’t want Darius Acrux in my head. My attention snagged on a deep red stain on the sleeve of his pristine white shirt and I pointed it out. “Are you bleeding?” I asked. “No,” he replied forcefully before looking down at the offending stain and waving his hand to clear it away with his water magic. “Well that was obviously blood so-” “I said no, just drop it,” he snarled. I flinched back but he didn’t release me and my heart started beating faster. He sighed heavily and shook his head before letting me go. “Sorry, I just... I’m not bleeding now. It’s not an issue.” “Okay...” I took a step back, wondering why I was even talking to him. This was the guy who had tormented me for weeks and he was clearly going to snap right back into asshole mode after tonight. But something about this nice version of Darius kept drawing me in despite my reservations. “Come on, let’s catch up with the others and get back to the Academy,” he urged, offering me his arm again. The anger which had risen in him a moment ago seemed to have gone so I tentatively accepted his arm and we started walking down the driveway and away from his family. “Careful,” I teased. “Someone might think we don’t even hate each other if you don’t release me soon.” We made it to the edge of the pooling light which lit up the front of his house and he drew me into the darkness beyond it. “I never said I hated you,” he murmured, his voice deep as he tugged me around to face him. I looked up at his striking face, the moonlight highlighting his strong jaw and pulling my attention to his mouth for a moment. “Well I really feel sorry for anyone you do hate,” I muttered, pulling my arm out of his grip. He resisted for a moment like he wanted to keep hold of me but gave in when I tugged a little harder. “The things I’ve done to you... you know it isn’t personal, right?” he asked. I looked up at him for several long seconds, wondering if he seriously bought into that horse shit or if it was just what he was trying to sell me. I wasn’t really sure what I saw there but I definitely didn’t buy his excuses. “Is that how you justify it to yourself?” I asked bitterly, our little bubble of peace well and truly burst now that we were standing in the cold air of the night. Darius hesitated and I gave him an eye roll dramatic enough to fell a small tree. I turned away from him, looking for Orion and the stardust which would take us back to the Academy but his fingers curled around my wrist before I could escape. “Do you hate me, then?” he asked quietly and for some strange reason it sounded like the idea of that didn’t sit well with him. I forced myself to reply in a steady tone, holding his eye as I spoke. “No,” I said and a glimmer of relief spilled through his eyes, almost halting me there but I wasn’t quite so blinded by him as to give him a free pass for all his bullshit. “To hate you, I’d have to care about you. And I don’t give one shit about you,” I said coldly. I shook his hand off of me for the second time and stalked away towards Darcy and Orion. He didn’t follow me and I was glad. Because I had the horrible feeling that that might just have been a lie.(toy)

We have to wait around for a relationship to realize our destiny. It’s time to stop waiting and start living. Yes, two people coming together is a beautiful thing . . . but so is one person standing boldly in their purpose. You don’t have to sit idly by, waiting for the day that a prince comes riding up on his white horse and the two of you gallop off into the sunset of your destiny. Your destiny is in the here and now. God wants to do something powerful with you and for you and through you now. Today. This moment. I don’t know what it is, I can’t possibly tell you what your destiny on this planet is, but I can tell you that had I not made the choice to follow my passion and chase my dreams and pour my heart and soul into making the world around me a better place right where I was . . . you wouldn’t be reading this book right now. I had to get past my singleness and decide that I had things to do with my life, and I didn’t have time to wait around on a man to come along for me to do them. I hope with all my heart that someday someone will come along and join me in my journey, but I’m not going to hit the Pause button on my life until that happens (although I do reserve the right to hit the Pause button on my dating life from time to time). And you shouldn’t either. Do all the things you want to do with your life right now. Stop waiting. Because the truth is, a woman who creates a full, joyful, meaningful life for herself is a lot more appealing (and happy) than a woman who waits around on a man to do it for her.

When you hold onto bitterness, it infects that part of your heart, and my heart is reserved for those who love me back and who love me most.

During the Commonwealth period in England (1649–1660), antinomianism was present among high Calvinists who maintained that an elect person, being predestined to salvation, need not keep the moral law and doesn’t even need to repent. No one should be urged to repent, therefore. Others have said “that good works hinder salvation, and that a child of God cannot sin; that the moral law is altogether abrogated as a rule of life; that no Christian believeth or worketh any good, but that Christ only believeth and worketh [good].”[9] The Effect on Spiritual Formation Now, you have only to think for a moment to see what a disaster this will be for spiritual formation and the development of character. It amounts to rejecting it entirely except insofar as it may be done to you by God, passively. And you have only to glance briefly at the behavior of professing Christians currently to realize the practical outcome of holding the law and obedience to the law to be irrelevant to the life of faith in Christ.[10] The basic practice of Western Christianity today is, I fear, strongly antinomian. Here is a true story from the current Christian scene. Test our theology on it: A man—a longtime, faithful church member—came to his pastor and said, “I’m going to divorce my wife and marry someone else.” The pastor, aghast, said, “You can’t do that! You’re a devoted Christian, and so is your wife. Divorce in these circumstances is clearly wrong.” “Yes,” the man replied, “I know that, but I’m going to do it anyway. I just can’t stand her any longer. I know it’s wrong, but after it’s all over I’ll ask God for forgiveness and he will forgive me. He must, because I believe that Christ died for me. That’s what you teach.” You can extend this to imaginary cases: murdering someone who “deserves it”; a once-in-a-lifetime, career-making, crooked deal; and so forth. How, precisely, does our version of salvation rule out a judicious use of sin? And what does growth in Christlikeness mean if one can hold such a use in reserve? Just something to think about.

And then, he laughed. “That’s ridiculous.” “You didn’t take one six months ago, so here you are.” “Retired. That was the agreement. And besides…” His arms dropped, gesturing to me, then flailing into something like a shrug. “I mean— honestly? Do I have to say any of this? Where do I even start?” During that last question, his gaze flicked over me with an incredulous disgust that made my teeth grind together. “What are your reservations?” Nura retorted. “What are my reservations? You bring me a Fragmented Valtain who’s practically geriatric and ask me what my reservations are?

What are my reservations? You bring me a Fragmented Valtain who’s practically geriatric and ask me what my reservations are?” Geh-ri-act-rick. I didn’t know what it meant, but I was sure it was an insult.

You common cry of curs! whose breath I hate As reek o' the rotten fens, whose loves I prize As the dead carcasses of unburied men That do corrupt my air, I banish you; And here remain with your uncertainty! Let every feeble rumour shake your hearts! Your enemies, with nodding of their plumes, Fan you into despair! Have the power still To banish your defenders; till at length Your ignorance, which finds not till it feels, Making not reservation of yourselves, Still your own foes, deliver you as most Abated captives to some nation That won you without blows! Despising, For you, the city, thus I turn my back: There is a world elsewhere.

When I look at Lincoln, I realize that I’ve never actually been in love before. Maybe my heart was always reserved for him and I just didn’t know it.

So she is tearing us apart, dictating the rest of my life and we have to go along with it or she will destroy Hytanica?” “Yes. And we’re running out of time.” He shook his head in awe. “I have to hand it to her, Alera. She’s ruthless in pursuing what she wants.” “This is serious, Narian.” I found his attitude almost irritating. He obviously understaood the direness of his situation, yet was acting like it was only a game. “I know it’s serious, but there is only one choice as far as I’m concerned. I don’t want to live without you, Alera. I won’t live without you.” I sat up and searched the depths of his blue eyes. “What do you mean?” He leaned forward and kissed me tenderly, and my pulse raced. Then I put my hands on his chest and pushed myself away. “Tell me, Narian.” “All right. There are three things I believe with all my heart. Hytanica can withstand a Cokyrian assault. I can no longer let Nantilam control my life and I will die before I let you go.” His eyes met mine and he unlaced my blouse, slowly pushing it off my shoulders. This time I did not resist him. “What I want,” he softly finished, “is to spend these last hours holding the woman I love, the woman to whom I am bound.” “But how are you feeling?” “Trust me, Alera, I’m not feeling any pain right now.” Tears trickled from the corners of my eyes as I opened his shirt and ran my fingers over the muscles of his chest. He stood, leading me to the rug in front of the hearth, where he drew me down to kneel beside him. His touch was warm, gentle, as he almost reverently removed my clothing, then he stripped off his shirt and breeches, his skin and his golden hair glistening in the light cast by the fire. As my pulse and breathing quickened, he caressed me, first with his eyes, then with his hands and mouth. “I love you, Alera,” he whispered against my skin, and I gave in to him completely, sinking into the feelings he stirred in me, knowing I stirred the same feelings in him. In all my dreams of what this moment would be like, I had never imagined the soaring bliss that came from giving yourself to another person with reservation, without fear, without pressure. A person you loved and trusted with all your heart and who returned those feelings a hundredfold.