“
As long as I live under the capitalistic system I expect to have my life influenced by the demands of moneyed people. But I will be damned if I propose to be at the beck and call of every itinerant scoundrel who has two cents to invest in a postage stamp. This, sir, is my resignation.
”
”
William Faulkner
“
If you want to know what’s your boss is really like, go to his office with a resignation letter. You will then see your boss’s true colours. You will then see his emotions without any filters. No boss can ever fake himself in front of an employee who has just resigned.
”
”
Abhaidev (The World's Most Frustrated Man)
“
I need to feel strongly, to love and to admire, just as desperately as I need to breathe. A letter from a friend, a Balthus painting on a postcard, a page of Saint-Simon, give meaning to the passing hours. But to keep my mind sharp, to avoid descending into resigned indifference, I maintain a level of resentment and anger, neither too much nor too little, just as a pressure cooker has a safety valve to keep it from exploding.
”
”
Jean-Dominique Bauby
“
I am miserable now—not feeling unhappiness, just lack of life coming to me and coming out of me—resignation to getting nothing and seeking nothing, staying behind shell. The glare of unknown love, human, unhad by me,—the tenderness I never had. I don’t want to be just a nothing, a sick blank, withdrawal into myself forever. I just want something, beside the emptiness I’ve carried around in me all my life.
”
”
Allen Ginsberg (The Letters of Allen Ginsberg)
“
There was a letter, tucked among the pictures. It was addressed to Santa Claus and written in blue crayon. The jerky letters danced across the page. He wanted a bike, he said, or a puppy, and promised to be good. It was signed, and he had added his age. Four.
I do not know why, but as I read it, my world seemed to collapse. Grief exploded in my chest like a grenade. I had been feeling calm - not happy, not even resigned, but calm - and that serenity vanished, as if vaporized. Beneath it, I was raw.
”
”
S.J. Watson (Before I Go to Sleep)
“
I've quit.
I didn't get your resignation letter. Invite me in.
”
”
Kitty French (Knight & Stay (Knight, #2))
“
The esteemed Reverend Rufus Griswold is everything I aspire to be, though I fear I shall never soar so quite as high as he"
-from his resignation letter to Graham's Magazine
”
”
Edgar Allan Poe (The Selected Writings of Edgar Allan Poe)
“
I need to feel strongly, to love and to admire, just as desperately as I need to breathe. A letter from a friend, a Balthus painting on a postcard, a page of Saint-Simon, give meaning to the passing hours. But to keep my mind sharp, to avoid descending into resigned indifference, I maintain a level of resentment and anger, neither too much nor to little, just a s a pressure cooker has a a safety valve to keep it from exploding.
”
”
Jean-Dominique Bauby (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly: A Memoir of Life in Death)
“
Justin's resignation letter to Elizabeth Holmes regarding her management style: 'good luck and please do read those books, watch The Office, and believe the people who disagree with you
”
”
John Carreyrou (Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup)
“
Lidewij,
I believe Agustus Waters sent a few pages from a notebok to Peter Van Houten shortly before he (Augustus) died. It is very important to me that someone reads these pages. I want to read them, of course, but maybe they weren't written for me. Regardless, they must be read. They must be. Can you help?
Your friend,
Hazel Grace Lancaster
"She responded late that afternoon."
Dear Hazel,
I did not know that Augustus had died. I am very sad to hear this news. He was such a very charismatic young man. I am so sorry, and so sad.
I have not spoken to Peter since I resigned that day we met.
It is very late at night here, but I am going over to his house first thing in the morning to find this letter and force him to read it.
Mornings were his best time,
usually.
Your friend,
Lidewij Vliegenthart
p.s. I am bringing my boyfriend in case we have to physically retsrain Peter.
”
”
John Green (The Fault in Our Stars)
“
Kelly said, “That was the greatest show of self-control I have ever seen. If that was me, I would have taken that resignation letter and shoved it up his ass six different times.
”
”
Bob Woodward (Fear: Trump in the White House)
“
he should accept with patience the tribulation which has actually been dealt out to him—the present anxiety and suspense. It is about this that he is to say ‘Thy will be done’, and for the daily task of bearing this that the daily bread will be provided. It is your business to see that the patient never thinks of the present fear as his appointed cross, but only of the things he is afraid of. Let him regard them as his crosses: let him forget that, since they are incompatible, they cannot all happen to him, and let him try to practise fortitude and patience to them all in advance. For real resignation, at the same moment, to a dozen different and hypothetical fates, is almost impossible,
”
”
C.S. Lewis (The Screwtape Letters)
“
I used to think of the Christian life as a sort of achievement test in which we were supposed to hurry to figure out all the right answers, but I'm starting to wonder if these slow, hard days of growth help transform us into our eternal form, and therefore are crucial. God lets us live out our belief (and our unbelief) in such a way that the truth of ourselves rises to the surface. Sincere doubt and deflective doubt are divided. What we love most is exposed by our long days of chasing. We are shown ourselves so that we can resign more and more to the indwelling God. Those who love the light pursue the light, and those who love the darkness of self-deification are allowed to feel the gravity of this choice while time remains to make new choices.
”
”
Rebecca K. Reynolds (Courage, Dear Heart: Letters to a Weary World)
“
I will treat language with resigned delight, embrace it like unrequited love, offer words to you with a kind of secret shame, for I know that sometimes there is such a thing as too much language, and that language can hold a kind of sincerity that is tiresome and overwrought.
”
”
Meia Geddes (Love Letters to the World)
“
In love, vulnerability is inevitable; finding beauty in it is a choice.
”
”
Baljeet Randhawa (The Resignation Letter)
“
In a beautiful paradox of the smile that cries and the tears that smile, the trick that fails and the follies that sail, they had decided upon giving it a try.
”
”
Baljeet Randhawa (The Resignation Letter)
“
How long've you been keeping this resignation letter in your pocket to blackmail me with?'
'Wrote it the day after I took the job.
”
”
Sebastien de Castell (Crownbreaker (Spellslinger, #6))
“
Ralph Peters, a conservative uber-hawk and former army intelligence officer who in early 2018 resigned in disgust as a Fox commentator. In a scorching letter of resignation leaked to BuzzFeed, he wrote, “Fox has degenerated from providing a legitimate and much-needed outlet for conservative voices to a mere propaganda machine for a destructive and ethically ruinous administration.
”
”
Max Boot (The Corrosion of Conservatism: Why I Left the Right)
“
The moment of near despair is quite often the moment that precedes courage rather than resignation. In a sense, with the back to the wall and no exit but death or acceptance, the options narrow to one.
”
”
Christopher Hitchens (Letters to a Young Contrarian)
“
It looks like everyone is striving for that one simple thing – happiness – be it misunderstood or misinterpreted. Perhaps for many, the story ends before they realize what happiness meant in the first place.
”
”
Baljeet Randhawa (The Resignation Letter)
“
He went to Yale Club and wrote a long letter to his parents explaining his unhappiness with the law, and the next day he resigned from Courdet Brothers in order to “pursue a career in journalism.” What he wished to pursue was a career in love.
”
”
Andrew Holleran (Dancer from the Dance)
“
But the heavy stroke which most of all distresses me is my dear Mother. I cannot overcome my too selfish sorrow, all her tenderness towards me, her care and anxiety for my welfare at all times, her watchfulness over my infant years, her advice and instruction in maturer age; all, all indear her memory to me, and highten my sorrow for her loss. At the same time I know a patient submission is my Duty. I will strive to obtain it! But the lenient hand of time alone can blunt the keen Edg of Sorrow. He who deignd to weep over a departed Friend, will surely forgive a sorrow which at all times desires to be bounded and restrained, by a firm Belief that a Being of infinite wisdom and unbounded Goodness, will carve out my portion in tender mercy towards me! Yea tho he slay me I will trust in him said holy Job. What tho his corrective Hand hath been streached against me; I will not murmer. Tho earthly comforts are taken away I will not repine, he who gave them has surely a right to limit their Duration, and has continued them to me much longer than deserved. I might have been striped of my children as many others have been. I might o! forbid it Heaven, I might have been left a solitary widow.
Still I have many blessing left, many comforts to be thankfull for, and rejoice in. I am not left to mourn as one without hope.
My dear parent knew in whom she had Believed...The violence of her disease soon weakned her so that she was unable to converse, but whenever she could speak, she testified her willingness to leave the world and an intire resignation to the Divine Will. She retaind her Senses to the last moment of her Existance, and departed the world with an easy tranquility, trusting in the merrits of a Redeamer," (p. 81 & 82).
”
”
Abigail Adams (My Dearest Friend: Letters of Abigail and John Adams)
“
I understood where I had come from: from a dreary tangle of sadness and pretense, of longing, absurdity, inferiority and provincial pomposity, sentimental education and anachronistic ideals, repressed traumas, resignation, and helplessness. Helplessness of the acerbic, domestic variety, where small-time liars pretended to be dangerous terrorists and heroic freedom fighters, where unhappy bookbinders invented formulas for universal salvation, where dentists whispered confidentially to all their neighbors about their protracted personal correspondence with Stalin, where piano teachers, kindergarten teachers, and housewives tossed and turned tearfully at night from stifled yearning for an emotion-laden artistic life, where compulsive writers wrote endless disgruntled letters to the editor of Davar, where elderly bakers saw Maimonides and the Baal Shem Tov in their dreams, where nervy, self-righteous trade-union hacks kept an apparatchik's eye on the rest of the local residents, where cashiers at the cinema or the cooperative shop composed poems and pamphlets at night.
”
”
Amos Oz (A Tale of Love and Darkness)
“
I'm no expert, but in my limited experience, women aren't born women. They start out as girls. And every girl, from the moment they can dream, imagines the rescue. The knight. The castle. Life in a fairy tale. If you don't believe me, watch boys and girls on a playground. No one teaches us to do this. The kid in us actually believes in things that are too good to be true. Before life convinces us we can't and they're not.
Then life kicks in. Boys become men. Girls become women. For any number of reasons we are wounded and, sadly, wounded people wound people. So many of us grow into doubting, hopeless, callous adults protecting hardened hearts. Medicating the pain. Life isn't what we imagined. Nor are we. And we didn't start out trying to get there. Far from it. But it's who we've become. One day we turn around, and what we once dreamed or hoped is a distant echo. We've forgotten what it sounded like. Once pure and unadulterated, the voice of hope is now muted by all the stuff we've crammed on top of it. And we're okay with that. For some illogical reason, we stand atop the mine shaft of ourselves, shoving stuff into the pipe that is us, telling our very soul, 'Shut up. Not another word.' Why? Because the cry of our heart hurts when unanswered. And the longer it remains unanswered, the deeper the hurt. In self-protection we inhale resignation and exhale indifference.
[Murphy Shepherd]
”
”
Charles Martin (The Letter Keeper (Murphy Shepherd, #2))
“
Marooned for the pre-Christmas weekend at the White House, Trump watched hours of cable news and stewed over the coverage—not only of the shutdown, but also of Mattis’s resignation. Mattis’s letter—distributed to reporters by his aides—was interpreted in the media as a scathing rebuke of Trump’s worldview.
”
”
Philip Rucker (A Very Stable Genius: Donald J. Trump's Testing of America)
“
I think it is a duty I owe to my profession and to my sex to show that a woman has a right to the practice of her profession and cannot be condemned to abandon it merely because she marries. I cannot conceive how women's colleges, inviting and encouraging women to enter professions can be justly founded or maintained denying such a principle.
[From a letter Brooks wrote to her dean, knowing that she would be told to resign if she married, she asked to keep her job. Nevertheless, she lost her teaching position at Barnard College in 1906. Dean Gill wrote that 'The dignity of women's place in the home demands that your marriage shall be a resignation.']
”
”
Harriet Brooks
“
On the TV screens along the back wall I could see COMEY RESIGNS in large letters. The screens were behind my audience, but they noticed my distraction and started turning in their seats. I laughed and said, “That’s pretty funny. Somebody put a lot of work into that one.” I continued my thought. “There are no support employees in the FBI. I expect…” The message on the screens now changed. Across three screens, displaying three different news stations, I now saw the same words: COMEY FIRED. I wasn’t laughing any longer. There was a buzz in the room. I told the audience, “Look, I’m going to go figure out what’s happening, but whether that’s true or not, my message won’t change, so let me finish it and then shake your hands.
”
”
James B. Comey (A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership)
“
I am off to a life where I can exist in a room and not have to pretend I want to be there. I am off to hear people who have something to say. I don’t even have to agree with it— I just want to know what it’s like to listen to a real sentence. I long for a time where I don’t wish the day would be over. This means leaving the company. I can wonder, or I can wander—and it’s time for me to get lost. Reinvention is hard. To let it go? To admit you don’t love something anymore? That’s the stuff that kills you. But I must run before another workday asks for me again. Things are hard so that we can start. I feel like fate is blindfolding me. My arms reach out not knowing if I’ll impale myself or secure my foothold—but all great things come from motion. Nothing begets nothing. And I’m scared, but I have the movies with me. The things we love require us. I wonder what would happen if everyone in the world did what they loved. Would things fall into place and leave no empty spaces? Would there be harmony in the work field? Sustainable marriages? Children with parents? Dirty water? Would there be resignation letters?
”
”
Kristian Ventura (The Goodbye Song)
“
It is man’s duty to live in conformity with the divine will, and this means, firstly, bringing his life into line with ‘nature’s laws’, and secondly, resigning himself completely and uncomplainingly to whatever fate may send him. Only by living thus, and not setting too high a value on things which can at any moment be taken away from him, can he discover that true, unshakeable peace and contentment to which ambition, luxury and above all avarice are among the greatest obstacles.
”
”
Seneca (Letters from a Stoic)
“
Although outwardly resigned to my godmother’s death, inwardly I had not truly accepted it. Well-intentioned people assured me that those we love can never die, while we keep them alive in memory, but I had always considered this a singularly specious argument. Why should existence depend upon anything so fallible as human memory, which diminishes with age? Either there is life after death, or we are snuffed out like candles; there is no way round this age-old dilemma, wriggle as we may.
”
”
Daphne du Maurier (Letters from Menabilly: Portrait of a Friendship)
“
On August 5, he sent Stanton a one-sentence letter: “Public considerations of a high character constrain me to say, that your resignation as Secretary of War will be accepted.”5 Johnson knew that if Stanton resigned, instead of being sacked, the troublesome legislation would be a dead issue. That same day, in a tart response, Stanton lectured Johnson that “public considerations of a high character . . . constrain me not to resign the office of Secretary of War before the next meeting of Congress.
”
”
Ron Chernow (Grant)
“
After that, Sunny seemed to have it in for Seth and frequently harassed him, which led Seth to look for another job. He found one a few months later at a company based in Redwood City called Genomic Health and walked into Elizabeth’s office, resignation letter in hand, to give his notice. Sunny, who was there, opened up the letter, read it, then threw it back in Seth’s face. “I won’t accept this!” he shouted. Seth shouted back, deadpan, “I have news for you, sir: in 1863, President Lincoln freed the slaves.
”
”
John Carreyrou (Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup)
“
The most decisive and certainly most delicious option for an aggrieved worker in a narcissist’s office is simply quitting. Slamming your resignation letter on the boss’s desk and striding out to take a better job somewhere else is satisfying and in both its finality and its totality. Instantly the feared figure is stripped of all power, reduced to a person of utter inconsequence in your life. Not only does this spell immediate freedom for the exiting employee, it can also contribute to the long-term decline of the boss.
”
”
Jeffrey Kluger (The Narcissist Next Door: Understanding the Monster in Your Family, in Your Office, in Your Bed--in Your World)
“
You see us as insolent conspirators. An odd sort of conspirators. Admittedly you are a prominent subject of our conversations, as you have been of our thoughts since the very beginning, however, we do not come together with the intention of plotting against you, but rather to talk through with one another - in every detail, from all angles, at every oppurtunity, from near and far, under stress, in jest, in sincerity, with love, defiance, anger, revulsion, resignation, guilt, with all the strenght of our heads and hearts - that terrible trial that hangs over us and separates us from you, a trial in which you always claim the role of judge although, at least for the most part, you are just as weak and blinded as we are.
”
”
Franz Kafka (Letter to His Father)
“
Reading Mrs Gaskell's Life of Charlotte Brontë after Jane Eyre is a curious experience. The subject of the biography is recognisably the same person who wrote the novel, but the effect of the two books is utterly different. The biography is indeed depressing and painful reading. It captures better, I believe, than any any
subsequent biography the introverted and puritan pessimist side of Charlotte Brontë, and conveys the real dreariness of the world of privation, critical discouragement and limited opportunity that
so often made her complain in her letters that she felt marked out for suffering.
Jane Eyre, on the other hand, is exhilarating reading, partly because the reader, far from simply pitying the heroine, is struck by her resilience, and partly because the novel achieves such an imaginative transmutation of the drab. Unlike that of Jane Austen's Fanny Price or Dickens's Arthur Clennam or John Harmon, Jane
Eyre's response to suffering is never less than energetic. The reader is torn between exasperation at the way she mistakes her resentments and prejudices for fair moral judgements, and admiration at the way she fights back. Matthew Arnold, seeking 'sweetness and light' was repelled by the 'hunger, rebellion and rage' that he
identified as the keynotes of the novel. One can see why, and yet feel that these have a more positive effect than his phrase allows. The heroine is trying to hold on to her sense of self in a world that gives it little encouragement, and the novel does put up a persuasive case for her arrogance and pugnacity as the healthier alternatives
to patience and resignation. That the book has created a
world in which the golden mean seems such a feeble solution is both its eccentricity and its strength.
”
”
Ian Gregor (Reading the Victorian novel: Detail into form (Vision critical studies))
“
The White Liners didn’t bother with any such pretense of civility or restraint. On October 7, John Milton Brown, the sheriff of Coahoma County, reported a “perfect state of terror” had seized his jurisdiction. “I have been driven from my county by an armed force. I am utterly powerless to enforce law or to restore order.” Disheartened by Grant’s refusal to rush troops to Mississippi, Ames sat brooding and besieged in the governor’s mansion in Jackson. He concluded that Reconstruction was a dead letter, white supremacists in his state having engineered a coup d’état. “Yes, a revolution has taken place—by force of arms—and a race are disfranchised—they are to be returned to a condition of serfdom—an era of second slavery,” he lamented to his wife. Sarcastically referring to Grant’s and Pierrepont’s words, he wrote, “The political death of the Negro will forever release the nation . . . from such ‘political outbreaks.’ You may think I exaggerate. Time will show you how accurate my statements are.” To head off threatened impeachment, he decided to resign after the election. His darkly prophetic letter previewed the nearly century-long Jim Crow system that would cast blacks back into a state of involuntary servitude to southern whites.
”
”
Ron Chernow (Grant)
“
for the Labour Party – splendid news. That increasingly leftward bound organisation is in process of splitting, and Shirley Williams,fn31 Roy Jenkinsfn32 etc. will found a new Social Democratic Partyfn33 (this oddly repeats events in Oxford circa 1940 when I was chairman of the leftward bound Labour Club and Roy Jenkins led a group to found a new Social Democratic Club. How right he was!). It’s a pity about the Labour Party but given the whole scene the split is best. It is now official Labour policy to leave the Common Market and NATO! And unofficially are likely to abolish the House of Lords instantly and have no second chamber, abolish private schooling etc. And of course (this is perhaps the main point) to have the leadership under the control of the executive committee (and Labour activists in the constituencies) substituting party ‘democracy’ for parliamentary democracy. I blame Denis Healey and others very much for not reacting firmly earlier against the left. A crucial move was when the parliamentary party elected Michael Foot, that wet crypto-left snake, as leader instead of Denis. Now Denis and co. are left behind, complaining bitterly, to fight the crazy left. Shirley still hasn’t resigned from the party so it’s all a bit odd! ‘On your bike, Shirl,’ the lefty trade unionists shout at her!
”
”
Iris Murdoch (Living on Paper: Letters from Iris Murdoch 1934-1995)
“
Ere long, however, the daemon was wrestling with him once more; he was seized by that “terrible spirit of unrest” which drove him “like the deluge, to the mountain peaks”. Shadows of gloom and discontent crept into his letters. He began to complain of his “dependent position”, and the forces at work within him soon became obvious. He could not endure regular occupation, could not bear to participate in the daily round of ordinary people. No existence other than that of a poet was acceptable. In this first crisis he probably failed to understand that the trouble sprang from the daemonism within him, from the jealous exclusiveness of the spirit that possessed him, making mundane relationships impossible. He still rationalised the immanent inflammability of his impulses by discovering objective causes for them. He spoke of his pupil’s stubbornness, of defects in the lad’s character which he, as tutor, was impotent to remedy. Hölderlin’s incapacity to meet the demands of everyday life was in this matter all too plain. The boy of nine had a stronger will than the man of twenty-five. The tutor resigned his post. Charlotte von Kalb, who was anything but obtuse, grasped the underlying truth. Wishing to console Johann Christian Friedrich’s mother, she wrote to the latter: “His spirit cannot stoop to these petty labours … or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he takes them too much to heart.
”
”
Stefan Zweig (The Struggle with the Daemon: Hölderlin, Kleist and Nietzsche)
“
sighed. “I can’t say that you weren’t expected.” “I’m just going to be walking around here and taking some measurements. It says here… you own eighty acres? That is one of the most gorgeous mansions I have ever seen,” he rambled on. “It must have cost you millions. I could never afford such a beauty. Well, heck, for that matter I couldn’t afford the millions of dollars in taxes a house like this would assess, let alone such a pricey property. Do you have an accountant?” Zo opened her mouth to respond, but he continued, “For an estate this size, I would definitely have one.” “I do have an accountant,” she cut in, with frustration. “Furthermore, I have invested a lot of money bringing this mansion up to speed. You can see my investment is great.” “Of course, it would be. The fact of the matter is, Mrs. Kane, a lot of people are in over their heads in property. You still have to pay up, or we take the place. Well, I’ll get busy now. Pay no mind to me.” He walked on, taking notes. “Clairrrrre!” Zo called as soon as she entered the house. “Bring your cell phone!” Two worry-filled months went by and many calls were made to lawyers, before Zoey finally picked one that made her feel confident. And then the letter came with the totals and the due date. “There is no way we can pay this, Mom, even if we sold off some of our treasures, because a lot of them are contracted to museums anyway. I am feeling awfully poor all of a sudden, and insecure.” “Yes, and I did some research, thinking I’d be forced to sell. It’s unlikely that anyone else around here can afford this place. It looks like they are going to get it all; they aren’t just charging for this year. What we have here is a value about equal to a little country. And all the new construction sites for housing developments suddenly popping up on this side of the river, does not help. Value is going up.” Zo put her head in her hands. “Ohhh, oh, oh, oh!” “Yeah, bring out the ice-cream and cake. I need comforting,” sighed Claire. The cell phone rang. “Yes, tonight? You guys have become pretty good to us, haven’t you?! You know, Bob, Mom and I thought we were just going to pig out on ice cream and cake. We found out we are losing this estate and are going to be poor again and we are bummed out.” There was a long pause. “No, that’s okay, I understand. Yeah, okay, bye.” “Well?” Zo ask dryly. “He was appropriately sorry, and he got off the phone fast, saying he remembered he had other business to take care of. Do you want to cry? I do…” “I’ll get the cake and dish the ice cream. You make our tea and we’ll cry together.” A pitter patter began to drum on the window. “Rain again. It seems softer though, dear.” “I thought you said this was going to be a softer rain!” It started to pour. “At least this is not a thunder storm… What was that?” “Thunder,” replied Claire, unmoved and resigned. An hour had gone by when there was a rapping at the door. “People rarely use the doorbell, ever notice that?” Zo asked on the way to the door. She opened it to reveal two wet guys holding a pizza, salad, soft drink, and giant chocolate chip cookies in a plastic container. In a plastic
”
”
Zoey Kane (The Riddles of Hillgate (Z & C Mysteries #1))
“
HOW TO USE THIS BOOK
WHAT TO DO FIRST
1.
Find the MAP. It will be there. No Tour of Fantasyland is complete without one. It will be found in the front part of your brochure, quite near the page that says
For Mom and Dad for having me
and for Jeannie (or Jack or Debra or Donnie or …) for
putting up with me so supportively
and for my nine children for not interrupting me
and for my Publisher for not discouraging me
and for my Writers’ Circle for listening to me
and for Barbie and Greta and Albert Einstein and Aunty May
and so on. Ignore this, even if you are wondering if Albert Einstein is Albert Einstein or in fact the dog.
This will be followed by a short piece of prose that says
When the night of the wolf waxes strong in the morning, the wise man is wary of a false dawn.
Ka’a Orto’o,
Gnomic Utterances
Ignore this too (or, if really puzzled, look up GNOMIC UTTERANCES in the Toughpick
section). Find the Map.
2. Examine the Map. It will show most of a continent (and sometimes part of another) with a large number of BAYS, OFFSHORE ISLANDS, an INLAND SEA or so and a sprinkle of TOWNS. There will be scribbly snakes that are probably RIVERS, and names made of CAPITAL LETTERS in curved lines that are not quite upside down. By bending your neck sideways you will be able to see that they say things like “Ca’ea Purt’wydyn” and “Om Ce’falos.” These may be names of COUNTRIES, but since most of the Map is bare it is hard to tell.
These empty inland parts will be sporadically peppered with little molehills, invitingly labeled “Megamort Hills,” “Death Mountains, ”Hurt Range” and such, with a whole line of molehills near the top called “Great Northern Barrier.” Above this will be various warnings of danger. The rest of the Map’s space will be sparingly devoted to little tiny feathers called “Wretched Wood” and “Forest of Doom,” except for one space that appears to be growing minute hairs. This will be tersely labeled “Marshes.”
This is mostly it.
No, wait. If you are lucky, the Map will carry an arrow or compass-heading somewhere in the bit labeled “Outer Ocean” and this will show you which way up to hold it. But you will look in vain for INNS, reststops, or VILLAGES, or even ROADS. No – wait another minute – on closer examination, you will find the empty interior crossed by a few bird tracks. If you peer at these you will see they are (somewhere) labeled “Old Trade Road – Disused” and “Imperial Way – Mostly Long Gone.” Some of these routes appear to lead (or have lead) to small edifices enticingly titled “Ruin,” “Tower of Sorcery,” or “Dark Citadel,” but there is no scale of miles and no way of telling how long you might take on the way to see these places.
In short, the Map is useless, but you are advised to keep consulting it, because it is the only one you will get. And, be warned. If you take this Tour, you are going to have to visit every single place on this Map, whether it is marked or not. This is a Rule.
3. Find your STARTING POINT. Let us say it is the town of Gna’ash. You will find it down in one corner on the coast, as far away from anywhere as possible.
4. Having found Gna’ash, you must at once set about finding an INN, Tour COMPANIONS, a meal of STEW, a CHAMBER for the night, and then the necessary TAVERN BRAWL. (If you look all these things up in the Toughpick section, you will know what you are in for.) The following morning, you must locate the MARKET and attempt to acquire CLOTHING (which absolutely must include a CLOAK), a SADDLE ROLL, WAYBREAD, WATERBOTTLES, a DAGGER, a SWORD, a HORSE, and a MERCHANT to take you along in his CARAVAN. You must resign yourself to being cheated over most prices and you are advised to consult a local MAGICIAN about your Sword.
5. You set off. Now you are on your own. You should turn to the Toughpick section of this brochure and select your Tour on a pick-and-mix basis, remembering only that you will have to take in all of it.
”
”
Diana Wynne Jones
“
Designori's face had clouded over once more. "Some times," he said resignedly, "it seems to me that we have not only two different languages and ways of expressing ourselves, each of which can only vaguely be translated into the other, but that we are altogether and fundamentally different creatures who can never understand each other. Which of us is really the authentic and integral human being, you or me? Every so often I doubt that either of us is. There were times when I looked up to you members of the Order and Glass Bead Game players with such reverence, such a sense of inferiority, and such envy that you might have been gods or supermen, forever serene, forever playing, forever enjoying your own existences, forever immune to suffering. At other times you seemed to me either pitiable or contemptible, eunuchs, artificially confined to an eternal childhood, child-like and childish in your cool, tightly fenced, neatly tidied playground and kindergarten, where every nose is carefully wiped and every troublesome emotion is soothed, every dangerous thought repressed, where everyone plays nice, safe, bloodless games for a lifetime and every jagged stirring of life, every strong feeling, every genuine passion, every rapture is promptly checked, deflected, and neutralized by meditation therapy. Isn't it artificial, sterilized, didactically pruned world, a mere sham world in which you cravenly vegetate, a world without vices, without passions, without hunger, without sap and salt, a world without family, without mothers, without children, almost without women? The instinctual life is tamed by meditation. For generations you have left to others dangerous, daring, and responsible things like economics, law, and politics. Cowardly and well-protected, fed by others, and having few burdensome duties, you lead your drones' lives, and so that they won't be too boring you busy yourselves with all these erudite specialties, count syllables and letters, make music, and play the Glass Bead Game, while outside in the filth of the world poor harried people live real lives and do real work.
”
”
Hermann Hesse (The Glass Bead Game)
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*Wife's Letter* Pt1
...
It was not the mask that died among the boots, but you. The girl with the yoyo was not the only one to know about your masked play. From the very first instant, when, elated with pride, you talked about the distortion of the magnetic field, I too saw through you completely. Please don’t insult me any more by asking how I did it. Of course, I was flustered, confused, and frightened to death. Under any circumstances, it was an unimaginably drastic way of acting, so different from your ordinary self. It was hallucinatory, seeing you so full of self-confidence. Even you knew very well that I had seen through you. You knew and yet demanded that we go on with the play in silence. I considered it a dreadful thing at first, but I soon changed my mind, thinking that perhaps you were acting out of sympathy for me. Then, though the things you did seemed a little embarrassing, they began to present the appearance of a delicate and suave invitation to a dance. And as I watched you become amazingly serious and go on pretending to be deceived, my heart began to fill with a feeling of gratitude, and so I followed after you meekly.
But you went from one misunderstanding to the next, didn’t you? You write that I rejected you, but that’s not true. Didn’t you reject yourself all by yourself? I felt that I could understand your wanting to. In view of the accident and all, I had more than half resigned myself to sharing your suffering. For that very reason, your mask seemed quite good to me. In a happy frame of mind, I reflected that love strips the mask from each of us, and we must endeavor for those we love to put the mask on so that it can be taken off again. For if there is no mask to start with, there is no pleasure in removing it, is there? Do you understand what I mean?
I think you do. After all, don’t even you have your doubts? Is what you think to be the mask in reality your real face, or is what you think to be your real face really a mask? Yes, you do understand. Anyone who is seduced is seduced realizing this.
But the mask did not return. At first you were apparently trying to get your own self back by means of the mask, but before you knew it you had come to think of it only as your magician’s cloak for escaping from yourself. So it was not a mask, but somewhat the same as another real face, wasn’t it? You finally revealed your true colors. It was not the mask, but you yourself. It is meaningful to put a mask on, precisely because one makes others realize it is a mask. Even with cosmetics, which you abominate so, we never try to conceal the fact that it is make-up. After all, it was not that the mask was bad, but that you were too unaware of how to treat it. Even though you put the mask on, you could not do a thing while you were wearing it. Good or bad, you could not do a thing. All you could manage was to wander through the streets and write long, never-ending confessions, like a snake with its tail in its mouth. It was all the same to you whether you burned your face or didn’t, whether you put on a mask or didn’t. You were incapable of calling the mask back. Since the mask will not come back, there is no reason for me to return either.
”
”
Kōbō Abe (The Face of Another)
“
July 1998, CEO Yun and nine other Samsung executives locked themselves up in a hotel and wrote their resignation letters. They made a pact that they would put the letters away for five months, at the end of which they would actually resign if they didn’t cut company costs by 30 percent.
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Euny Hong (The Birth of Korean Cool: How One Nation Is Conquering the World Through Pop Culture)
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Nicholas never mastered the technique of forceful, efficient management of subordinates. He hated scenes and found it impossible to sternly criticize or dismiss a man to his face. If something was wrong, he preferred to give a minister a friendly reception, comment gently and shake hands warmly. Occasionally, after such an interview, the minister would return to his office, well pleased with himself, only to receive in the morning mail a letter regretfully asking for his resignation. Not unnaturally, these men complained that they had been deceived.
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Robert K. Massie (Nicholas and Alexandra: The Classic Account of the Fall of the Romanov Dynasty)
“
Having accepted a graduate fellowship in the Department of Philosophy at Cornell, I duly presented myself to begin studies for a Ph.D. One of our assignments during the first semester was to read Kant's Critique of Pure Reason from cover to cover, along with Norman Kemp Smith's commentary thereon, which was almost as voluminous. Pondering this literature, it did not take me long to conclude that these Kantian ratiocinations, brilliant though they may be, have little to do with that Sophia—that more-than-human Wisdom—of which authentic philosophy, by its very designation, is literally the love. And so, three weeks into the semester, I resigned my fellowship and left Cornell University.
"I had always been attracted to the natural world, to forests and mountains especially; and so I resolved to proceed to the great Northwest, henceforth to earn my keep as a lumberjack. No doubt I had an unrealistic and overly romanticized conception of what this entails; but in any case, at that point fate abruptly intervened. I had made my intentions known to my brother, who at the time was studying chemical engineering at Purdue University. He immediately proceeded to the chairman of the physics department to tell him about my case, going so far as to put my letter in his hands. The verdict was instant: 'Tell you brother to present himself in my office Monday morning to assume his duties as a teaching assistant.' It seems the voice of Providence had spoken: despite my very mixed feelings regarding the contemporary academic world, I was destined to pass most of my professional life in its precincts—but not in departments of philosophy!
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Wolfgang Smith (Unmasking the Faces of Antichrist)
“
The cities of the Empire and the guilds supported the Emperor Ludwig in his conflict with the Pope, and they suffered severely under the Interdict. In 1332 a number of cities addressed a letter to the Archbishop of Treves. They declared that the Emperor Ludwig of all the princes of the world lived most according to the teaching of Christ, and that in faith, as well as in modest resignation, he shone as an example to others. “We shall at all times”, they said, “unto death’, hold to him in firm and unchangeable fidelity, springing from faith, attachment and sincere obedience to him as our true Emperor and natural lord. No sufferings, no changes, no circumstances of any kind will ever separate us from him.” They go on to illustrate the right relations between Church and State by the sun and moon, express the most painful regret that ambition of earthly honour had disturbed these relations, deny the Papal claim to be the only source of authority, and as “poor Christians” beg and pray that no further harm may be done to the Christian faith.
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E.H. Broadbent (The Pilgrim Church: Being Some Account of the Continuance Through Succeeding Centuries of Churches Practising the Principles Taught and Exemplified in The New Testament)
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As soon as Qyree turned in his resignation letter, things went downhill. Jaxon didn’t think about what his son’s reaction would be once he told him he was giving his job to someone else.
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Denora Boone (Heaven Between Her Thighs: Stealing His Heart)
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Although the thought has occurred to me regularly over the past two decades that, at least in the United States, it is simply impossible to be, with integrity, both evangelical and intellectual, this epistle is not a letter of resignation from the evangelical movement.
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Mark A. Noll (The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind)
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Edward Carrington of Virginia wrote to Thomas Jefferson that "these Letters are the best of anything that has been written" against the Constitution.77 What was it about the "rights" in a bill of rights that was considered so indispensable? In his second "Letter," dated October 9, the "Federal Farmer" declared: "There are certain unalienable and fundamental rights, which in forming the social compact, ought to be explicitly ascertained and fixed—a free and enlightened people, in forming this compact, will not resign all their rights to those who govern, and they will fix limits to their legislators and rulers, which will soon be plainly seen by those who are governed, as well as by those who govern . . . ." Contrary to the Constitution's proponents, "I still believe a complete federal bill of rights to be very practicable.
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Stephen P. Halbrook (The Founders' Second Amendment: Origins of the Right to Bear Arms)
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Lenin had created the conditions for the rise of Stalin, but like Dr Frankenstein the monster outgrew him. He suffered a cerebral haemorrhage on 24 May 1922 and from this time forward his involvement in political affairs was sporadic. Too late he realised, on 25 December 1922, that Stalin represented a real threat to the stability of the Party. He penned a postscript to his famous “Testament”. This called for the removal of Stalin as General Secretary but significantly not from the Politburo. Despite Lenin’s request, the “Testament” was only discussed in the Central Committee, and Stalin’s offer to resign as General Secretary was rejected by Zinoviev and Kamenev. They had now formed a triumvirate with him, and during Lenin’s illness Zinoviev had assumed nominal leadership of the Party. Fearing that any demotion of Stalin would lead to the elevation of Trotsky, Zinoviev and Kamenev not only supported him, but hushed up the letters of Lenin.
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Jock Dominie (Russia: Revolution and Counter-Revolution, 1905-1924. A View from the Communist Left)
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Yet Carnegie, for all his financial success, questioned his own commitment to commercial matters. Just three years into his independence, he had an income of $50,000 and had amassed assets of $400,000. In the waning days of 1868, he wrote himself a letter, setting a limit of two more years to secure his fortune: Beyond this never earn—make no effort to increase fortune, but spend the surplus each year for benevolent purposes. Cast aside business forever . . . settle in Oxford and get a thorough education making the acquaintance of literary men. . . . The amassing of wealth is one of the worst species of idolatry. . . . To continue much longer overwhelmed by business cares and with most of my thoughts wholly upon the way to make more money in the shortest time, must degrade me beyond hope of permanent recovery. I will resign business at thirty-five. This conflict between the ease with which he made money and what he saw as his elevated purpose would arise time and again. But the letter, in tone and content, was more pessimistic and stark than the refined, exuberant Carnegie philosophy that would ultimately emerge.
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Bhu Srinivasan (Americana: A 400-Year History of American Capitalism)
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She briefly closed her eyes as a fiery blush crept into her face. "The first letter," she repeated. "Of course it would be."
"Milsom bought it from her for fifty pounds. He brought it back to Pershing with him. I read it yesterday morning. And now I am here, Miss Stafford. I have come to tell you...that the overland journey was unremarkable. My new horse settled admirably, though I regret to say that I lost him at the siege of Jhansi. I love you. I have always loved you. And we may be married as soon as you please. I resigned my commission. You can no longer follow the drum, but I sincerely hope you will settle for being my countess. I did not propose to you that night in the garden because I was afraid of being rejected, damn me. You were not shameless and the kiss you gave me then sustained me through two years of hell." He paused, plainly shaken. "Forgive me, I did not stay safe. And I have come back to you three years too late and not in the best of looks (...)
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Mimi Matthews (The Lost Letter)
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Missing a train is only painful if you run after it! Likewise, not matching the idea of success others expect from you is only painful if that’s what you are seeking. You stand above the rat race and the pecking order, not outside of it, if you do so by choice. Quitting a high-paying position, if it is your decision, will seem a better payoff than the utility of the money involved (this may seem crazy, but I’ve tried it and it works). This is the first step toward the stoic’s throwing a four-letter word at fate. You have far more control over your life if you decide on your criterion by yourself. Mother Nature has given us some defense mechanisms: as in Aesop’s fable, one of these is our ability to consider that the grapes we cannot (or did not) reach are sour. But an aggressively stoic prior disdain and rejection of the grapes is even more rewarding. Be aggressive; be the one to resign, if you have the guts. It is more difficult to be a loser in a game you set up yourself. In Black Swan terms, this means that you are exposed to the improbable only if you let it control you. You always control what you do; so make this your end.
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Nassim Nicholas Taleb (Incerto 5-Book Bundle: Fooled by Randomness, The Black Swan, The Bed of Procrustes, Antifragile, Skin in the Game)
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Or indeed when the desire to create and contemplate beauty manages to overcome reductionism through a kind of salvation which occurs in beauty and in those who behold it. An authentic humanity, calling for a new synthesis, seems to dwell in the midst of our technological culture, almost unnoticed, like a mist seeping gently beneath a closed door. Will the promise last, in spite of everything, with all that is authentic rising up in stubborn resistance? 113. There is also the fact that people no longer seem to believe in a happy future; they no longer have blind trust in a better tomorrow based on the present state of the world and our technical abilities. There is a growing awareness that scientific and technological progress cannot be equated with the progress of humanity and history, a growing sense that the way to a better future lies elsewhere. This is not to reject the possibilities which technology continues to offer us. But humanity has changed profoundly, and the accumulation of constant novelties exalts a superficiality which pulls us in one direction. It becomes difficult to pause and recover depth in life. If architecture reflects the spirit of an age, our megastructures and drab apartment blocks express the spirit of globalized technology, where a constant flood of new products coexists with a tedious monotony. Let us refuse to resign ourselves to this, and continue to wonder about the purpose and meaning of everything.
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Pope Francis (ENCYCLICAL LETTER LAUDATO SI' ON CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME)
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Officer Gurney ran a strip of yellow tape around the back area of the café, roping it off so no one could disturb the site. Then he scanned the crowd. His eyes lit on a comfortably plump woman wearing a red down jacket that made her look even plumper. She had a short brownish-blond ponytail that stuck out through a hole in her red baseball hat. “Brenda,” said Officer Gurney. “What do you think?” Grover was in danger of being late for school by this time. He’d already been late twice this month. If he was late again, he might get a note sent home to his parents. But he had to risk it. This was too interesting to miss. The woman stepped forward. Grover knew her, of course; everyone did. Mrs. Brenda Beeson was the one who had figured out the Prophet’s mumbled words and explained what they meant. She and her committee—the Reverend Loomis, Mayor Orville Milton, Police Chief Ralph Gurney, and a few others—were the most important people in the town. Officer Gurney raised the yellow tape so Mrs. Beeson could duck under it. She stood before the window a long time, her back to the crowd, while everyone waited to see what she would say. Clouds sailed slowly across the sun, turning everything dark and light and dark again. To Grover, it seemed like ages they all stood there, holding their breath. He resigned himself to being late for school and started thinking up creative excuses. The front door of his house had stuck and he couldn’t get it open? His father needed him to help fish drowned rats out of flooded basements? His knee had popped out of joint and stayed out for half an hour? Finally Mrs. Beeson turned to face them. “Well, it just goes to show,” she said. “We never used to have people breaking windows and stealing things. For all our hard work, we’ve still got bad eggs among us.” She gave an exasperated sigh, and her breath made a puff of fog in the chilly air. “If this is someone’s idea of fun, that person should be very, very ashamed of himself. This is no time for wild, stupid behavior.” “It’s probably kids,” said a man standing near Grover. Why did people always blame kids for things like this? As far as Grover could tell, grown-ups caused a lot more trouble in the world than kids. “On the other hand,” said Mrs. Beeson, “it could be a threat, or a warning. We’ve heard the reports about someone wandering around in the hills.” She glanced back at the bloody rag hanging in the window. “It might even be a message of some sort. It looks to me like that stain could be a letter, maybe an S, or an R.” Grover squinted at the stain on the cloth. To him it looked more like an A, or maybe even just a random blotch. “It might be a B,” said someone standing near him. “Or an H,” said someone else. Mrs. Beeson nodded. “Could be,” she said. “The S could stand for sin. Or if it’s an R it could stand for ruin. If you’ll let me have that piece of cloth, Ralph, I’ll show it to Althea and see if she has anything to say about it.” Just then Wayne Hollister happened to pass by, saw the crowd, and chimed in about what he’d seen in the night. His story frightened people even more than the blood and the broken glass. All around him, Grover heard them murmuring: Someone’s out there. He’s given us a warning. What does he mean to do? He’s trying to scare us. One woman began to cry. Hoyt McCoy, as usual, said that Brenda Beeson should not pronounce upon things until she was in full possession of the facts, which she was not, and that to him the
”
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Jeanne DuPrau (The Prophet of Yonwood)
“
Handling Resignations In the course of an organization’s work, boards and officers may be confronted with the resignation of a fellow officer, board member, or committee chairman. There are two reasons people resign from office. The first reason is that something arises in the personal life of the officer that demands his or her time and attention. The officer feels at this time that he or she can’t fulfill the duties of the office and do justice to the organization, so the officer submits a resignation. The second reason is that there is a rift or severe disagreement within the organization. An officer may become angry, disheartened, or vengeful, so he or she submits a resignation. The first thing that the organization should do after it receives a resignation is to figure out why the person is resigning. If the organization really needs this person’s active input, it should find a way to keep him or her. If the person is resigning because of lack of time, then perhaps the organization can appoint an assistant to help with the work. If the person is resigning because he or she can’t attend the meetings, the organization should consider changing the meeting date and time. If the person submits his or her resignation because of organizational problems, the organization needs to look at how its members communicate with each other. Perhaps the members need to be more willing to allow disagreements and hear what others are saying. If an organization strictly obeys the principle of majority rule while protecting the rights of the minority, it can resolve problems in an intelligent, kind, and civil way. A resignation should be a formal letter that includes the date, the name of the person to whom it is addressed, the reason for the resignation, and the person’s signature. The person resigning can mail his or her letter to the secretary or hand it to the secretary in person. Under no circumstance should the secretary or president accept an oral resignation. If a resignation is given to the officer this way, he or she should talk with the person and find out the reasons for the resignation. Perhaps just talking to the person can solve the problem. However, an officer who insists on resigning should put it in writing and submit it to the secretary. This gives the accepting body something to read and consider. Every resignation should be put to a vote. When it is accepted, the office is vacant and should be immediately filled according to the rules for filling vacancies stated in the bylaws. If an officer submits a resignation and then decides to withdraw it, he or she can do this until a vote is taken. It is unjust for a secretary or governing body not to allow a withdrawal of the resignation before a vote is taken. The only way a resignation can’t be withdrawn is if some rule of the organization or a state statute prohibits it. When submitting the resignation, the member resigning should give it to the secretary only and not mail it to everyone in the organization. (An e-mail resignation is not acceptable because it is not signed.) Sending the resignation to every member only confuses matters and promotes gossip and conjecture in the organization. If the member later decides to withdraw his or her resignation, there is much more explaining to do. The other members may see this person as unstable and not worthy of the position.
”
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Robert McConnell Productions (Webster's New World: Robert's Rules of Order: Simplified & Applied)
“
Bose was correct in identifying Vallabhbhai Patel as his main opponent within the party. The two had an old rivalry, at once personal and political. Their relationship rapidly deteriorated after the death of Vallabhbhai’s elder brother Vithalbhai in 1933. Bose had nursed Vithalbhai during his last illness. In his will, the elder Patel left three-fourths of his estate to Bose, to be used ‘preferably for publicity work on behalf of India’s cause in other countries’. Vallabhbhai now cast aspersions on the authenticity of the will. A long legal battle ensued, which ended in a triumph for Vallabhbhai, with Vithalbhai’s next of kin getting the money instead of Subhas.
This familial history apart, Patel was also opposed to Bose’s militant socialism. When, in 1938, Gandhi decided to propose Bose’s name for the presidency of the Congress, Patel opposed it. Gandhi overruled his objection. In 1939, when Bose sought a second term, Patel opposed him again, unsuccessfully. ‘I never dreamt,’ wrote Patel to Rajendra Prasad, ‘that he [Subhas] will stoop to such dirty mean tactics for re-election.’ In another letter, he told Prasad that ‘it is impossible for us to work with Subhas’. The resignation of the working committee members in February, and Pant’s resolution at Tripuri in March, were both approved of—if not instigated by—Patel.
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Ramachandra Guha (Gandhi 1915-1948: The Years That Changed the World)
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Nearly every doctor I worked with dreamed as a child about curing disease and worked like crazy to become a doctor. They studied tirelessly to learn science, entered medical school with idealistic visions, and became the pride of their family. They entered residency with hundreds of thousands of dollars of student loan debt and initially saw the chronic sleep deprivation and verbal abuse by their superiors as integral parts of the experience—because “great achievement is born of great sacrifice.” But almost universally among doctors I have met, this idealism eventually turns to cynicism. My colleagues in residency talked often about questioning their sanity, of wondering whether this was all worth it. I spoke with successful surgeons who’d drafted their resignation letters dozens of times. Another had a recurring daydream of leaving everything behind and becoming a baker. Many of my supervising physicians were desperate to spend more time with their children. I witnessed more than one tearful breakdown in the operating room when surgical cases were delayed and led to yet another missed bedtime for their kids. Several had dealt with suicidal depression. I understood why doctors had the highest burnout and suicide rate of any profession. Inevitably, these conversations led to an insight that I believe is whispered by doctors in every hospital in America: they feel trapped inside a broken system.
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Casey Means (Good Energy: The Surprising Connection Between Metabolism and Limitless Health)
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If I send this letter, it will relieve my feelings, but it will make Meade try to justify himself. It will make him condemn me. It will arouse hard feelings, impair all his further usefulness as a commander, and perhaps force him to resign from the army.
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Dale Carnegie (How To Win Friends and Influence People)
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ON 12 JANUARY 1829, a week before Anglesey’s tragic, tearful and triumphant departure from Ireland, the Home Secretary, Robert Peel, wrote a long letter to Wellington. He told him that if his resignation would be an ‘insuperable obstacle’ to Emancipation, he would stay.
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Antonia Fraser (The King and the Catholics: England, Ireland, and the Fight for Religious Freedom, 1780-1829)
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And less than a week after General Kelly resigned, Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis resigned with a scorching letter to the president that got a ton of attention. So now we’d have a second defense secretary in two years. But that was a whole other drama that I wasn’t really in on.
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Stephanie Grisham (I'll Take Your Questions Now: What I Saw at the Trump White House)
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There are things that never see light again.
They scream and bang at their fate, hoping they will be discovered. A forgotten letter beneath a file, an ivory button in a couch, a handprint against a window. These things tremble in rage at their apparent insignificance. Eventually they calm down; they take deep breaths. They resign themselves to their fate and watch time pass.
But they hold on to hope.
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Shubnum Khan (The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years)
“
In a quiet abode, where shadows weep,
Lived the saddest grandmother, her sorrow ran deep.
Once a home filled with laughter and cheer,
Now echoes silence, a symphony of tears.
Her eyes, like windows to a weathered soul,
Glistened with memories that took their toll.
A tale unfolded of love's sweet refrain,
Now stained with loss, an enduring pain.
Beside the hearth where warmth once thrived,
Loneliness lingered, love deprived.
A husband's absence, a void untold,
Left her heart shattered, bitter and cold.
Her family, once a vibrant bouquet,
Now scattered petals, drifting away.
The echoes of laughter, a distant sound,
In the vast emptiness that sorrow found.
Photographs whispered of days long past,
A love that forever seemed to last.
But time, a cruel and relentless stream,
Carved lines of grief in a once joyous dream.
Through tear-stained letters and faded attire,
The saddest grandmother stoked love's dwindling fire.
A matriarch cradled in solitude's embrace,
Longing for the touch of her love's warm grace.
Her children, grown and scattered like leaves,
Each carried a piece of the pain she conceives.
Yet, united by grief, a bittersweet thread,
Bound by the love that time hadn't shed.
In twilight's embrace, she wept in despair,
A tapestry woven with threads of wear.
The saddest grandmother, weathered and gray,
Whispered to the wind the words she couldn't say.
For in the echoes of her silent plea,
Lingered the remnants of love's decree.
A tale of loss, etched in the lines,
Of the saddest grandmother, where sorrow resigns.
”
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The innocent Devil By Elissar Benjamin
“
The Fideles operate on much the same principle,” she went on, disregarding his interruption. “You think they are pure and simple and good—and you’re right, they are all these things. But is it hard to be pure and simple and good? Is it hard to accept the doctrine, the code, laid out to the final letter of deportment? When you are told what to wear, what to eat, what to think, what to do on a daily basis—when there is no leeway at any juncture of any day for a person to make an individual decision—is that harder, I wonder, than to make those decisions every day, a hundred times a day, going by your own morality and your own judgment and balancing your desires against your sense of justice? I think the Fideles can be so pure because they have given up the struggle that makes the rest of us human beings, Lieutenant. Maybe they have resigned the struggle in favor of this great ‘goodness’ that you are impressed by. But that does not make them better people than those who are still struggling.
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Sharon Shinn (Wrapt in Crystal)
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This is essentially a people's contest. On the side of the Union it is a struggle for maintaining in the world that form and substance of government whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men; to lift artificial weights from all shoulders; to clear the paths of laudable pursuits for all; to afford all an unfettered start and a fair chance in the race of life. Yielding to partial and temporary departures, from necessity, this is the leading object of the Government for whose existence we contend. I am most happy to believe that the plain people understand and appreciate this. It is worthy of note that while, in this the Government's hour of trial, large numbers of those in the army and navy who have been favored with the offices have resigned and proved false to the hand which
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Abraham Lincoln (LINCOLN – Complete 7 Volume Edition: Biographies, Speeches and Debates, Civil War Telegrams, Letters, Presidential Orders & Proclamations: Including the ... and Abraham Lincoln by Joseph H. Choate)
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Mary.' The voice was familiar, but oh, so tired. Startled, she looked up. Sherlock Holmes was awake! He was looking at her with kind, grey eyes.
'I shot you. I almost killed you!' She wanted to make sure he knew that, her culpability.
'I know. I remember.'
'I don't expect you to forgive me. You could have died.'
He reached up and touched her cheek. 'Mary.'
'If you wish me to hand in my letter of resignation, I will, of course, do so. I can't imagine that you would want to work with me after—'
'Mary, come here.' He pulled her down toward him.
And suddenly, it seemed so natural, so inevitable, that she should lean down and kiss him with all the longing of the last few days, the last few months.
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Theodora Goss (The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl (The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club, #3))
“
The gleaming orange and silver express slid to a stop beside them. Tiger barged his way on board. Bond waited politely for two or three women to precede him. When he sat down beside Tiger, Tiger hissed angrily, "First lesson, Bondo-san! Do not make way for women. Push them, trample them down. Women have no priority in this country. You may be polite to very old men, but to no one else. Is that understood?"
"Yes, master," said Bond sarcastically.
"And do not make Western-style jokes while you are my pupil. We are engaged on a serious mission."
"Oh, all right, Tiger," said Bond resignedly. "But damn it all..."
Tiger held up a hand. "And that is another thing. No swearing, please. There are no swearwords in the Japanese language and the usage of bad language does not exist."
"But good heavens, Tiger! No self-respecting man could get through the day without his battery of four-letter words to cope with the roughage of life and let off steam. If you're late for a vital appointment with your superiors, and you find that you've left all your papers at home, surely you say, well, Freddie Uncle Charlie Katie, if I may put it so as not to offend."
"No," said Tiger. "I would say 'Shimata', which means 'I have made a mistake.'"
"Nothing worse?"
"There is nothing worse to say."
"Well, supposing it was your driver's fault that the papers had been forgotten. Wouldn't you curse him backwards and sideways?"
"If I wanted to get myself a new driver, I might conceivably call him 'bakyaro' which means a 'bloody fool', or even 'konchikisho' which means 'you animal'. But these are deadly insults and he would be within his rights to strike me. He would certainly get out of the car and walk away."
"And those are the worst words in the Japanese language! What about your taboos? The Emperor, your ancestors, all these gods? Don't you ever wish them in hell, or worse?"
"No. That would have no meaning."
"Well then, dirty words. Sex words?"
"There are two--'chimbo' which is masculine and 'monko' which is feminine. These are nothing but coarse anatomical descriptions. They have no meaning as swearing words. There are no such things in our language."
"Well I'm...I mean, well I'm astonished. A violent people without a violent language! I must write a learned paper on this. No wonder you have nothing left but to commit suicide when you fail an exam, or cut your girlfriend's head off when she annoys you."
Tiger laughed. "We generally push them under trams or trains."
"Well, for my money, you'd do much better to say 'You-------'," Bond fired off the hackneyed string, "and get it off your chest that way."
"That is enough, Bondo-san," said Tiger patiently. "The subject is now closed. But you will kindly refrain both from using these words or looking them. Be calm, stoical, impassive. Do not show anger. Smile at misfortune. If you sprain your ankle, laugh.
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Ian Fleming (You Only Live Twice (James Bond, #12))
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You can’t leave the show,” King said to Nichols. “We are there because you are there.” Black people have been imagined in the future, he continued, emphasizing to the actress how important and groundbreaking a fact that was. Furthermore, he told her, he had studied the Starfleet’s command structure and believed that it mirrored that of the US Air Force, making Uhura—a black woman!—fourth in command of the ship. “This is not a black role, this is not a female role,” he said to her. “This is a unique role that brings to life what we are marching for: equality.” The rest of Nichols’ weekend was a fog of anger and sadness: what right did Dr. King have to upend her career plans? Eventually, she moved from resignation to conviction. Nichols returned to Gene Roddenberry’s office on Monday morning and asked him to tear up the resignation letter.
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Margot Lee Shetterly (Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race)
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his lifetime NRA membership in a blistering letter. It’s worth reading the whole text to get a sense of the totality of Bush’s fury: I was outraged when, even in the wake of the Oklahoma City tragedy, Mr. Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of N.R.A., defended his attack on federal agents as “jack-booted thugs.” To attack Secret Service agents or A.T.F. people or any government law enforcement people as “wearing Nazi bucket helmets and black storm trooper uniforms” wanting to “attack law abiding citizens” is a vicious slander on good people. Al Whicher, who served on my [U.S. Secret Service] detail when I was Vice President and President, was killed in Oklahoma City. He was no Nazi. He was a kind man, a loving parent, a man dedicated to serving his country—and serve it well he did. In 1993, I attended the wake for A.T.F. agent Steve Willis, another dedicated officer who did his duty. I can assure you that this honorable man, killed by weird cultists, was no Nazi. John Magaw, who used to head the U.S.S.S. and now heads A.T.F., is one of the most principled, decent men I have ever known. He would be the last to condone the kind of illegal behavior your ugly letter charges. The same is true for the F.B.I.’s able Director Louis Freeh. I appointed Mr. Freeh to the Federal Bench. His integrity and honor are beyond question. Both John Magaw and Judge Freeh were in office when I was President. They both now serve in the current administration. They both have badges. Neither of them would ever give the government’s “go ahead to harass, intimidate, even murder law abiding citizens.” (Your words) I am a gun owner and an avid hunter. Over the years I have agreed with most of N.R.A.’s objectives, particularly your educational and training efforts, and your fundamental stance in favor of owning guns. However, your broadside against Federal agents deeply offends my own sense of decency and honor; and it offends my concept of service to country. It indirectly slanders a wide array of government law enforcement officials, who are out there, day and night, laying their lives on the line for all of us. You have not repudiated Mr. LaPierre’s unwarranted attack. Therefore, I resign as a Life Member of N.R.A., said resignation to be effective upon your receipt of this letter. Please remove my name from your membership list. Sincerely, [signed] George Bush
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Stuart Stevens (It Was All a Lie: How the Republican Party Became Donald Trump)
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In a terse letter of resignation, Secretary of Defense James Mattis—the only member of Trump’s cabinet with a truly independent and bipartisan reputation—wrote, “Our strength as a nation is inextricably linked to the strength of our unique and comprehensive system of alliances and partnerships.” The storied former U.S. Marine general declared, “We must be resolute and unambiguous in our approach to those countries whose strategic interests are increasingly in tension with ours.” And he stated that his “views on treating allies with respect and also being clear-eyed about both malign actors and strategic competitors are strongly held and informed by over four decades of immersion in these issues.” He was stepping down, he concluded, because the president has “the right to have a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with” his own.
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Susan Hennessey (Unmaking the Presidency: Donald Trump's War on the World's Most Powerful Office)
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Wiremu tried shoving the handful of notes into his trouser pocket. The movement did not go unnoticed. ‘I have no other debt with you and, as I said, I was just leaving,’ Wiremu said, getting up to leave. Jowl reached out, clasping the smaller man on his arm, digging his fingers in, dragging Wiremu back into his seat. ‘The thing is, Mister Kepa — oh yes, I know who you are. I’ve heard all about you. I know more about you than your mother does. See, you interfered with my family business, and the Jowl brothers don’t take kindly to others interfering in our business. We’re good churchgoing folk who abide by the word of Lord Jesus our Saviour, but we also need money to live, to follow the word of God. And when you owe the Jowl brothers, you pay the debt. You, sir, are well overdue on paying what you owe.’ Wiremu looked around the bar, trying to catch the eye of anyone watching, hoping they’d intervene, but no one would meet his eye. Since Jowl had sat at his table, most of the other patrons had decided they had things to do elsewhere. The room was almost empty. No one would help him; he was on his own. Resigned to his fate, Wiremu replied, ‘Fine. How much do I owe you?’ ‘You owe me for the bottles of liquor which smashed, two shillings ought to deal with that.’ Wiremu exhaled in relief. Two shillings was fine, it left him enough for the trip down country. He thrust his hand into his pocket and pulled out the cash. Joe changed his grip to Wiremu’s wrist, ‘I said two shillings would cover the bottles which were broke, but that won’t cover the loss of the girl.’ Wiremu frowned, ‘What
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Kirsten McKenzie (The Last Letter (The Old Curiosity Shop #2))
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Trump, has purportedly already signed his resignation letter, as he, under pressure from the New York Jewish mob, wasn’t allowed to sign the RV-agreement with General Dunford as the Chinese Elders had required; necessary for the implementation of the gold standard. His upcoming
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Peter B. Meyer (The Great Awakening: An Enlightening Analysis About What Is Wrong In Our Society)
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King Saud never intended to quietly fade away. Now he saw a chance to mobilize discontented clerics, merchants, tribal leaders, and some mid-ranking princes. He began blocking Faisal’s appointments for judges and governors. In November 1960, King Saud refused to approve Prime Minister Faisal’s proposed budget. A frustrated Faisal submitted a letter stating that “As I am unable to continue, I shall cease to use the powers vested in me as from tonight.”26 Faisal did not use the word resign, but that was how Saud chose to read it. King Saud used Faisal’s letter as the pretext to reclaim his role as prime minister, and then created a new cabinet in an alliance with the so-called free princes.
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David Rundell (Vision or Mirage: Saudi Arabia at the Crossroads)
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All told, there must have been more than a hundred people there, milling about between the makeshift tricycle track in the parking lot and the fraternity house. The freshmen had come sporting a variety of attire, from the East Coasters in polos to Southern Californians in tank tops, most trying too hard to look cool and casual at the same time. All the brothers were wearing yellow t-shirts for rush; the front depicted Curious George passed out next to a tipped-over bottle of ether. The lower right side of the back showed a small anchor with the fraternity’s letters, KΣ, on each side—it was Evan’s signature. The anchor was his way of saying, “This is an Evan Spiegel production.” Evan was born on June 4, 1990, to a pair of highly successful lawyers. His mother, Melissa Thomas, graduated from Harvard Law School and practiced tax law as a partner at a prominent Los Angeles firm before resigning to become a stay-at-home mother when Evan was young. His father, John Spiegel, graduated from Stanford and Yale Law School and became a partner at Munger, Tolles & Olson, an elite firm started by Berkshire Hathaway’s Charlie Munger. His clients included Warner Bros. and Sergey Brin.
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Billy Gallagher (How to Turn Down a Billion Dollars: The Snapchat Story)
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My first job out of college was at 211 W. Fort St. in downtown Detroit. The guy that hired me made about 150k a year and didn't really know, by his own admission, what was going on in his office (Room) during regular business hours. When I resigned, he was kind enough to send me a letter stating that I was in good standing while I was there. The letterhead (211) reminds me that as an alcoholic, I can go ahead and steal Steel Reserve High Gravity beer from Kroger, and they probably aren't going to be any more sophisticated than a Director at the United States Dep. of Labor. Thank God, they are not. That's what Success means to me. You can get your beer, and not worry about catching Covid19 from the Cashiers at these establishments. If you believe it, You can achieve it!!!
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Dmitry Dyatlov
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He lamented becoming a “professional Auschwitz survivor”—in his letters he would use the term “Auschwitz Clown”—he chafed at playing the “professional senex” when On Aging: Revolt and Resignation appeared in 1968, and his urge to decry his devolution into a stock character may have inclined him to sympathize with the fictional Charles Bovary’s claims to humanity.
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Jean Améry (Charles Bovary, Country Doctor: Portrait of a Simple Man (New York Review Books Classics))
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a) A letter was received from a former employee of the organization seeking arrears of salary for the part of the month in which he was relieved on acceptance of his resignation. While trying to take some reference number from the old pay bill, it turned out that somebody was collecting pay in the name of the resigned employee continuously for several months after the said employee resigned from service.(b) A representation was received from an employee stating that his name was missing in the seniority list of group ‘D’ employees of the organization. While attempting to check the reasons for this omission, it emerged that the employee in question and several others were appointed through forged appointment orders issued by a racket.2. What is the first action on receipt of a complaint? On receipt of a complaint, it is checked whether it has a vigilance angle. If it has vigilance angle, it is entered in the appropriate part of the register prescribed by the Vigilance Manual.3. What is Vigilance Angle?
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Anonymous
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I don’t want a position I don’t deserve and I definitely don’t want people around here thinking I just got where I am because I’m black. I’ve always worked twice as har—” I began my diatribe moving toward the door, writing my resignation letter in my mind as I spoke.
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Jayne Allen (Black Girls Must Die Exhausted)
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The failure of “the reasonable ones”—those who think, with the best of intentions and in their naive misreading of reality, that with a bit of reason they can patch up a structure that has come out of joint—is apparent. With their ability to see impaired, they want to do justice on every side, only to be crushed by the colliding forces without having accomplished anything at all. Disappointed that the world is so unreasonable, they see themselves condemned to unproductiveness; they withdraw in resignation or helplessly fall victim to the stronger.
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Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Letters and Papers from Prison (Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works))
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day something happens in your life that presents you with a choice and it’s up to you what you do with that choice. It’s easy to play safe and stick with what we know. ‘But I’m wild,’ I thought. ‘I refuse to play safe.’ At the end of Valentine’s Day, as if sensing the waves of frustration and claustrophobia coming from the cast, the captain decided to give us the whole of the following day off, which was practically unheard of. To say that we needed to flop on a sun-soaked tropical beach makes us sound like spoilt brats and actually a freezing-cold stroll along the front at Blackpool would have been just as welcome if it had distracted us from our tired bodies and whirring minds. Anything to get away from relentlessly running through new routines to replace routines that had been reworked and replaced several times already. When I’m feeling low, it doesn’t usually take long for me to bounce back. At the end of a day spent lazing with the dancers on the beach I felt refreshed and renewed. ‘I’m definitely going to resign,’ I thought as I showered and dressed for the evening. It was the right decision and I vowed to deliver my letter in the morning. I ran my fingers through my hair and winked at my reflection in the mirror. Then I went up to the bar and my whole life changed in an instant. 10 The Way You Look Tonight The night I met Henrik Brixen I was ready for a bit of romance in my life. I hadn’t had a serious relationship in years, it was time. ‘I’m looking for the man of my dreams,’ I confided in my friends. ‘He’s got to be tall, blond, handsome, strong and ambitious …’ They laughed. ‘Not asking much, then?’ My friend, Günter Boodenstein, was on the lookout for me. Günter oversaw the ship’s engines and I often had a drink with him and his wife, Angelica, when she came aboard; they were lovely people and we became very pally. I bumped into Günter on the gangway as I was leaving the ship to go to the beach with the dancers on my day off. ‘Waiting for someone?’ I asked him. His face lit up. ‘Jane! You’re just the person I wanted to see. I have someone called Henrik Brixen coming onboard to have a look at the boiler.’ ‘Oh, yes? Up my street?’ He smiled. ‘Right up your street.’ A boiler man didn’t sound very promising, but I was prepared to keep an open mind. Günter and I agreed to meet up in the bar later and I went off to the beach. When Henrik arrived, Günter told him, ‘There’s a girl you should meet.’ Was there something in the stars that night? There was definitely some kind of magic, because the air seemed to glitter as Günter introduced me
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Jane McDonald (Riding the Waves: My Story)