Short Rescued Quotes

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And if we do speak out, we risk rejection and ridicule. I had a best friend once, the kind that you go shopping with and watch films with, the kind you go on holiday with and rescue when her car breaks down on the A1. Shortly after my diagnosis, I told her I had DID. I haven't seen her since. The stench and rankness of a socially unacceptable mental health disorder seems to have driven her away.
Carolyn Spring (Living with the Reality of Dissociative Identity Disorder: Campaigning Voices)
I too can play the madman, the fool, the hero; in short, any or everything to rescue her I love.
James Fenimore Cooper (The Last of the Mohicans (The Leatherstocking Tales, #2))
With the best of intentions you toss me a lifeline. Failing to see how a piece of rope will do me any good, I ignore it and drown.
Richelle E. Goodrich (Slaying Dragons: Quotes, Poetry, & a Few Short Stories for Every Day of the Year)
Lady Harborough... was on the platform, making a short speech in which she described the valuable work her hospital fund was doing. It seemed to consist largely of rescuing unmarried mothers from poverty and subjecting them to slavery instead, with the additional disadvantage of being preached at daily by evangelical clergymen.
Philip Pullman (The Shadow in the North (Sally Lockhart, #2))
There is only one world-view that is worthy of us, and which has already been discussed as the Choice of Achilles—better a short life, full of deeds and glory, than a long life without substance. The danger is so great, for every individual, every class, every people, that to cherish any illusion whatsoever is deplorable. Time cannot be stopped; there is no possibility for prudent retreat or wise renunciation. Only dreamers believe there is a way out. Optimism is cowardice. We are born into this time and must courageously follow the path to the end as destiny demands. There is no other way. Our duty is to hold on to the lost post, without hope, without rescue, like the Roman soldier whose bones were found in front of a door in Pompeii, who, during the eruption of Vesuvius, died at his post because they forgot to relieve him. That is greatness. . . . The honorable end is the one thing that can not be taken from a man. P 30
Ernst Jünger (On Pain)
Clint stared down at him. He was wearing what appeared to be a massive, lopsided and jewel-encrusted crown, holding a scepter and surrounded by a floating mass of Roombas. “Welcome to the sovereign nation of Bartonia,” he said, with a straight face. “My subjects, the Roombas, the drones and one random mechanical bird thing that I found, and I welcome you, and ask you what the fuck you think you're doing here, you are seriously a fucking moron.” “I'm here,” Tony gritted out, “to rescue you, and what kind of fucking attitude is that?.” “A little short for a storm trooper, aren't you?” Clint said, arching an eyebrow. He offered Tony a hand. “Are you wearing a crown? Seriously? Where did you get a- Why are you wearing a crown?” Tony asked, taking it and allowing Clint to help lever him back to his feet. “Listen, dude, I have learned something about myself today. Mostly, I have learned that if I end up in some sort of alien rubbish dump surrounded by neurotic robots and without a clue as to if I'm ever going to make it home, if I find a crown, I'm putting that bad boy on. There should never be a time when you do not wear a crown. Find a crown, you wear it and declare sovereignty over the vast mechanical wastes.” Clint waved his scepter around a bit, making the Roombas dodge. “Thus, Bartonia.
Scifigrl47 (Ordinary Workplace Hazards, Or SHIELD and OSHA Aren't On Speaking Terms (In Which Tony Stark Builds Himself Some Friends (But His Family Was Assigned by Nick Fury), #2))
I believe that the key to self-sufficiency is breaking free of the mindset that someone, somewhere, owes you something or will come to your rescue.
Timothy Ferriss (Tribe Of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World)
When Julius was twenty-five, his mother died of cancer—which Julius grieved over—and shortly afterward his father was swallowed by the bog when he tried to rescue a heifer. Julius grieved over that too—because he was fond of the heifer.
Jonas Jonasson (The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared)
ONCE, THERE WAS A CHINA RABBIT WHO was loved by a little girl. The rabbit went on an ocean journey and fell overboard and was rescued by a fisherman. He was buried under garbage and unburied by a dog. He traveled for a long time with the hoboes and worked for a short time as a scarecrow. Once, there was a rabbit who loved a little girl and watched her die. The rabbit danced on the streets of Memphis. His head was broken open in a diner and was put together again by a doll mender. And the rabbit swore that he would not make the mistake of loving again. Once there was a rabbit who danced in a garden in springtime with the daughter of the woman who had loved him at the beginning of his journey. The girl swung the rabbit as she danced in circles. Sometimes, they went so fast, the two of them, that it seemed as if they were flying. Sometimes, it seemed as if they both had wings. Once, oh marvelous once, there was a rabbit who found his way home.
Kate DiCamillo (The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane)
If something doesn’t feel right or if something feels ‘off,’ learn to trust your internal warning signals. They are alerting you to danger. Some physical signs are a racing heartbeat, shortness of breath, anxiety, perspiration, a migraine, nausea, or vertigo. Your body is screaming for you to pay attention. Do not dismiss it or deny your conscious reality. Instead, learn to trust your intuition.
Dana Arcuri (Soul Rescue: How to Break Free From Narcissistic Abuse & Heal Trauma)
There is no reason to be alarmed by benign, occasional, short-term hunger. Given base-level good health, you will not perish. You won’t collapse in a heap and need to be rescued by the cat. Your body is designed to go without food for longish periods, even if it has lost the skill through years of grazing, picking, and snacking. Research has found that modern humans tend to mistake a whole range of emotions for hunger.6 We eat when we’re bored, when we’re thirsty, when we’re around food (when aren’t we?), when we’re with company, or simply when the clock happens to tell us it’s time for food. Most of us eat, too, just because it feels good. This is known as hedonic hunger,
Michael Mosley (The Fast Diet: The Simple Secret of Intermittent Fasting: Lose Weight, Stay Healthy, Live Longer)
If you have realistic ideals and can generally live up to them, your self-esteem will not be threatened. If your ideals are exaggerated and you cannot reach them, your good feelings from successes may be short lived, and you may feel that you are never good enough. The continued hope for the impossible, the expectation that you will or can be unconditionally loved and adored, is not facing reality but rather holding onto an idealized image of yourself and an idealized version of what others can provide. If this is the case, your sense of self may be threatened by shame and its resulting depression, or by feelings of inadequacy for not living up to your unrealistic ideals. A better understanding of shame may help you recognize your tendency to hide what you feel from yourself and others.
Mary C. Lamia (The White Knight Syndrome: Rescuing Yourself from Your Need to Rescue Others)
Of all the ways that God could show up, He showed up by coming down. Therefore, despite the shortness of my reach it is never outside the length of His grasp.
Craig D. Lounsbrough
The human being is given by Nature little more energy than what is needed to maintain the species; to reproduce and to live out our (very short) spans. But if we want to be fit for the journey up and out of the limits of ordinary life, we have to learn not to waste energy. Which we do by busying ourselves too much with material things, and by using our minds in wasteful and damaging ways. You will have seen that I am describing concepts familiar to us from religions, put here in a different context, rescued from being 'sins' or sources of guilt, reintroduced, simply, as tools. It is not 'wicked' to eat and drink too much, not a 'sin' to be envious, but gluttony makes 'the Way' difficult; and thoughts of enmity keep the mind in a seethe, making subtler inputs impossible. And, besides, laws operate that we have not been taught about, whether we have had the benefits of religions or not. Thoughts of anger, jealousy, enmity, revenge, bring retribution. There is nothing theoretical about this: slowly you learn to see patterns where before you saw nothing, because you were over-emotional.
Doris Lessing (The Doris Lessing Reader)
Bullets chew up the earth on either side of the PJs sending gouts of dirt into the air. Rounds thwack into the wreckage behind them sounding like dull, muted bells. As bullets streak past them the PJs’ conversation mostly consists of short, disjointed exclamations like, “Holy Shit!” and “Can you fucking believe this?” Their situation is very unnerving and they squish against the rock, trying to get small.
William F. Sine (Guardian Angel: Life and Death Adventures with Pararescue, the World's Most Powerful Commando Rescue Force)
Then followed an incredible tactical blunder. With the British expeditionary force helplessly retreating toward the sea, but far behind in the race and about to be cut off by Guderian’s massed tanks, the Führer halted Guderian on the River Aa, nine miles from Dunkirk, and forbade the tank divisions to advance for three days! To this day nobody has factually ascertained why he did this. Theories are almost as abundant as military historians, but they add little to the facts. During these three days the British rescued their armies from the Dunkirk beaches. That is the long and short of the “miracle of Dunkirk.
Herman Wouk (The Winds of War (The Henry Family, #1))
The dead raccoon’s name was Rory. I fell in love with him the instant I saw him because he looked exactly like Rambo, the rescued, orphaned raccoon who lived in my bathtub when I was little. Rory hadn’t been lucky enough to be adopted by a small child who’d dress him up in small shorts sets and let him turn her sink into his own tiny waterfall. Instead, Rory had fallen in with a bad crowd and ended up as roadkill, but my friend Jeremy (a burgeoning taxidermist) saw great potential (and very few tire marks) on the cadaver and decided that Rory’s tiny spirit should live on in the most disturbingly joyous way possible.
Jenny Lawson (Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things)
Anyone who understood art knew that it never achieved what its maker dreamed for it. Art always fell short, and the artist, far from rescuing something from the disaster of life, was thereby condemned to be a double failure.
Julian Barnes
They should be rescued from ignorance.” “Don’t talk nonsense. Education is an opium of the people. You ought to know that. You’ve had a little.” “You do not believe in education?” “No,” said Mr. Frazer. “In knowledge, yes.” “I do not follow you.
Ernest Hemingway (The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway)
Better to take life seriously, and reach for light solutions. Satire, for instance; or suicide. Why did people hold so fast to life, that thing they were given without being consulted? All lives were failures, in Alice’s reading of the world, and Jane’s platitude about turning failure into art was fluffy fantasy. Anyone who understood art knew that it never achieved what its maker dreamt for it. Art always fell short, and the artist, far from rescuing something from the disaster of life, was thereby condemned to be a double failure
Julian Barnes (Pulse)
If there is, indeed, an anti-Marian spirit, what might it look like? Well, a woman in its grip would not value children. She would be bawdy, vulgar, and angry. She would rage against the idea of anything resembling humble obedience or self-sacrifice for others. She would be petulant, shallow, catty, and overly sensuous. She would also be self-absorbed, manipulative, gossipy, anxious, and self-servingly ambitious. In short, she would be everything that Mary is not. She would bristle especially at the idea of being a virgin or a mother.
Carrie Gress (The Anti-Mary Exposed: Rescuing the Culture from Toxic Femininity)
I’d finally gotten ready, even anxious, to adopt another cat, and it’d taken long months of mourning for me to reach that point: my last companion, Suki, had, after four years of unexpected but very close cohabitation, been claimed by the cruelly short life expectancy (just four to five years) of indoor-outdoor felines, especially those in wildernesses as remote as the one we inhabited. In fact, before encountering me and deciding that I was a human she could trust, Suki had lived on her own for two years and raised at least one litter of kittens in the wild, and so had beaten the odds admirably; but her disappearance had nonetheless been a terrible blow,
Caleb Carr (My Beloved Monster: Masha, the Half-wild Rescue Cat Who Rescued Me)
As commended by ancient and religious traditions alike, liberty is not liberation from constraint but rather our capacity to govern appetite and thus achieve a truer form of liberty—liberty from enslavement to our appetites and avoidance of depletion of the world. In short, needful is the rescue of liberal education from liberalism.
Patrick J. Deneen (Why Liberalism Failed)
In 1755, some seventy years after the last dodo’s death, the director of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford decided that the institution’s stuffed dodo was becoming unpleasantly musty and ordered it tossed on a bonfire. This was a surprising decision as it was by this time the only dodo in existence, stuffed or otherwise. A passing employee, aghast, tried to rescue the bird but could save only its head and part of one limb.
Bill Bryson (A Short History of Nearly Everything)
And he carefully stored what he considered the most vital piece of equipment: a satellite phone with solar-powered batteries, which would allow the men not only to record short audio dispatches but also to check in every day with an ALE operator and report their coordinates and medical condition. If the team failed to communicate for two consecutive days, ALE would dispatch a search-and-rescue plane—what Worsley called “the most expensive taxi ride in the world.
David Grann (The White Darkness)
So that was it?” she demanded. “All that build-up to rescue a princess, and . . . that was it?” “Would you prefer trying to fight your way out of the tower, through the ruined city transformed into a warzone, through the fetid lake and past the dragons, only to escort her over a thousand miles of treacherous territory back home?” “Yes, actually,” Noutha said, blinking. Tyndal stopped short at that. “I guess I’m glad you weren’t in charge of planning, then,” he decided.
Terry Mancour
In the center of the room Sarra the demon hung upside down by one leg, its arms bound behind its back, its suit scuffed-looking. Beneath it, crawling around an intricately scribed circle, a woman with short, curly red hair drew binding symbols with a gold stick. She looked up as I fanned away the smoke that was billowing up from the crack in the tile. "You're a Summoner. Hullo. I'm Noelle. Did you know that you have mismatched eyes?" I walked around the demon. It glared at me. "Yes, I know. Why do you have Sarra strung up by one leg?" She drew another symbol. It flared bright green as soon as the stick lifted from the circle. "It was getting a bit stroppy with me. The Hanged Man always teaches them a few manners. It's retaliating with the smoke. Are those spirits I saw yours, then?" "Yes, they are. There are four others as well. I hate to be a bother, but I'm in a bit of a hurry, what with Christian being held by this one's master and all, so if you could possibly just give me the abbreviated version of what's going on here, I'll be on my way to rescue him." She leaned back on her heels and sucked the tip of her gold stick. "Asmodeus, eh?" The demon snarled. A chunk of ceiling fell behind me. We both ignored it. It just never does to give a demon the satisfaction of knowing it's startled you. "It's a nasty bag of tricks, but I heard through the demonic grapevine that it was weakened and searching for a suitable sacrifice to regain its power," she added. "Well, it can't have Christian; he's mine. Back to the demon, if you don't mind…" She looked up at Sarra, still sucking the stick. "It's a pretty specimen, isn't it? I like the hair gel. Nice touch. The mustache is a bit much, though, don't you think? Makes it look so smarmy." "Um…" "I'm destroying it, so I suppose it really doesn't matter." I blinked and avoided two wine bottles as they flew out of a rack when the demon hissed at the Guardian.
Katie MacAlister (Sex and the Single Vampire (Dark Ones #2))
I gave up trying to duplicate Nara’s hunting skills. He could make animal calls from leaves. He put a leaf in his mouth and mimicked the sound of a chicken. A short time later, chickens walked over to him and he killed them. I could never attain that level of expertise. Animal impersonation skills must be genetic, because I could never make the proper sounds. When I tried an animal call it seemed that some creatures made sounds in reply. Nara said it was just the animals laughing at me.
William F. Sine (Guardian Angel: Life and Death Adventures with Pararescue, the World's Most Powerful Commando Rescue Force)
Travis?” Her voice came out scratchy and cracked. “What are you doing in my room?” Those eyes—not quite green, not quite brown—crinkled at the corners. “I’m not in your room, darlin’. You’re in mine.” What? Maybe she was still dreaming. That would explain why Travis was here and why nothing was making a lick of sense. But the throbbing behind her ear seemed awfully real. “My head hurts.” “You were kicked by a mule.” A mule? Meredith frowned. Uncle Everett didn’t own a mule. Had she been injured at the livery fetching Ginger? And why was Travis grinning at her? Shouldn’t he be more concerned? “It’s not very heroic of you to smile at my misfortune.” Really. This was her dream after all. Her hero should be more solicitous. Of course, usually in her dreams, Travis rescued her before any injury occurred. The man was getting lax. She’d started to tell him so when he laid the back of his hand on her forehead as if feeling for fever. The gentle touch instantly dissolved her pique. He removed his hand and met her gaze. “I’m smiling because I’m happy to see you awake. We’ve been worried about you.” “Awake?” Meredith scrunched her brows together until the throbbing around her skull forced her to relax. “Travis, you’re not making any sense. I can’t be awake. You only come to me when I’m dreaming. Although you’re usually younger and . . . well . . . cleaner, and not so in need of a shave. “But don’t get me wrong,” she hurried to assure him. It wouldn’t do to insult her hero. “You’re just as handsome as always. I don’t even mind that you didn’t save me this time. The important thing is that you’re here.
Karen Witemeyer (Short-Straw Bride (Archer Brothers, #1))
Forcing new loans upon the bankrupt on condition that they shrink their income is nothing short of cruel and unusual punishment. Greece was never bailed out. With their ‘rescue’ loan and their troika of bailiffs enthusiastically slashing incomes, the EU and IMF effectively condemned Greece to a modern version of the Dickensian debtors’ prison and then threw away the key. Debtors’ prisons were ultimately abandoned because, despite their cruelty, they neither deterred the accumulation of new bad debts nor helped creditors get their money back. For capitalism to advance in the nineteenth century, the absurd notion that all debts are sacred had to be ditched and replaced with the notion of limited liability. After all, if all debts are guaranteed, why should lenders lend responsibly? And why should some debts carry a higher interest rate than other debts, reflecting the higher risk of going bad? Bankruptcy and debt write-downs became for capitalism what hell had always been for Christian dogma – unpleasant yet essential – but curiously bankruptcy-denial was revived in the twenty-first century to deal with the Greek state’s insolvency. Why? Did the EU and the IMF not realize what they were doing? They knew exactly what they were doing. Despite their meticulous propaganda, in which they insisted that they were trying to save Greece, to grant the Greek people a second chance, to help reform Greece’s chronically crooked state and so on, the world’s most powerful institutions and governments were under no illusions. […] Banks restructure the debt of stressed corporations every day, not out of philanthropy but out of enlightened self-interest. But the problem was that, now that we had accepted the EU–IMF bailout, we were no longer dealing with banks but with politicians who had lied to their parliaments to convince them to relieve the banks of Greece’s debt and take it on themselves. A debt restructuring would require them to go back to their parliaments and confess their earlier sin, something they would never do voluntarily, fearful of the repercussions. The only alternative was to continue the pretence by giving the Greek government another wad of money with which to pretend to meet its debt repayments to the EU and the IMF: a second bailout.
Yanis Varoufakis (Adults in the Room: My Battle with Europe's Deep Establishment)
Most of all Ginny--part Schnauzer, part Siberian Husky, part angel from heaven--has taught me the most important lesson in life, that life is not worth living without love, that giving love is more rewarding than getting it, and that the humblest creatures, the least advantaged creatures, are worthy of the greatest outpouring of love. It's a spiritual message, that all life is precious (matters), all life is short, and that, just as human beings have immortal souls, so do animals have immortal souls, because they, too, were created by God. (word in parentheses by poster)
Philip Gonzalez and Leonore Fleischer
Release the grudges you’re holding against yourself,” Angel said. “Or one day they will become your undoing.” Snow White set the papers she was holding back on her desk. “What do you mean?” “If you continue to dwell on your short-comings, you will drive yourself mad. You are human. You will make mistakes. And while I admire your spirit—for it means you will work actively to make as few errors as possible and learn from them—I can say if you do not learn to forgive yourself for your past iniquities, years from now it will be you we are rescuing. Such thoughts open the doorway to darkness.
K.M. Shea (Snow White (Timeless Fairy Tales #11))
When they finally made it back to England, they didn’t realize they had violated a whole slew of British customs regulations. Kevin and Rick came to work as usual, blissfully unaware of any wrong doing, until customs officials dragged them away and swarmed over their boat searching every nook and cranny for contraband. On another occasion, during a surprise dorm inspection, their rooms were discovered devoid of all beds and other furniture but stacked floor-to ceiling with sheep and horse pelts they had bought in Iceland. They planned to sell the hides for a profit, but the inspection short circuited their scheme.
William F. Sine (Guardian Angel: Life and Death Adventures with Pararescue, the World's Most Powerful Commando Rescue Force)
Short work was made of a cushion which was so unfortunate as to slip off my chair; and finally, leaping up in a paroxysm of high spirits to lick my distracted face, Ivo knocked the table over, and there was a most frightful mix-up on the floor of Fräulein Schmidt and Mr. Anstruther—a story I was just then trying to write,—and ink, and broken glass. Could Shakespeare, could Kipling, have worked under such circumstances? I remember kneeling down to rescue what still remained of Fräulein Schmidt, and seeing, staring up at me where a great splash of ink left off, the remarks she had been making, and I had been writing, when Ivo tumbled her over on to the floor. A
Elizabeth von Arnim (All The Dogs Of My Life)
A torn aorta is almost always fatal He sets his stop watch; if his aorta is torn he only has a short time to live. Five minutes tick by, and he’s still alive. He shifts his attention to his leg which is painful and tingling and begins to check his lower body for injuries. Something about his leg looks weird. It takes him a few seconds to figure out what he’s looking at. Somehow he is sitting on his own leg, impossible even for a circus contortionist. The thigh bone, or femur, is the strongest bone in the body, and it takes a tremendous amount of force to break it. The PJ finally figures out his femur is snapped in half, and his leg is folded back underneath him.
William F. Sine (Guardian Angel: Life and Death Adventures with Pararescue, the World's Most Powerful Commando Rescue Force)
This was no coincidence. The best short stories and the most successful jokes have a lot in common. Each form relies on suggestion and economy. Characters have to be drawn in a few deft strokes. There's generally a setup, a reveal, a reversal, and a release. The structure is delicate. If one element fails, the edifice crumbles. In a novel you might get away with a loose line or two, a saggy paragraph, even a limp chapter. But in the joke and in the short story, the beginning and end are precisely anchored tent poles, and what lies between must pull so taut it twangs. I'm not sure if there is any pattern to these selections. I did not spend a lot of time with those that seemed afraid to tell stories, that handled plot as if it were a hair in the soup, unwelcome and embarrassing. I also tended not to revisit stories that seemed bleak without having earned it, where the emotional notes were false, or where the writing was tricked out or primped up with fashionable devices stressing form over content. I do know that the easiest and the first choices were the stories to which I had a physical response. I read Jennifer Egan's "Out of Body" clenched from head to toe by tension as her suicidal, drug-addled protagonist moves through the Manhattan night toward an unforgivable betrayal. I shed tears over two stories of childhood shadowed by unbearable memory: "The Hare's Mask," by Mark Slouka, with its piercing ending, and Claire Keegan's Irishinflected tale of neglect and rescue, "Foster." Elizabeth McCracken's "Property" also moved me, with its sudden perception shift along the wavering sightlines of loss and grief. Nathan Englander's "Free Fruit for Young Widows" opened with a gasp-inducing act of unexpected violence and evolved into an ethical Rubik's cube. A couple of stories made me laugh: Tom Bissell's "A Bridge Under Water," even as it foreshadows the dissolution of a marriage and probes what religion does for us, and to us; and Richard Powers's "To the Measures Fall," a deftly comic meditation on the uses of literature in the course of a life, and a lifetime. Some stories didn't call forth such a strong immediate response but had instead a lingering resonance. Of these, many dealt with love and its costs, leaving behind indelible images. In Megan Mayhew Bergman's "Housewifely Arts," a bereaved daughter drives miles to visit her dead mother's parrot because she yearns to hear the bird mimic her mother's voice. In Allegra Goodman's "La Vita Nuova," a jilted fiancée lets her art class paint all over her wedding dress. In Ehud Havazelet's spare and tender story, "Gurov in Manhattan," an ailing man and his aging dog must confront life's necessary losses. A complicated, only partly welcome romance blossoms between a Korean woman and her demented
Geraldine Brooks (The Best American Short Stories 2011)
We are not doing it for Jagen. We are doing it for our kind.” “We?” Rayna snaps. “What Gift do you have, Grom? Oh, that’s right. You and Nalia get to stay safely behind while me and Galen and Emma drown an entire island.” Oh, heck no. “Um, I’m not killing anyone,” I say, raising my hand. “Not humans, not Syrena.” “It’s a good thing your Gift isn’t deadly then, isn’t it?” Rayna sneers. “I have an idea. You can give the humans their last meal. That would be special, wouldn’t it?” “How would you like to go without eating for a while?” I shoot back. I could use my Gift to send the fish away from her, or I could just bust all her teeth out. Maturity seems to be evaporating into the air. I wonder if her Gift includes pushing all my buttons in rapid-point-five seconds. But then, I know her animosity is really toward Grom, not me. All I’m doing is feeding her anxiety. Galen tucks a tendril of my hair behind my ear. It’s enough to distract me and he knows it. I give him a sour look for interfering, but he grins. “You don’t have to kill anyone, angelfish. In fact, we need your help to save them.” He seems to be telling me something with his eyes, but I’m not picking up on it. I’d love to blame it on the pain meds. “Doesn’t that kind of miss the point?” Rayna says. “Of course not,” Galen says. “Our objective is to rescue our kind, not kill the humans. We can do that without destroying them.” Everyone is all ears, but Galen is not ready to divulge his plan just yet. He stands. “Highness, tell the Archives we will meet with them to discuss our terms.” “Terms?” Grom says. “This isn’t negotiable, Galen. They need us. It’s our duty as Royals.” Galen shrugs. “As far as I’m concerned, it’s entirely negotiable. And we’re not Royals anymore, not until I hear it from their lips.” He turns to Antonis. “And tell them that in view of recent events, the council must come here, on land. There is no reason for us to doubt that this is a trap to recapture us.” Antonis chuckles. I get the feeling that this is all an amusing game to him. But then, old people have earned the right to be amused by everything. And I’m pretty sure he’s the oldest person I know. “Young Prince Galen, I am at your service.” With that, my grandfather leaves. I turn away as he begins to finagle the shorts from his skinny waist on his way down the beach.
Anna Banks (Of Triton (The Syrena Legacy, #2))
There is an inherent, humbling cruelty to learning how to run white water. In most other so-called "adrenaline" sports—skiing, surfing and rock climbing come to mind—one attains mastery, or the illusion of it, only after long apprenticeship, after enduring falls and tumbles, the fatigue of training previously unused muscles, the discipline of developing a new and initially awkward set of skills. Running white water is fundamentally different. With a little luck one is immediately able to travel long distances, often at great speeds, with only a rudimentary command of the sport's essential skills and about as much physical stamina as it takes to ride a bicycle downhill. At the beginning, at least, white-water adrenaline comes cheap. It's the river doing the work, of course, but like a teenager with a hot car, one forgets what the true power source is. Arrogance reigns. The river seems all smoke and mirrors, lots of bark (you hear it chortling away beneath you, crunching boulders), but not much bite. You think: Let's get on with it! Let's run this damn river! And then maybe the raft hits a drop in the river— say, a short, hidden waterfall. Or maybe a wave reaches up and flicks the boat on its side as easily as a horse swatting flies with its tail. Maybe you're thrown suddenly into the center of the raft, and the floor bounces back and punts you overboard. Maybe you just fall right off the side of the raft so fast you don't realize what's happening. It doesn't matter. The results are the same. The world goes dark. The river— the word hardly does justice to the churning mess enveloping you— the river tumbles you like so much laundry. It punches the air from your lungs. You're helpless. Swimming is a joke. You know for a fact that you are drowning. For the first time you understand the strength of the insouciant monster that has swallowed you. Maybe you travel a hundred feet before you surface (the current is moving that fast). And another hundred feet—just short of a truly fearsome plunge, one that will surely kill you— before you see the rescue lines. You're hauled to shore wearing a sheepish grin and a look in your eye that is equal parts confusion, respect, and raw fear. That is River Lesson Number One. Everyone suffers it. And every time you get the least bit cocky, every time you think you have finally figured out what the river is all about, you suffer it all over again.
Joe Kane (Running the Amazon)
If Earth did freeze over, then there is the very difficult question of how it ever got warm again. An icy planet should reflect so much heat that it would stay frozen forever. It appears that rescue may have come from our molten interior. Once again, we may be indebted to tectonics for allowing us to be here. The idea is that we were saved by volcanoes, which pushed through the buried surface, pumping out lots of heat and gases that melted the snows and re-formed the atmosphere. Interestingly, the end of this hyper-frigid episode is marked by the Cambrian outburst—the springtime event of life’s history. In fact, it may not have been as tranquil as all that. As Earth warmed, it probably had the wildest weather it has ever experienced, with hurricanes powerful enough to raise waves to the heights of skyscrapers and rainfalls of indescribable intensity.
Bill Bryson (A Short History of Nearly Everything)
(T)he true enemy of humanity was not Evil, an abstract idea personified by some sort of crimson-faced creature dancing in flames, but Chance, that smoky million-handed monster forever fitting its tiny fingers into the fissures of your life, working tear it apart, loosening the fatal screw, turning that first cell cancerous, sending lightning to strike the tree that you chose for shelter from the storm. The version of Satan that embodied every ill of human life had been patched onto the Judeo-Christian tradition because the early God that Moses knew was too tough and terrible for worshippers to want to deal with. The fear that Moses had of Yahweh was as much of His caprice as of His power --He was just as likely to force the Hebrews to wander in the wilderness as He was to rescue them from the Egyptians. In short, He was not the embodiment of good, but of chance: neither good nor evil, but inscrutable and unavoidable.
Dexter Palmer
Women have always desired equality and respect, but our current culture isn’t seeking it through the grace of Mary; rather, the culture seeks this equality and respect through the vices of Machiavelli: rage, intimidation, tantrums, bullying, raw emotion, and absence of logic. It is this aggressive impulse—this toxic femininity—that finds pride in calling oneself “nasty,” feels empowered by dressing as a vagina, belittles men, and sees the (tragically ironic) need to drop civility so that civility can somehow return again. The devil knows that all these marks of the anti-Mary—rage, indignation, vulgarity, and pride—short-circuit a woman’s greatest gifts: wisdom, prudence, patience, unflappable peace, intuition, her ability to weave together the fabric of society, and her capacity for a deep and fulfilling relationship with God. Instead, the father of lies promises power, fame, fortune, and sterile, fleeting pleasures.
Carrie Gress (The Anti-Mary Exposed: Rescuing the Culture from Toxic Femininity)
ONCE, THERE WAS A CHINA RABBIT WHO was loved by a little girl. The rabbit went on an ocean journey and fell overboard and was rescued by a $sherman. He was buried under garbage and unburied by a dog. He traveled for a long time with the hoboes and worked for a short time as a scarecrow. Once, there was a rabbit who loved a little girl and watched her die. The rabbit danced on the streets of Memphis. His head was broken open in a diner and was put together again by a doll mender. And the rabbit swore that he would not make the mistake of loving again. Once there was a rabbit who danced in a garden inspringtime with the daughter of the woman who had loved him at the beginning of his journey. The girl swung the rabbit as she danced in circles. Sometimes, they went so fast, the two of them, that it seemed as if they were )ying. Sometimes, it seemed as if they both had wings. Once, oh marvelous once, there was a rabbit who found his way home.
Kate DiCamillo
Friendship: the word has come to mean many different things among the various races and cultures of both the Underdark and the surface of the Realms. In Menzoberranzan, friendship is generally born out of mutual profit. While both parties are better off for the union, it remains secure. But loyalty is not a tenet of drow life, and as soon as a friend believes that he will gain more without the other, the union - and likely the other's life - will come to a swift end. I have had few friends in my life, and if I live a thousand years, I suspect that this will remain true. There is little to lament in this fact, though, for those who have called me friend have been persons of great character and have enriched my existence, given it worth. First there was Zaknafein, my father and mentor who showed me that I was not alone and that I was not incorrect in holding to my beliefs. Zaknafein saved me, from both the blade and the chaotic, evil, fanatic religion that damns my people. Yet I was no less lost when a handless deep gnome came into my life, a svirfneblin that I had rescued from certain death, many years before, at my brother Dinin's merciless blade. My deed was repaid in full, for when the svirfneblin and I again met, this time in the clutches of his people, I would have been killed - truly would have preferred death - were it not for Belwar Dissengulp. My time in Blingdenstone, the city of the deep gnomes, was such a short span in the measure of my years. I remember well Belwar's city and his people, and I always shall. Theirs was the first society I came to know that was based on the strengths of community, not the paranoia of selfish individualism. Together the deep gnomes survive against the perils of the hostile Underdark, labor in their endless toils of mining the stone, and play games that are hardly distinguishable from every other aspect of their rich lives. Greater indeed are pleasures that are shared. - Drizzt Do'Urden
R.A. Salvatore (Exile (Forgotten Realms: The Dark Elf Trilogy, #2; Legend of Drizzt, #2))
Wait in the car." He opened the door and started to climb out. "Hold on! How long should I give you? What if you don't come back in a certain number of minutes? Should I call the cops?" "Don't do anything. Don't call anyone. I'll be fine." "But what if you're not?" "Then go home." And with that, he got out and jogged down the street, like if I heard screams or gunshots or whatever I would just drive on home like nothing happened. Well, good for you, I thought, watching him climb a short cement staircase and put a key in the door. You don't need anyone. Fine. I watched the clock. Three minutes went by, four. I thought about knocking on the door, having of course no idea what I would actually do once I got there. Maybe I'd have to break the door down, wrestle Cameron away from the bad men, and then carry him out the way you hear people when they get a huge burst of adrenaline. Except the person I pictured rescuing was little Cameron, in shorts and a striped T-shirt, his arms wrapped around my neck. Then there he was, bursting out of the apartment door and bounding down the steps, a big garbage bag in hand. He ran to the car, fast. I reached over and opened the passenger door and he jumped in. "Go." You can't exactly peel out in a '94 Escort, but I did my best. Cameron breathed hard, clutching the garbage bag to his chest. "What happened?" I drove a good fifteen miles per hour over the speed limit, convinced we were being chased by angry roommates with guns. "Nothing. You can slow down." I didn't. "Nothing? Nothing happened?" "They weren't even there." Then I did slow down. "No one was there? At all?" "Right." His breathing had returned to almost normal. "Then what's the deal with freaking me out like that?" My voice came out high and hysterical and I realized how nervous I'd been, imagining some dangerous scenario from which Cameron had barely escaped, an echo of that day at his house. "I don't know. I started to picture one of them pulling up and finding me there and...I panicked.
Sara Zarr (Sweethearts)
[T]he Christian reverence due to suffering—was simply gammon, resting as it did on a misconception, on mistaken sympathy, on erroneous psychology. The pity the well person felt for the sick—a pity that almost amounted to awe, because the well person could not imagine how he himself could possibly bear such suffering—was very greatly exaggerated. The sick person had no real right to it. It was, in fact, the result of an error in thinking, a sort of hallucination; in that the well man attributed to the sick his own emotional equipment, and imagined that the sick man was, as it were, a well man who had to bear the agonies of a sick one—than which nothing was further from the truth. For the sick man was—precisely that, a sick man: with the nature and modified reactions of his state. Illness so adjusted its man that it and he could come to terms; there were sensory appeasements, short circuits, a merciful narcosis; nature came to the rescue with measures of spiritual and moral adaptation and relief, which the sound person naïvely failed to take into account.
Thomas Mann (The Magic Mountain)
It was on one of these walks that Kicky performed his famous rescue act for which afterwards he was unmercifully teased by his family. The whole crowd of them had been for the usual Sunday walk, Kicky, Pem, and the children, and were returning home by the White Stone Pond. It was winter, and the ice frozen upon it about an inch thick, and as they came to the pond they noticed a mob of people shouting and pointing to the centre, where a miserable dog was slowly drowning, the ice having given way beneath him. Nobody was making the slightest attempt to save the wretched animal. Kicky, short-sighted without his glasses, was only aware that a dog was in difficulties in the water—he could not even see the ice. Stripping himself dramatically of his coat, his eyes flashing, he ran a few paces back and then took an enormous header on to a thin layer of ice that barely covered two foot of water. It was a tremendous sight! Cheered and applauded by the crowd, he plunged to the centre of the pond (still only three foot deep) and rescued the yelping dog, which covered his face with licks of gratitude.
Daphne du Maurier (Gerald: A Portrait)
During the same hours of 1993 when the chopper crews in Somalia were slowly being overpowered and gunned down, there were twenty-four young boys back in the United States who would grow up to be future players in that African struggle. They had no way to know anything yet about the unique fighting group every one of them would eventually strive with all his determination to join. They also couldn’t know, though they would one day find out in person, that this particular battle corps is so elite, the candidate must first be a Navy SEAL just to attempt to get through the training - and even then, three out of four of those superb warrior-athletes fail to qualify. The group has had numerous military names during its long rise from the murky history of the early “frogmen” swimmers, to the black operations of the Underwater Demolition Teams whose only calling card was to render their targets dead, to the latest appellation as the U.S. Naval Special Warfare Development Group - or DEVGRU, for those who prefer names ugly and short. But the group is better known to the general public as the near-mythical warriors of “SEAL Team Six.” Their complex training supports a brilliantly simple task: to be the very last thing their opponents see, if they are ever seen at all.
Anthony Flacco (Impossible Odds: The Kidnapping of Jessica Buchanan and Her Dramatic Rescue by SEAL Team Six)
The depression which spread over the world like a great conflagration toward the end of 1929 gave Adolf Hitler his opportunity, and he made the most of it. Like most great revolutionaries he could thrive only in evil times, at first when the masses were unemployed, hungry and desperate, and later when they were intoxicated by war. Yet in one respect he was unique among history’s revolutionaries: He intended to make his revolution after achieving political power. There was to be no revolution to gain control of the State. That goal was to be reached by mandate of the voters or by the consent of the rulers of the nation—in short, by constitutional means. To get the votes Hitler had only to take advantage of the times, which once more, as the Thirties began, saw the German people plunged into despair; to obtain the support of those in power he had to convince them that only he could rescue Germany from its disastrous predicament. In the turbulent years from 1930 to 1933 the shrewd and daring Nazi leader set out with renewed energy to obtain these twin objectives. In retrospect it can be seen that events themselves and the weakness and confusion of the handful of men who were bound by their oath to loyally defend the democratic Republic which they governed played into Hitler’s hands. But this was by no means foreseeable at the beginning of 1930.
William L. Shirer (The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany)
Er, hello, Chewie," he said politely. "Woof," the dog said back. "Chewie is a Newfoundland," Beka explained. "They're great water dogs. They swim better than we do, and even have webbed feet. They're often used for water rescue, and the breed started out as working dogs for fishermen." "Uh-huh... Chewie - I guess you named him for Chewbacca in Star Wars. I can see why; they're both gigantic and furry." Beka giggled. "I never thought of that. Actually, Chewie is short for Chudo-Yudo. Also, he chews on stuff a lot, so it seemed fitting." "Chudo what?" Marcus said. The dog made a snuffling sound that might have been canine laughter. "Chudo-Yudo," Beka repeated. "He's a character out of Russian fairy tales, the dragon that guards the Water of Life and Death. You never heard of him?" Marcus shook his head. "My father used to tell the occasional Irish folk tale when I was a kid, but I'm not familiar with Russian ones at all. Sorry." "Oh, don't be," she said cheerfully. "Most of them were pretty gory, and they hardly ever had happy endings." "Right." Marcus looked at the dog, who gazed alertly back with big brown eyes, as if trying to figure out if the former Marine was edible or not. "So, you named him after a mythical dragon from a depressing Russian story. Does anyone get eaten in that story, just out of curiosity?" Chewie sank down onto the floor with a put-upon sigh, and Beka shook her head at Marcus. "Don't be ridiculous. Of course people got eaten. But don't worry. Chewie hasn't taken a bite out of anyone in years. He's very mellow for a dragon.
Deborah Blake (Wickedly Wonderful (Baba Yaga, #2))
In her eyes, he could see the fear, but also the love. The need. Time to show her, that to him, she meant everything. “Before you shower me with kisses for saving you –” “I think it could be argued that I played a part.” “Not when I retell the story you won’t. But we can argue about that later, naked. As I was saying, I have something for you.” Remy pulled the sheet of paper out of his back pocket and unfolded it. Initially he’d worried about it being too short. But as Lucifer assured him when he made the contract and binding, the less clauses he put in, the more his promise would stick out. Handing it to her, he waited. Fidgeted when she didn’t say a word. Almost tore it from her grasp. Then stumbled back as she threw herself at him. I, Remy, the most awesome demon in Hell, do declare to love the witch Ysabel, fiery temper and all, for an eternity. I will never stray. Never betray her trust. Never do anything to cause her pain upon penalty of permanent death. This I do swear in blood, Remy A simple contract, which in its very lack of clauses and sub items, awed her. “You love me that much?” He peered at her with incredulity on his face. “Of course I love you that much. Would I have done all the things I did if I didn’t?” “Well, you are related to a mad woman.” “Yes, and maybe it’s madness for me to love you, but I do. Do you think just any woman would inspire me enough to take on a bloody painful curse. Or put up with the fact you have a giant, demon eating cat. I know you have trust issues, and that I might not have led the kind of life that inspires confidence, but I will show you that you can believe in me. I want you to love me.” “I know you do. And I do love you. Only for you would I come to the rescue wearing nothing to cover my bottom.” His eyebrows shot up. “You came to battle in a skirt without any underwear?” A slow nod was her answer. He grinned, then scowled. “You will not do that again. Do you know how many demons live in the sewer and could have looked up your skirt? I won’t have them looking at what’s mine. On second thought. Throw out all your underwear. I’ll lead the purge on the sewers myself so you can stroll around with your girl parts unencumbered for my enjoyment.” “You’re insane,” she laughed. “Crazy in love with you,” he agreed. “But I do warn you, we’ll have to have dinner with my crazy mother at least once a month.” “Or more often. I quite like your mom. She’s got a refreshing way of viewing the world.” “Oh fuck. Don’t tell me she’s already rubbing off,” he groaned, as he pulled her into his arms. She snuggled against him. This was where she belonged. But she did have a question. “As my new… what should I call you anyway? Boyfriend? Demon I sleep with?” “The following terms are acceptable to me. Yours. Mate. Husband. Divine taster of your –” She slapped a hand over his mouth. “I’ll stick to mate.” “And I’m going with my super, sexy, touch her and die, fabulous cougar, ass kicking witch.” “I dare you shout that five times in a row without stumbling.” He did to her eye popping disbelief. “I told you, I have a very agile tongue.” “I remember.
Eve Langlais (A Demon and His Witch (Welcome to Hell, #1))
For things to change, somebody somewhere has to start acting differently. Maybe it’s you, maybe it’s your team. Picture that person (or people). Each has an emotional Elephant side and a rational Rider side. You’ve got to reach both. And you’ve also got to clear the way for them to succeed. In short, you must do three things: → DIRECT the Rider FOLLOW THE BRIGHT SPOTS. Investigate what’s working and clone it. [Jerry Sternin in Vietnam, solutions-focused therapy] SCRIPT THE CRITICAL MOVES. Don’t think big picture, think in terms of specific behaviors. [1% milk, four rules at the Brazilian railroad] POINT TO THE DESTINATION. Change is easier when you know where you’re going and why it’s worth it. [“You’ll be third graders soon,” “No dry holes” at BP] → MOTIVATE the Elephant FIND THE FEELING. Knowing something isn’t enough to cause change. Make people feel something. [Piling gloves on the table, the chemotherapy video game, Robyn Waters’s demos at Target] SHRINK THE CHANGE. Break down the change until it no longer spooks the Elephant. [The 5-Minute Room Rescue, procurement reform] GROW YOUR PEOPLE. Cultivate a sense of identity and instill the growth mindset. [Brasilata’s “inventors,” junior-high math kids’ turnaround] → SHAPE the Path TWEAK THE ENVIRONMENT. When the situation changes, the behavior changes. So change the situation. [Throwing out the phone system at Rackspace, 1-Click ordering, simplifying the online time sheet] BUILD HABITS. When behavior is habitual, it’s “free”—it doesn’t tax the Rider. Look for ways to encourage habits. [Setting “action triggers,” eating two bowls of soup while dieting, using checklists] RALLY THE HERD.
Chip Heath (Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard)
I'm unaccustomed to being cooped up all day-I really must insist that you permit me to enjoy a short walk." "Not on your life," Fletcher growled. From the sound, Breckenridge realized the group had moved closer to the tap. "You don't need to think you're going to give us the slip so easily," Fletcher said again. "My dear good man"-Heather with her nose in the air; Breckenridge could tell by her tone-"just where in this landscape of empty fields do you imagine I'm going to slip to?" Cobbins opined that she might try to steal a horse and ride off. "Oh,yes-in a round gown and evening slippers," Heather jeered. "But I wasn't suggesting you let me ramble on my own-Martha can come with me." That was Martha's cue to enter the fray, but Heather stuck to her guns, refusing to back down through the ensuing, increasingly heated verbal stoush. Until Fletcher intervened, aggravated frustration resonating in his voice. "Look you-we're under strict orders to keep you safe, not to let you wander off to fall prey to the first shiftless rake who rides past and takes a fancy to you." Silence reigned for half a minute, then Heather audibly sniffed. "I'll have you know that shiftless rakes know better than to take a fancy to me." Not true, Breckenridge thought, but that wasn't the startling information contained in Fletcher's outburst. "Come on, Heather-follow up." As if she'd heard his muttered exhortation, she blithely swept on. "But if rather than standing there arguing, you instead treated me like a sensible adult and told me what your so strict orders with respect to me were, I might see my way to complying-or at least to helping you comply with them." Breckenridge blinked as he sorted through that pronouncement; he could almost feel for Fletcher when he hissed out a sigh. "All right," Fletcher's frustration had reached breaking point. "If you must know, we're to keep you safe from all harm. We're not to let a bloody pigeon pluck so much as a hair from your head. We're to deliver you up in prime condition, exactly as you were when he grabbed you." From the change in Fletcher's tone, Breckenridge could visualize him moving closer to tower over Heather to intimidate her into backing down; he could have told him it wouldn't work. "So now you see," Fletcher went on, voice low and forceful, "that it's entirely out of the question for you to go out for any ramble." "Hmm." Heather's tone was tellingly mild. Fletcher was about to get floored by an uppercut. For once not being on the receiving end, Breckenridge grinned and waited for it to land. "If, as you say, your orders are to-do correct me if I'm wrong-keep me in my customary excellent health until you hand me over to your employer, then, my dear Fletcher, that will absolutely necessitate me going for a walk. Being cooped up all day in a carriage has never agreed with me-if you don't wish me to weaken or develop some unhealthy affliction, I will require fresh air and gentle exercise to recoup." She paused, then went on, her tone one of utmost reasonableness, "A short excursion along the river at the rear of the inn, and back, should restore my constitution." Breckenridge was certain he could hear Fletcher breathing in and out through clenched teeth. A fraught moment passed on, then, "Oh, very well! Martha-go with her. Twenty minutes, do you hear? Not a minute more." "Thank you, Fletcher. Come, Martha-we don't want to waste the light." Breckenridge heard Heather, with the rather slower Martha, leave the inn by the main door. He sipped his ale, waited. Eventually, Fletcher and Cobbins climbed the stairs, Cobbins grumbling, Fletcher ominously silent. The instant they passed out of hearing, Breckenridge stood, stretched, then walked out of the tap and into the foyer. Seconds later, he slipped out of the front door.
Stephanie Laurens (Viscount Breckenridge to the Rescue (Cynster, #16; The Cynster Sisters Trilogy, #1))
In the very midst of this panic came the news that the steamer Central America, formerly the George Law, with six hundred passengers and about sixteen hundred thousand dollars of treasure, coming from Aspinwall, had foundered at sea, off the coast of Georgia, and that about sixty of the passengers had been providentially picked up by a Swedish bark, and brought into Savannah. The absolute loss of this treasure went to swell the confusion and panic of the day. A few days after, I was standing in the vestibule of the Metropolitan Hotel, and heard the captain of the Swedish bark tell his singular story of the rescue of these passengers. He was a short, sailor-like-looking man, with a strong German or Swedish accent. He said that he was sailing from some port in Honduras for Sweden, running down the Gulf Stream off Savannah. The weather had been heavy for some days, and, about nightfall, as he paced his deck, he observed a man-of-war hawk circle about his vessel, gradually lowering, until the bird was as it were aiming at him. He jerked out a belaying pin, struck at the bird, missed it, when the hawk again rose high in the air, and a second time began to descend, contract his circle, and make at him again. The second time he hit the bird, and struck it to the deck. . . . This strange fact made him uneasy, and he thought it betokened danger; he went to the binnacle, saw the course he was steering, and without any particular reason he ordered the steersman to alter the course one point to the east. After this it became quite dark, and he continued to promenade the deck, and had settled into a drowsy state, when as in a dream he thought he heard voices all round his ship. Waking up, he ran to the side of the ship, saw something struggling in the water, and heard clearly cries for help. Instantly heaving his ship to, and lowering all his boats, he managed to pick up sixty or more persons who were floating about on skylights, doors, spare, and whatever fragments remained of the Central America. Had he not changed the course of his vessel by reason of the mysterious conduct of that man-of-war hawk, not a soul would probably have survived the night.
William T. Sherman (The Memoirs Of General William T. Sherman)
In the early 1680s, at just about the time that Edmond Halley and his friends Christopher Wren and Robert Hooke were settling down in a London coffee house and embarking on the casual wager that would result eventually in Isaac Newton’s Principia, Hemy Cavendish’s weighing of the Earth, and many of the other inspired and commendable undertakings that have occupied us for much of the past four hundred pages, a rather less desirable milestone was being passed on the island of Mauritius, far out in the Indian Ocean some eight hundred miles off the east coast of Madagascar. There, some forgotten sailor or sailor’s pet was harrying to death the last of the dodos, the famously flightless bird whose dim but trusting nature and lack of leggy zip made it a rather irresistible target for bored young tars on shore leave. Millions of years of peaceful isolation had not prepared it for the erratic and deeply unnerving behavior of human beings. We don’t know precisely the circumstances, or even year, attending the last moments of the last dodo, so we don’t know which arrived first a world that contained a Principia or one that had no dodos, but we do know that they happened at more or less the same time. You would be hard pressed, I would submit to find a better pairing of occurrences to illustrate the divine and felonious nature of the human being-a species of organism that is capable of unpicking the deepest secrets of the heavens while at the same time pounding into extinction, for no purpose at all, a creature that never did us any harm and wasn’t even remotely capable of understanding what we were doing to it as we did it. Indeed, dodos were so spectacularly short on insight it is reported, that if you wished to find all the dodos in a vicinity you had only to catch one and set it to squawking, and all the others would waddle along to see what was up. The indignities to the poor dodo didn’t end quite there. In 1755, some seventy years after the last dodo’s death, the director of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford decided that the institution’s stuffed dodo was becoming unpleasantly musty and ordered it tossed on a bonfire. This was a surprising decision as it was by this time the only dodo in existence, stuffed or otherwise. A passing employee, aghast tried to rescue the bird but could save only its head and part of one limb. As a result of this and other departures from common sense, we are not now entirely sure what a living dodo was like. We possess much less information than most people suppose-a handful of crude descriptions by "unscientific voyagers, three or four oil paintings, and a few scattered osseous fragments," in the somewhat aggrieved words of the nineteenth century naturalist H. E. Strickland. As Strickland wistfully observed, we have more physical evidence of some ancient sea monsters and lumbering saurapods than we do of a bird that lived into modern times and required nothing of us to survive except our absence. So what is known of the dodo is this: it lived on Mauritius, was plump but not tasty, and was the biggest-ever member of the pigeon family, though by quite what margin is unknown as its weight was never accurately recorded. Extrapolations from Strickland’s "osseous fragments" and the Ashmolean’s modest remains show that it was a little over two and a half feet tall and about the same distance from beak tip to backside. Being flightless, it nested on the ground, leaving its eggs and chicks tragically easy prey for pigs, dogs, and monkeys brought to the island by outsiders. It was probably extinct by 1683 and was most certainly gone by 1693. Beyond that we know almost nothing except of course that we will not see its like again. We know nothing of its reproductive habits and diet, where it ranged, what sounds it made in tranquility or alarm. We don’t possess a single dodo egg. From beginning to end our acquaintance with animate dodos lasted just seventy years.
Bill Bryson (A Short History of Nearly Everything)
In this instance, she’d not heard him count. He’d not hit a wall, unless the brick-headed stubbornness of Dmitri’s face counted. Thwack! “Yay.” Yes, that was her cheering for her Pookie aloud. Since it seemed he hadn’t heard, she said it louder, yodeled it as a matter of fact. “You get him, Pookie. Show him who’s the biggest, baddest pussy around.” Leo turned his head at that, narrowing his blue gaze on her. Totally annoyed. Totally adrenalized. Totally hot. “Vex!” How sexy her nickname sounded when he growled it. She could tell he totally dug the encouragement. She waggled her fingers at him and meant to say, “You’re welcome,” but instead shouted, “Behind you!” During that moment of inattention— which really Leo should have known better than to indulge in— Dmitri threw a mighty hook. Had she mentioned just how sigh-worthy big her Pookie was? The perfectly aimed blow hit Leo in the jaw, and the force snapped his head to the side. But it certainly didn’t fell him. Not even close. On the contrary, the punch brought the predator in him alive. As he rotated his jaw, Leo’s gaze flicked her way, his eyes lit with a wildness, his lip quirked, almost in amusement, and then he acted. His fist retaliated then his elbow, snapping Dmitri in the nose. Any other man, even shifter, might have quickly succumbed, but the Russian Siberian tiger was more than a match for the hybrid lion/ tiger. Put them in a ring and they’d have brought in a fortune. They certainly put on a good show. Blood trailed from Dmitri’s lip from where Leo’s fist struck him. However, that didn’t stop the Russian from giving as good as he got. Size-wise, Leo held a slight edge, but what Dmitri lacked in girth, he made up for in skill. Even if Meena wasn’t interested in marrying him, it didn’t mean she couldn’t admire the grace of Dmitri’s movement and his uncanny intuition when it came to dodging blows. Leo wasn’t too shabby either. While he’d obviously not grown up on the mean streets of Russia, he knew how to throw a punch, wrestle a man, and look totally hot in defense of his woman. Sigh. A man coming to her rescue. Just like one of those romance novels Teena likes to read. Luna sidled up alongside her. “What did you do this time?” Why did everyone assume it was her fault? “I didn’t do anything.” Luna snorted. “Sure you didn’t. And it also wasn’t you who put Kool-Aid in Arik’s mom’s shampoo bottle and turned her hair pink at the family picnic a few years ago.” “I thought the short spikes she sported after she got it shaved looked awesome.” “Never said the outcome wasn’t worth it. Just like I’m totally intrigued about what’s happening here. That is Leo laying a smackdown on that Russian diplomat, right? Since I highly doubt they’re sparring over who makes the better vodka or who deserved the gold medal in hockey at the last winter Olympics, then that leaves only one other possibility.” Luna fixed her with a gaze. “This is your fault.” Meena’s shoulders hunched. “Okay, so maybe I’m a teensy tiny bit responsible. Like maybe I made sure my ex-fiancé and current fiancé got to meet.” “Duh. I already knew about that part. What I’m talking about is, how the hell did you get Leo to lose his shit? I mean when he gets his serious on, you couldn’t melt an ice cube in his mouth. Leo never loses control because to lose control is to lose one’s way, or some such bullshit. He’s always spouting these funny little sayings in the hopes of curbing our wild tendencies.” Pookie had the cutest personality. “What can I say?” Meena shrugged. “I guess he got jealous. Totally normal, given we’re soul mates.
Eve Langlais (When an Omega Snaps (A Lion's Pride, #3))
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oxford plumber
In spite of the desire for relational connectivity, the greatest ministry challenge facing these younger Christians is arguably long-term commitment. In their fast-moving, ever-changing world, concentration on any one thing for more than three or six months is very challenging. Going on a short-term mission trip to rescue people from human trafficking is one thing; investing years or decades in fighting unjust legal systems is another.
Paul Borthwick (Western Christians in Global Mission: What's the Role of the North American Church?)
You have to remember life is short, but
Jack Weatherford (The Secret History of the Mongol Queens: How the Daughters of Genghis Khan Rescued His Empire)
The distance between comfortable and comatose is surprisingly short.
Jon Acuff (Do Over: Rescue Monday, Reinvent Your Work, and Never Get Stuck)
For things to change, somebody somewhere has to start acting differently. Maybe it’s you, maybe it’s your team. Picture that person (or people). Each has an emotional Elephant side and a rational Rider side. You’ve got to reach both. And you’ve also got to clear the way for them to succeed. In short, you must do three things: → DIRECT the Rider FOLLOW THE BRIGHT SPOTS. Investigate what’s working and clone it. [Jerry Sternin in Vietnam, solutions-focused therapy] SCRIPT THE CRITICAL MOVES. Don’t think big picture, think in terms of specific behaviors. [1% milk, four rules at the Brazilian railroad] POINT TO THE DESTINATION. Change is easier when you know where you’re going and why it’s worth it. [“You’ll be third graders soon,” “No dry holes” at BP]               → MOTIVATE the Elephant FIND THE FEELING. Knowing something isn’t enough to cause change. Make people feel something. [Piling gloves on the table, the chemotherapy video game, Robyn Waters’s demos at Target] SHRINK THE CHANGE. Break down the change until it no longer spooks the Elephant. [The 5-Minute Room Rescue, procurement reform] GROW YOUR PEOPLE. Cultivate a sense of identity and instill the growth mindset. [Brasilata’s “inventors,” junior-high math kids’ turnaround]                             → SHAPE the Path TWEAK THE ENVIRONMENT. When the situation changes, the behavior changes. So change the situation. [Throwing out the phone system at Rackspace, 1-Click ordering, simplifying the online time sheet] BUILD HABITS. When behavior is habitual, it’s “free”—it doesn’t tax the Rider. Look for ways to encourage habits. [Setting “action triggers,” eating two bowls of soup while dieting, using checklists] RALLY THE HERD. Behavior is contagious. Help it spread. [“Fataki” in Tanzania, “free spaces” in hospitals, seeding the tip jar] ————— OVERCOMING OBSTACLES ————— Here we list twelve common problems that people encounter as they fight for change, along with some advice about overcoming them. (Note
Chip Heath (Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard)
The fact is,” Cara continues, “the data network exists, and that is ethically questionable, but I believe it can work to our advantage here. Just as the computers can access data from other factions, they can send data to other factions. If we sent the data you wished to rescue to every other faction, destroying it all would be impossible.” “When you say ‘we,’” I say, “are you implying that--” “That we would be going with you?” she says. “Obviously not all of us would go, but some of us must. How do you expect to navigate Erudite headquarters on your own?” “You do realize that if you come with us, you might get shot,” says Christina. She smiles. “And no hiding behind us because you don’t want to break your glasses, or whatever.” Cara removes her glasses and snaps them in half at the bridge. “We risked our lives by defecting from our faction,” says Cara, “and we will risk them again to save our faction from itself.” “Also,” pipes up a small voice behind Cara. A girl no older than ten or eleven peers around Cara’s elbow. Her black hair is short, like mine, and a halo of frizz surrounds her head. “We have useful gadgets.” Christina and I exchange a look. I say, “What kinds of gadgets?” “They’re just prototypes,” Fernando says, “so there’s no need to scrutinize them.” “Scrutiny’s not really our thing,” says Christina. “Then how do you make things better?” the little girl asks. “We don’t, really,” Christina says, sighing. “They kind of just keep getting worse.” The little girl nods. “Entropy.” “What?” “Entropy,” she chirps. “It’s the theory that all matter in the universe is gradually moving toward the same temperature. Also known as ‘heat death.’” “Elia,” Cara says, “that is a gross oversimplification.” Elia sticks out her tongue at Cara. I can’t help but laugh. I have never seen one of the Erudite stick out her tongue before. But then again, I haven’t interacted with many young Erudite. Only Jeanine and the people who work for her. Including my brother.
Veronica Roth (Insurgent (Divergent, #2))
So did John Parker of Ripley, a former slave who had walked shackled with four hundred other slaves from Richmond to Alabama. Once free, he became famous for risky ventures, such as returning to snatch the baby of a slave couple from the arms of the baby girl’s sleeping master after already rescuing the baby’s parents. He reportedly helped free more than one thousand slaves. The Ripley home of the Reverend John Rankin also became the doorway to freedom for at least four thousand fugitives who crossed the Ohio River. Fugitives who arrived in Cleveland from Ripley often showed up with written messages for a free black man named Bynum Hunt, who found short-term jobs for them around the docks and then put them on a Detroit-bound steamboat.
Betty DeRamus (Forbidden Fruit: Love Stories from the Underground Railroad)
And, above all, our present goal is to know Jesus Christ as the Son of Man, true man. But we fall short of the goal if we will not try to rescue the question from the impasse into which it was led by the christological discussion of the older Protestants.
Karl Barth, §64.2.II (pg. 83)
Someone needs to remain on over-watch. We don’t know when those bats will come back.”   Trenton tilted his head. “That’s already taken care of. A couple of pathfinders and your friend Dane showed up shortly after we started using the Koa to help defend it. They’ll stay here. Braden’s also sent some of his warriors to protect the poor darlings.”   He sent a wicked glance at the woman at his side. The woman rolled her eyes but didn’t contradict him.   Good enough for Shea. She slid the sword into its scabbard as Gawain did the same.   “Let’s see what Fallon wants, then,” she said, clapping Trenton on the shoulder and easing past him.   He barely controlled his wince before he followed her.   “What’s the matter? One of the bats get a little too close?” Gawain asked in a sarcastic tone.   Shea hid her grin when her guard sent the clan leader a nasty glare.   “More than a little close,” Eliza said with a sidelong glance. “When we showed up, one of them had him by the arm and was about to drag him over the cliff. Good thing we arrived when we did or else someone would have had to scrape the poor darling off the rocks below.”   Trenton gave her a dour look and Shea choked back a laugh. She could just imagine how much he hadn’t enjoyed being rescued.   “You’re getting a bit slow from your easy assignment,” Gawain said, prodding the other man.   Trenton slid a dark look his way. “You’ve seen the types of situations she gets herself into. Does this seem like a cushy assignment to you?”   Gawain gave a small shrug, conceding Trenton’s point with a small smirk.   Shea ignored the banter. She did not get herself into situations. She saw a problem and fixed it. Not her fault that things often avalanched from there.
T.A. White (Wayfarer's Keep (The Broken Lands, #3))
We have to stop spending our life waiting to be set free from this “prison” called singleness so we can finally join the ranks of celebrated coupledom. If society won’t throw the party for us, let’s throw it ourselves! Our unfinished, unwritten, imperfect lives deserve to be honored. Our life choices deserve to be recognized. And our singleness should be celebrated. We’re doing this life thing just fine alone, and if that isn’t brave and admirable and confetti-worthy, then I don’t know what is. I urge you to find a way to celebrate yourself and your singleness on a regular basis. Decide that you are going to be happy no matter what. Decide that you are going to make your dreams come true no matter what. And if those dreams include things like adopting a child and buying a house and doing things that people usually wait to do ’til they’re married . . . I want you to do them anyway. I want you to stop waiting and start living. Stop waiting for love, stop waiting for marriage, stop waiting for Prince Charming to come along and rescue you, and start designing a life you don’t wish to be rescued from. Life is short, and it’s high time to decide that, alone or accompanied, you are going to build the most beautiful life you can, and then you are going to revel in it. Because, guess what? You are the one you’ve been waiting for. You are the one who can make your dreams come true. You are the one, the only one, you will 100 percent definitely spend the rest of your life with . . . and it’s time to start making you happy. Not as a New Year’s resolution or at some lofty date in the future but right now. Because you are worthy of a beautiful life, and that beautiful life starts and ends with you. Don’t just accept your singleness—honor it! Appreciate it. Revel in it. Throw a shower for yourself and register at Target and Starbucks if you want to. But don’t keep wishing it away because you’re hoping and praying and longing for marriage. Stop letting the swipe rule your life. And don’t for one second allow society to cause you to believe that you don’t lead a life that’s worthy of celebrating. Whether your singleness is for a season or for a lifetime, there is great beauty, adventure, magic, love, laughter, and happiness right here in the middle of this moment. And I don’t know about you, but I’d say that’s worth a celebration or two.
Mandy Hale (Don't Believe the Swipe: Finding Love without Losing Yourself)
EVERYTHING Before I knew we were poor, Everything was magic. An empty fridge meant freezer-burnt Popsicles for dinner. Purple-blue mouths and toothless smiles calmed the torment in my mother’s crux. Everything was an adventure. A shared bedroom with my little brother meant an eternal playmate. A warm tent, closed off by a blanket hung from a bunk bed and a hair dryer snuck under the sheets to keep warm. Arctic explorers waiting for a rescue unit. Everything was a mystery. Voices resounding from the living room vehemently snaking through the short halls of the apartment. And then one day, I had Everything And Everything was over too soon.
Halsey (I Would Leave Me If I Could: A Collection of Poetry)
When we are afraid, we stop asking questions and start seeking short-term solutions. The work of my hands is the work of teaching students how to ask more and better questions. It is the work of rescuing curiosity from the clutches of fear.
Brittney Cooper (Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower)
Rufous Hummingbirds that do not elect to make the easy stop in Southern California migrate north up the coast before nesting in forests from the Sierra and Rocky Mountains to south-central Alaska. Rufous remain in their northern habitats only a few months to breed and nest. By August, adult males spearhead the wave back south through the Rocky Mountains and the sky islands, reaching central Mexico in October, where they spend the winter molting their feathers before commencing their long flight north in March. To accomplish these mind-boggling journeys, hummingbirds rely on the wisdom of their genetic history and the information stored in tiny brains the size of silver cupcake beads. Envisioning these near-weightless fliers braving the formidable obstacles posed by wind, fire, rain and snow to adjust to the seasons of the earth is nothing short of awe-inspiring.
Terry Masear (Fastest Things on Wings: Rescuing Hummingbirds in Hollywood)
HIM He was so perfect. So kind and funny. I loved the things he said. He always made me laugh. Whenever I got home he was always there for me, whenever I was alone in a crowded room, he'd always come to my rescue. I felt protected by him. That he'd never hurt me. I don't think he knew how. I'd spend late night's up just listening to his plans and ideas. I hated every second I wasn't with him. The house was always so lonely when he wasn't around. I felt my heart quake and my body feel empty of emotion. He made me feel, made me believe the world was a good place. There was no one else like him. I got jealous whenever other girls talked about him with lovey dovey eyes. He was mine... but I could never make him claim me back. It hurt me how he was so perfect, and whenever someone was introduced to him they'd fall for him too. Everyone would talk about how they saw him as unique in their eyes, but only I knew the real him. I was getting more and more hesitant the more I got to know him, as our time was soon coming to and end and I didn't want that. I wanted him to stay forever the way he was. New, exciting. But then reality finally had to set in after five years. He was just a fictional character. I was on the last book. And the author had just died.
A.A. Wray (20 Dark, Scary and Sad Short Stories)
To introduced myself to you in this nightmare story.I'm a victim of rape on my childhood stage l'd experienced rape in my life the victim were my sibblings and community members as I told you that on my growth. My mum was upsent it were only my dad, sister and brother in my house my dad were living with heart condition desease than my mom choose to hunting work live us with dad on my toddler stage hape you imagine the situation.By telling you this I don'nt expected your pitty or. being sorry for me but I'm going somewhere I want to speak with someone who condem,look him or herself down lost confident with same and other stuation.There's hope if l managed to survive on my situations you can to.God favoured me my introduced himself to me on my teenage stage ashored me that he love me and transformed my life mostly healed me day by day couse this situations is deep it a proccess to be heal in it l use to say it like living in fire where you need to live with God himself in it.Why I say this? allow me to say it some sort of journey of chosen people.The reason is other people take it easy as we have different categories of help and high science source to cure this the truth is it can't why?Rape destroy the whole life of person as human divided into 3 part which is body,soul spirit as I experience it not once several times till I reach the stage where I can rescure myself by confronting the victims,shortly it spoiled my whole 3 part you see I needed my creater to rebuid me and that not heppening overnight I personally say rape victims needed. Lifesaviour and Lifeguide who is God himself to rescue and guide you in life journey course this thing is a beast that never die if you never experience it you'll never understand it thanks for your trying don't need to.what I need is your support,how? pray for me,not feeling sorry,give hope,listen me,never judge ,stop gossip rather ask the ask,allow me to take my own decisions, give me time,be partient of me,avoid to remind me my past,believe in me,be careful on showing me my weekest sport rather put me on the spot where I can see for myself, give me chance of proving myself. This is what I can do;Forgive,move on,not forget,love other people not trust them 100% ,(truely fall in love conditional),Over protective while others says I'm selfish,depend on God's hand 100%, sensetive person, enjoy my space,help others, prayful person,other people says I'm moody person when I separate myself to meet with God in his present,can think wise things and do big things,focus on something that can keep my mind busy to escape on thinking about past,fight to change, enjoy to spend time with fruitfull freinds, rocking on doing my own business, on my own space,Not easy to accept people in my space till I know him or her better,enjoy nature things,love to be me,layalt pertionate & kind person.
Nozipho N.Maphumulo
The sight of her praying lit a fire in his heart. She'd suffered so many traumas in the short amount of time and yet she still believed, still looked to God for help and answers. She was an amazing woman.
Terri Reed (Alaskan Rescue (Alaska K-9 Unit, 1))
Marks … I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to find your spectacles in this wreckage.” “I have another pair at home,” she ventured. “Thank God.” Leo sat up with a quiet grunt of discomfort. “Now, if we stand on the highest pile of debris, it’s only a short distance to the surface. I’m going to hoist you up, get you out of here, and then you’re going to ride back to Ramsay House. Cam trained the horse, so you won’t need to guide him. He’ll find his way back home with no trouble.” “What are you going to do?” she asked, bewildered. He sounded rather sheepish. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to wait here until you send someone for me.” “Why?” “I have a—” He paused, searching for a word. “Splinter.” She felt indignant. “You’re going to make me ride back alone and unescorted and virtually blind, to send someone to rescue you? All because you have a splinter?” “A large one,” he volunteered. “Where is it? Your finger? Your hand? Maybe I can help to … Oh, God. ” This last as he took her hand and brought it to his shoulder. His shirt was wet with blood, and a thick shard of timber protruded from his shoulder. “That’s not a splinter,” she said in horror. “You’ve been impaled. What can I do? Shall I pull it out?” “No, it might be lodged against an artery. And I wouldn’t care to bleed out down here.” She crawled closer to him, bringing her face close to his to examine him anxiously... “Don’t worry,” he murmured. “It looks worse than it is.” But Catherine didn’t agree. If anything, it was worse than it looked... Stripping off her riding coat, she tried to lay it over his chest. “What are you doing?” he asked. “Trying to keep you warm.” Leo plucked the garment off his chest and made a scoffing sound. “Don’t be ridiculous. First, the injury isn’t that bad. Second, this tiny thing is not capable of keeping any part of me warm. Now, about my plan—” “It is obviously a significant injury,” she said, “and I do not agree to your plan. I have a better one.” “Of course you do,” he replied sardonically. “Marks, for once would you do as I ask?” “No, I’m not going to leave you here. I’m going to pile up enough debris for both of us to climb out.” “You can’t even see, damn it. And you can’t move these timbers and stones. You’re too small.” “There is no need to make derogatory remarks about my stature,” she said, lurching upward and squinting at her surroundings. Identifying the highest pile of debris, she made her way to it and hunted for nearby rocks. “I’m not being derogatory.” He sounded exasperated. “Your stature is absolutely perfect for my favorite activity. But you’re not built for hauling rocks. Blast it, Marks, you’re going to hurt yourself—” “Stay there,” Catherine said sharply, hearing him push some heavy object aside. “You’ll worsen your injury, and then it will be even more difficult to get you out. Let me do the work.” Finding a heap of ashlar blocks, she picked one up and lugged it up the pile, trying not to trip over her own skirts. “You’re not strong enough,” Leo said, sounding aggravated and out of breath. “What I lack in physical strength,” she replied, going for another block, “I make up for in determination.” “How inspiring. Could we set aside the heroic fortitude for one bloody moment and dredge up some common sense?” “I’m not going to argue with you, my lord. I need to save my breath for”—she paused to heft another block—“stacking rocks.” Somewhere amid the ordeal, Leo decided hazily that he would never underestimate Catherine Marks again. Ounce for ounce, she was the most insanely obstinate person he had ever known, dragging rocks and debris while half blind and hampered by long skirts, diligently crossing back and forth across his vision like an industrious mole. She had decided to build a mound upon which they could climb out, and nothing would stop her.
Lisa Kleypas (Married by Morning (The Hathaways, #4))
I said “yes” to this journey many years ago and have since discovered that His goodness is beyond my wildest dreams. My yes started by simply recognizing that I have sinned and fallen short of God’s purpose and design. Jesus then became for me the perfect manifestation of goodness. He rescued me from all that would destroy me and brought me into a relationship with Him where more of His goodness could be discovered. Many have taken that first step but tragically have stopped after step one, picking up the view of who God is as seen in the Old Testament stories. Those stories are important and necessary. But the fact is, Jesus came to replace them with a clearer view of what God is like. There are few deceptions more devastating than this one. It is tragic and so completely unnecessary.
Bill Johnson (God is Good: He's Better Than You Think)
Many of us are like James Joyce’s Mr. Duffy who “lived a short distance from his body.” In fact, we may live some distance from our bodies, and it can take enormous effort to get back in touch with our five senses. In trying, we often go overboard and get destructive with our bodies or what we put into them. …An unexpected pratfall is sometimes the way our “earthiness” is revealed to us. Jung once spoke of this experience as a pilgrimage back down out of the clouds into our bodies. He writes of having to climb back down to the earth to accept that the little clod of earth that he was. This wasn’t self-negation but true humility. The monk Thomas Merton records having a similar experience in a crosswalk in Louisville. He jumped for joy when he realized that he was like everybody else-a human being, a creature in solidarity with all creation. But not everybody jumps for joy at that realization. One reason we may try to ignore the senses or zonk out with excess is that our bodies remind us of our extreme vulnerability. The gift of life can be taken away so suddenly and unexpectedly. Holding this awareness rescues us from the danger of imagining that we are morally self-sufficient or excellent. Celebrating our vulnerability and finitude places our fears and dreads where they belong-not at the center of life but at its edge. We are closer to the mystery at the heart of things, to which the proper response is gratitude.
Alan Jones (Seasons of Grace: The Life-Giving Practice of Gratitude)
The modern ideology is compounded of human rights, equality, individuality, minimization of suffering and maximization of self-respect, diversity, inclusion and a strong emphasis on nontraditional sexual self-expression and identity. But the point is not so much these positive doctrines as the negative ones: this-life is all there is, and there is no meaning to life beyond the happiness or misery experienced; there is no objectivity to morality, humans are existentially alone and communication is uncertain and mostly a matter of self-deception. In sum, the modern ideology is secular and nihilistic, and modern people are short-termist, pleasure-orientated, and alienated.
Edward Dutton (The Genius Famine: Why We Need Geniuses, Why They're Dying Out, Why We Must Rescue Them)
Runaways are the foundation for what air scent dogs do – it’s a chain of behavior we start with puppies from day one. In short, the handler holds the dog while another person runs away and hides a short distance away. The dog is released with a “go find” command, locates the subject, returns to the handler, and does a trained final response (TFR) such as a bark, jump, or tug to communicate that he has found a subject. “Show me!” shouts the handler, who then sprints after the dog, who has already whirled and is now dashing madly back to the lost person. Upon arrival, the dog’s favorite toy magically appears, a big party ensues, and the handler and training subject yip and yell to excite and reward the K9.
Suzanne Elshult (A Dog's Devotion: True Adventures of a K9 Search and Rescue Team)
Grief, what a son of a bitch, Ariel, we have a surfeit of it, far too much, you and me and most of us in this century and the wreckage of centuries that came before. A son of a bitch, but absolutely necessary. Without pain, life means nothing. The tree needs the sound it makes as it falls, so it can be heard, at least in the future, its way of demanding witnesses. Which is why we need funeral rites, great or small, the outpouring of sorrow, the long and short good-bye, like the one your people have just held for Allende, why the worst sin is to disappear a body and deny the mourning, a crime against life because it doesn't allow life to go on, other trees to grow from the soil of the tree as it dies away. And that's why the refrain, do not speak ill of the dead, makes sense. We're not erasing the bad acts, the mistakes and blindness, the cruelty and selfishness, the damage caused to others. But it's healthy to rescue, at least once in each person's odyssey, what's best for the future. And if we become extinct? No last rites, no words about us, no stories told, death will have the last word. So we have to tell that story now, before it's too late.
Ariel Dorfman
I will need to speak briefly about the divine twins in Proto-Indo-European mythology. In short, these are recurring twin Gods that show up in many Indo-European cultures. They are typically depicted as youthful sons of the Sky Father, associated with horses, who attend a consort Goddess with solar characteristics. Their sun Goddess consort is typically rescued from the sea, or some other “watery peril.”31 The mythology is mainly reconstructed using Greek, Vedic, and Lithuanian culture. The Greek Dioscuri correspond clearly to the Vedic Aswins, and the Baltic Dieva Deli. This is pertinent to the episode of the Nart Sagas explained above, because Zerasha is retrieved from the sea and marries the hero, Akshar. Later, Akshar and his twin brother Akshartag quarrel over her and both of them die. Interestingly, Zerasha’s daughter Satanaya (born from her tomb) also marries one of two twin brothers. (one of her two half-brothers). This strengthens the idea that Satanaya is, in some sense, Zerasha reborn.
T. D. Kokoszka (Bogowie: A Study of Eastern Europe's Ancient Gods)
Leia opened her eyes and lifted her head. She had an uncomprehending look on her face as she said, “Aren’t you a little short for a stormtrooper?” “Huh?” Luke replied. “Oh…the uniform.” He reached up to pull off the helmet. Shaking his hair free, he said, “I’m Luke Skywalker. I’m here to rescue you.
Ryder Windham (Star Wars: Classic Trilogy: Collecting A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi (Disney Junior Novel (eBook)))
There is only one world-view that is worthy of us, and which has already been discussed as the Choice of Achiles—better a short life, full of deeds and glory, than a long life without substance. The danger is so great, for every individual, every class, every people, that to cherish any illusion whatsoever is deplorable. Time cannot be stopped; there is no possibility for prudent retreat or wise renunciation. Only dreamers believe there is a way out. Optimism is cowardice. We are born into this time and must courageously follow the path to the end as destiny demands. There is no other way. Our duty is to hold on to the lost post, without hope, without rescue, like the Roman soldier whose bones were found in front of a door in Pompeii, who, during the eruption of Vesuvius, died at his post because they forgot to relieve him. That is greatness. . . . The honorable end is the one thing that can not be taken from a man.
Oswald Spengler
She was a woman fighting a woman’s fight for her beloved, and her thoughts were all upon velvet-nosed Prince Charming and the five days left in which he must be rescued or disappear forever.
Walter Alden Dyer (Many Dogs There Be (Short Story Index Reprint Series))
But just across the U.S. border, up in the tar sands of Alberta, there is another equally horrific image. A gaping pit, an abyss on its way to becoming the size of Florida, exists where Imperial Oil -- the largest company in the world -- is using the wild Athabasca River to pressure-wash underground sand formations that they gouge up like honeycombs, using huge amounts of energy and clean fresh water to steam the oil from those sands. Native people in the area are dying from drastically abnormal incidences of rare cancers, and Imperial Oil is seeking to transport more giant mining equipment -- on trucks over two hundred feet long and three stories high-- up the Snake River to Lewiston, Idaho, along the same route where the Nez Perce tribe rescued Lewis and Clark and directed them to the Pacific, shortly before the U.S. betrayed the Nez Perce and chased them toward Canada before killing them. (Rick Bass)
Melvin McLeod (editor)
Haven’t you heard a damned word that I’ve said?” she exploded. “You show up on the day before my wedding, thinking to ‘rescue’ me, but have you ever even once asked me what I want? No—instead, you’ve made this all about you. How you could never live with yourself if this marriage of honor went through. How you only want what’s best for me. Stars, Eve—you’re no different from everyone else who wants to control every detail of my life!
Joe Vasicek (The Freedom of Second Chances: A Short Story (Short Story Singles))
She’s right. And with the galaxy in the state that it’s in right now, there’s no better time to try. You need to live like there’s no tomorrow because there very well might not be. Life is too short to carry grudges. All they do is poison your spirit and destroy relationships. I’m not saying you should condone everything Luke does because breaking the law is wrong, but if you can forgive each other for how you’ve treated each other over the years, you can begin to build a relationship where your guidance would be accepted and not just turned away.
Pixel Ate (The Accidental Minecraft Family: Book 41: Search & Rescue: Space Wars 3)
While they are still very young, we want to hand our boys any responsibilities we think they can handle. Actually—on the advice of my grown sons—sometimes we need to assign them a little bit more than what we think they can handle. This gives them a mission, something to conquer and overcome. We can be right there cheering them on, but we shouldn’t be too quick to rescue them. As I mentioned earlier with schoolwork, the struggle is an important part of their development.
Durenda Wilson (Raising Boys to Men: A Simple, Mercifully Short Book on Raising and Homeschooling Boys)
Finally, Christians can use more-advanced strategies like geofencing. Geofencing is a powerful marketing strategy my marketing company uses for commercial clients. It targets prospects and gathers their mobile IDs based on their physical location. You can target your prospect by time and/or location — for example, anyone who went to a selected church in the last week, in the last month, or in the last six months. You can also select anyone who went just one time, two times in one month, four times in two months, and so on. It’s a great way to get very specific contact lists that meet pretty much any criteria you can think of. If a pastor simply won’t talk about the election, geofencing their church is a good way to get directly to the church attendees. For one campaign, my company “fenced” 74 different evangelical churches in a candidate's district and gathered 94,000 mobile IDs, thereby building a large database in a short amount of time. In the end, we collected the contact information of 10,000 highly motivated voters who were also considered “low propensity” voters for the clients’ database. We also generated potential voters by getting: • 100,000+ landing page visitors. • 942,000 ad impressions. • 288,000 video views. All these views and ad impressions led to increased voter awareness and turnout for our client.
Craig Huey (The Great Deception: 10 Shocking Dangers and the Blueprint for Rescuing The American Dream)
Europeans argued that, in taking Africans out of their native continent, they were ‘rescuing’ them from a ‘primitive’ and ‘barbaric’ existence. It was a short step from this to arguing that Africans were naturally inferior. And when Europeans sought to colonise the African continent in the late nineteenth century, they used arguments such as these to justify their actions in the name of spreading Christianity and ‘civilisation’.
Kevin Shillington (History of Africa)
Of all organizations, it was oddly enough Wal-Mart that best recognized the complex nature of the circumstances, according to a case study from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. Briefed on what was developing, the giant discount retailer’s chief executive officer, Lee Scott, issued a simple edict. “This company will respond to the level of this disaster,” he was remembered to have said in a meeting with his upper management. “A lot of you are going to have to make decisions above your level. Make the best decision that you can with the information that’s available to you at the time, and, above all, do the right thing.” As one of the officers at the meeting later recalled, “That was it.” The edict was passed down to store managers and set the tone for how people were expected to react. On the most immediate level, Wal-Mart had 126 stores closed due to damage and power outages. Twenty thousand employees and their family members were displaced. The initial focus was on helping them. And within forty-eight hours, more than half of the damaged stores were up and running again. But according to one executive on the scene, as word of the disaster’s impact on the city’s population began filtering in from Wal-Mart employees on the ground, the priority shifted from reopening stores to “Oh, my God, what can we do to help these people?” Acting on their own authority, Wal-Mart’s store managers began distributing diapers, water, baby formula, and ice to residents. Where FEMA still hadn’t figured out how to requisition supplies, the managers fashioned crude paper-slip credit systems for first responders, providing them with food, sleeping bags, toiletries, and also, where available, rescue equipment like hatchets, ropes, and boots. The assistant manager of a Wal-Mart store engulfed by a thirty-foot storm surge ran a bulldozer through the store, loaded it with any items she could salvage, and gave them all away in the parking lot. When a local hospital told her it was running short of drugs, she went back in and broke into the store’s pharmacy—and was lauded by upper management for it.
Atul Gawande (The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right)
She’s a resident at our all-girl’s home. We rescued her from her home just a few short months ago, where she suffered from abuse, both mentally and physically. She’s also a victim of sexual assault.
Meagan Brandy (Trouble at Brayshaw High)
There are so many big-picture ways to help dogs, to find them more homes—new ways of thinking, fresh ideas to fill a crisp three-ring binder, long lists of training techniques—but I’m just a Shelter volunteer. All I can do is help these dogs one by one in the relatively short time I have, with a stroll, a game of fetch, some people-watching, or just a chance to be themselves
Amy Sutherland (Rescuing Penny Jane: One Shelter Volunteer, Countless Dogs, and the Quest to Find Them All Homes)
But even after the surrender of the Confederacy—a surrender that presaged the final destruction of slavery—there were Democrats who refused to accept the outcome. One of them, John Wilkes Booth, decided to take action. Booth was a Confederate sympathizer from Maryland. Earlier Booth had joined a volunteer militia of Democrats in attendance at the hanging of abolitionist John Brown. Booth and the Democrats came armed to prevent abolitionists from rescuing Brown from the gallows. Two days after Lee’s surrender, Lincoln gave a speech at the White House in which he suggested that some blacks should get the vote. That did it for Booth, who gathered a group of likeminded Democrats who resolved to assassinate not only President Lincoln but also the vice president and the secretary of state. This was nothing short of an attempted coup.
Dinesh D'Souza (Hillary's America: The Secret History of the Democratic Party)
After I paid my admission fee, I saw that the reptile enclosures were kept perfectly clean--the snakes glistened. I kept rescued animals myself at home. I knew zoos, and I knew the variety of nightmares they can fall into. But I saw not a sign of external parasites on these animals, no old food rotting in the cages, no feces or shed skin left unattended. So I enjoyed myself. I toured around, learned about the snakes, and fed the kangaroos. It was a brilliant, sunlit day. “There will be a show at the crocodile enclosures in five minutes,” a voice announced on the PA system. “Five minutes.” That sounded good to me. I noticed the crocodiles before I noticed the man. There was a whole line of crocodilians: alligators, freshwater crocodiles, and one big saltie. Amazing, modern-day dinosaurs. I didn’t know much about them, but I knew that they had existed unchanged for millions of years. They were a message from our past, from the dawn of time, among the most ancient creatures on the planet. Then I saw the man. A tall, solid twentysomething (he appeared younger than he was, and had actually turned twenty-nine that February), dressed in a khaki shirt and shorts, barefoot, with blond flyaway hair underneath a big Akubra hat and a black-banded wristwatch on his left wrist. Even though he was big and muscular, there was something kind and approachable about him too. I stood among the fifteen or twenty other park visitors and listened to him talk. “They can live as long as or even longer than us,” he said, walking casually past the big saltwater croc’s pond. “They can hold their breath underwater for hours.” He approached the water’s edge with a piece of meat. The crocodile lunged out of the water and snapped the meat from his hand. “This male croc is territorial,” he explained, “and females become really aggressive when they lay eggs in a nest.” He knelt beside the croc that had just tried to nail him. “Crocodiles are such good mothers.” Every inch of this man, every movement and word exuded his passion for the crocodilians he passed among. I couldn’t help but notice that he never tried to big-note himself. He was there to make sure his audience admired the crocs, not himself. I recognized his passion, because I felt some of it myself. I spoke the same way about cougars as this Australian zookeeper spoke about crocs. When I heard there would be a special guided tour of the Crocodile Environmental Park, I was first in line for a ticket. I had to hear more. This man was on fire with enthusiasm, and I felt I really connected with him, like I was meeting a kindred spirit. What was the young zookeeper’s name? Irwin. Steve Irwin.
Terri Irwin (Steve & Me)
The american climber Mark Twight, mentor of the Grivel climbing team, commented, "Now every ill-prepared sad sack whose ability falls short of his Himalayan ambitions can get on the radio, call for help, and expect the cavalry to save the day" - on Tomaz Humar's rescue from Rupal Face of Nanga Parvat.
Bernadette McDonald (Tomaz Humar)
As long as you are in a place where you’re asking for help, constantly crying, ‘Save me, help me!’ people care about you. The minute you pick yourself up and stop crying for help, the sympathy stops flowing! In fact, the crying gives them a kick — they don’t like it when you stop giving them that pleasure! If you keep on crying, many will rush to your rescue — but that’s just for a short while.
Nalini Jameela (The Autobiography of a Sex Worker)
Kahnawake November 1704 Temperature 44 degrees “They won’t let you see her,” said Ruth flatly. “Now tell us, Mr. Williams, why has ransom not come? Do people have short memories or no memory? Why do they not rescue us? I get so angry sometimes.” Sometimes! thought Mercy.
Caroline B. Cooney (The Ransom of Mercy Carter)
The twelve stay. They eat a final meal with Jesus, and with his hands he tears the unleavened bread and holds it up to them. 'This is my body,' he says. 'Remember me.' And he tells Simon that the adversary has asked to sift them all like wheat, but their faith will be restored. The next day the Christ is lifted up at Golgotha, nailed to a tree, dead before sunset. And when his Spirit leaves him, the temple curtain rends, a veil between God and man. Left exposed in the holiest place is the ark of the covenant, and in that, the manna given to the Hebrews in the desert, life-giving for those who ate of it, but only for a short while here on this earth. And the people remember his words on the shore of Capernaum: 'Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.' His body, crucified, given for them so they may taste eternity. Three days later, resurrected, so those who believe can come to his banquet table and be filled. His followers obey. They devote themselves to the breaking of the bread. They remember him each time they eat of it, and offer thanks. They are sustained in the world and rescued from the world because God became man, and man became bread.
Christa Parrish (Stones For Bread)
range viewer mounted near our ship’s console. Jafar steered for Lucas. After a few more minutes, Lucas signed off and turned to us. “We have a carrier strike group nearby, guys. Denny says they launched two 60H Seahawk helicopters with Seal Teams aboard. We get to clear the Mother Ship’s deck for safe boarding of the Seal teams. I’ll circle the wagons and you guys go rain some death down on the Mother Ship deck until ain’t nothin’ livin’ there. Then we hold shadow position until the Seahawks get here, maintaining a safe landing zone.” Casey and I just smile at each other. Oh yeah! And it’s my turn on the XM307. We jog back into position with Casey manning our Browning fifty while I slipped behind the XM307. We started taking small arms fire from the pirate ship as Lucas passed them to the port side before giving us a clear field of fire. Casey tilted and fired short bursts with tracers. Soon, anything stupid enough to get near the railing was cut in half. I fired 25mm bursts stem to stern. Airburst shells exploded all along the pirate deck, blowing out the view windows on their bridge, and leaving no inch of the vessel untouched above deck. Lucas sped up, passed the pirate bow and angled out on the starboard side. We repeated our dual assault although there really wasn’t anyone alive anyway. Twenty minutes later, we heard the Seahawk helicopters approaching. I fired one more burst as Lucas passed once again on the port side. With the helicopters in sight, Lucas headed for the open sea. Shortly after Casey and I closed up shop, Jafar came to summon us to the bridge. Denny was on speaker. “We’re all here, Captain Blood,” Lucas told him. “The Seals found twenty-six mangled pirates above deck and took no fire from the vessel. Below decks, fourteen more pirates were taken prisoner and eleven of the original ship’s crew rescued. No one spotted you guys so steam for our next baiting area. Once things get wrapped up with the rescued ship the carrier group will get orders to take up a support position within striking distance in case we get this lucky again. Great job! Man, we fucked them up today!” We did our ‘pirate talk’ for a few minutes, including Jafar. Denny cracked up. Who says pirate warfare and cold blooded murder can’t be fun. I had to ask though. “What was the cover story for no live pirates on deck to the carrier group?” “Don’t ask, don’t tell,” Denny adlibbed for our amusement. “The Seals didn’t mind. The official news coverage will be a pirate falling out. The mysterious crater where the pirate den used to be near Mogadishu will be rumored a munitions accident. Those
Bernard Lee DeLeo (Hard Case (John Harding: Hard Case, #1))
Do you mind?” the stranger snapped. “I’m here to rescue you.” Michonne—Michi for short—stared at the man rubbing his chest. “Who are you?” Other than ridiculously handsome with dark hair and blue eyes. “Your fucking knight in shining armor.
Eve Langlais (First Mate's Accidental Wife (Gypsy Moth, #1))
This process is short-circuited when people are told, “Jesus has forgiven all your sins; now stop mourning them!” This is like telling a man whose wife has just died, “Jesus has taken your wife to heaven; now stop mourning her death!” Jesus wept at the tomb of Lazarus (John 11:35)—even knowing he was about to bring him back to life. If that’s the case, the need to grieve is so deep in human nature that trying to prevent it is foolish and can even be harmful.
Jimmy Akin (The Drama of Salvation: How God Rescues You from Your Sins and Brings You to Eternal Life)
Curiosity is often the first casualty of the politics of fear. Sometimes the things we fear most are our questions. More specifically, we fear the questions to which we don’t have answers. When we are afraid, we stop asking questions and start seeking short-term solutions. The work of my hands is the work of teaching students how to ask more and better questions. It is the work of rescuing curiosity from the clutches of fear.
Brittney Cooper (Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower)