Substance Girl Quotes

Society. The same society, I might add, that dictates that little girls should always be sugar and spice and everything nice, which encourages them not to be assertive. And that, in turn, then leads to low self-esteem, which can lead to eating disorders and increased tolerance and acceptance of domestic, sexual, and substance abuse." "You get all that from a pink Onesie?" Leah said after a moment.

A woman who holds her head up too high, is trying to breathe from her own pollution.

She's a baby," Maggie told me. "Babies wear pastels." "Says who?" I asked. ... "Society. The same society, I might add, that dictates that little girls should always be sugar and spice and everything nice, which engourages them to not be assertive. And that, in turn, then leads to low self-esteem, which can lead to eating disorders and increased tolerance and acceptance of domestic, sexual, and substance abuse.

Jackson," I asked carefully. "Are you on any illegal substances I should know about?" "Nope." "Eaten any strange looking mushrooms?" "Not lately." "Any near brushed with eternal damnation that might be affecting your judgement?" He grinned. "That hard to believe, huh?

I was doing my little stand up shtick, the one I did for pretty girls, so they'd like me quickly and wouldn't try too hard to actually get to know me beyond my role as wisecracking Cameron, the orphan. Maybe it was a little like flirting, but also a kind of protection: Don't get too close; I'm just jokes with substance.

I once knew of a girl whose story forms the substance of the diary. Whether he has seduced others I do not know... we learn of his desire for something altogether arbitrary. With the help of his mental gifts he knew how to tempt a girl to draw her to him without caring to possess her in any stricter sense. I can imagine him able to bring a girl to the point where he was sure she would sacrifice all then he would leave without a word let a lone a declaration a promise. The unhappy girl would retain the consciousness of it with double bitterness because there was not the slightest thing she could appeal to. She could only be constantly tossed about in a terrible witches' dance at one moment reproaching herself forgiving him at another reproaching him and then since the relationship would only have been actual in a figurative sense she would constantly have to contend with the doubt that the whole thing might only have been an imagination.

Remember that, Iz. Be a kid of honesty. Wave it like a banner for all to see. Also, while I'm thinking about it - be a kid who loves surprises. Squeal with delight over puppies and cupcakes and birthday parties. Be curious, but content. Be loyal, but independent. Be kind. To everyone. Treat every day like you're making waffles. Don't settle for the first guy (or girl) unless he's the right guy (or girl). Live your effing life. Do so with gusto, because my God, there's nothing sorrier than a gusto-less existence. Know yourself. Love yourself. Be a good friend. Be a kid of hope and substance. Be a kid of appetite, Iz. You know what I mean, don't you? (Of course you do. You're a Malone.) Okay, that's all for now. Catch you on the flip side. Blimey, get ready. Signing off, Mary Iris Malone, Your Big Sister

She was no malleable, since frigid, substance upon which desires might be executed; she was not a true prostitute for she was the object on which men prostituted themselves.

The disorder is more common in women." Note the construction of that sentence. They did not write, "The disorder is more common in women." It would still be suspect, but they didn't bother trying to cover their tracks. Many disorders, judging by the hospital population, were more commonly diagnosed in women. Take, for example, "compulsive promiscuity." How many girls do you think a seventeen-year-old boy would have to screw to earn the label "compulsively promiscuous"? Three? No, not enough. Six? Doubtful. Ten? That seems more likely. Probably in the fifteen-to-twenty range, would be my guess - if they ever put that label on boys, which I don't recall their doing.... In the list of six "potentially self-damaging" activities favored by the borderline personality, three are commonly associated with women (shopping sprees, shoplifting, and eating binges) and one with men (reckless driving). One is not "gender specific," as they say these days (psychoactive substance abuse). And the definition of the other (casual sex) is in the eye of the beholder.

Is it that by its indefiniteness it shadows forth the heartless voids and immensities of the universe, and thus stabs us from behind with the thought of annihilation, when beholding the white depths of the milky way? Or is it, that as in essence whiteness is not so much a color as the visible absence of color; and at the same time the concrete of all colors; is it for these reasons that there is such a dumb blankness, full of meaning, in a wide landscape of snows- a colorless, all-color of atheism from which we shrink? And when we consider that other theory of the natural philosophers, that all other earthly hues — every stately or lovely emblazoning — the sweet tinges of sunset skies and woods; yea, and the gilded velvets of butterflies, and the butterfly cheeks of young girls; all these are but subtile deceits, not actually inherent in substances, but only laid on from without; so that all deified Nature absolutely paints like the harlot, whose allurements cover nothing but the charnel-house within; and when we proceed further, and consider that the mystical cosmetic which produces every one of her hues, the great principle of light, for ever remains white or colorless in itself, and if operating without medium upon matter, would touch all objects, even tulips and roses, with its own blank tinge — pondering all this, the palsied universe lies before us a leper; and like wilful travellers in Lapland, who refuse to wear colored and coloring glasses upon their eyes, so the wretched infidel gazes himself blind at the monumental white shroud that wraps all the prospect around him. And of all these things the Albino whale was the symbol. Wonder ye then at the fiery hunt?

She felt high, as if she had consumed some inappropriate and presumably illegal substance. She focused her gaze on the street lamp outside the window and sat still while her brain worked at top speed.

Black Girls… Strive to be a woman of substance! Don’t solely allow your big butt, thick thighs, wide hips, large breasts, and overall good looks to define you as a woman. Your looks alone shouldn’t define who you are. What more do you have to offer? What is your TRUE character? How is your attitude? What have you accomplished? Do you have respect for yourself? What do you represent? Everywhere you look, there’s another beautiful, stunning, fine looking sista. Stand out from the rest and dare to be different! Your good looks should only be a bonus, not the main factor. #RealTalk

Still, when I looked behind the faces of those around me, all I saw was insanity, unrest, and anguish; or suffering, fear, and loneliness; or boredom, or solitude, or rage and impotence - shit, what was there to be happy about? Some fun, right? I saw a few pretty girls, but they seemed ugly to me, and the men seemed stupid...What I wanted was to fade into the shadows. I wanted a sad world, a cold one - a world without hope, without substance, without light. That's how it was. I wanted to plunge to the bottom...Sometimes you just want to see the whole show fold - the sky fall. Anyway, this was my state of mind, and I hadn't drunk a drop.

The girl waved her hand to Hepzibah and Clifford, and went up the street; a religion in herself, warm, simple, true, with a substance that could walk on earth, and a spirit that was capable of heaven.

Like faith or hope, love isn't a substance we can take in our hands and hold out to someone and say 'look, I told you it was real.' It exists, purely within our own hearts. If anything, that makes it all the more powerful. If we could measure it, set it out on a platter for weighing, it make so many things easier.

You make out with a boy because he’s cute, but he has no substance, no words to offer you. His mouth tastes like stale beer and false promises. When he touches your chin, you offer your mouth up like a flower to to be plucked, all covered in red lipstick to attract his eye. When he reaches his hand down your shirt, he stops, hand on boob, and squeezes, like you’re a fruit he’s trying to juice. He doesn’t touch anything but skin, does not feel what’s within. In the morning, he texts you only to say, “I think I left the rest of my beer at your place, but it’s cool, you can drink it. Last night was fun.” You kiss a girl because she’s new. Because she’s different and you’re twenty two, trying something else out because it’s all failed before. After spending six weekends together, you call her, only to be answered by a harsh beep informing you that her number has been disconnected. You learn that success doesn’t come through experimenting with your sexuality, and you’re left with a mouth full of ruin and more evidence that you are out of tune. You fall for a boy who is so nice, you don’t think he can do any harm. When he mentions marriage and murder in the same sentence, you say, “Okay, okay, okay.” When you make a joke he does not laugh, but tilts his head and asks you how many drinks you’ve had in such a loving tone that you sober up immediately. He leaves bullet in your blood and disappears, saying, “Who wants a girl that’s filled with holes?” You find out that a med student does. He spots you reading in a bar and compliments you on the dust spilling from your mouth. When you see his black doctor’s bag posed loyally at his side, you ask him if he’s got the tools to fix a mangled nervous system. He smiles at you, all teeth, and tells you to come with him. In the back of his car, he covers you in teethmarks and says, “There, now don’t you feel whole again.” But all the incisions do is let more cold air into your bones. You wonder how many times you will collapse into ruins before you give up on rebuilding. You wonder if maybe you’d have more luck living amongst your rubble instead of looking for someone to repair it. The next time someone promises to flood you with light to erase your dark, you insist them you’re fine the way you are. They tell you there’s hope, that they had holes in their chest too, that they know how to patch them up. When they offer you a bottle in exchange for your mouth, you tell them you’re not looking for a way out. No, thank you, you tell them. Even though you are filled with ruins and rubble, you are as much your light as you are your dark.

Dear my strong girls, you will all go through that phase of life making a mistake of helping a toxic girl whose friendship with you turns into her self-interest. This kind of girls is a real burden towards the empowerment of other females as they can never get past their own insecurity and grow out of high-school-like drama. Despite how advanced we are in educating modern women, this type will still go through life living in identity crisis, endlessly looking for providers of any kind at the end of the day. They can never stand up for others or things that matter because they can't stand up for themselves. They care what everyone thinks only doing things to impress men, friends, strangers, everyone in society except themselves, while at the same time can't stand seeing other women with purpose get what those women want in life. But let me tell you, this is nothing new, let them compete and compare with you as much as they wish, be it your career, love or spirit. You know who you are and you will know who your true girls are by weeding out girls that break our girlie code of honor, but do me a favor by losing this type of people for good. Remind yourself to never waste time with a person who likes to betray others' trust, never. Disloyalty is a trait that can't be cured. Bless yourself that you see a person's true colors sooner than later. With love, your mama. XOXO

What seems like a tale from a simpler time turns out to be the product of a difficult and sometimes troubled life. What appears to be a sweet, light story of four girls growing up is also very much about how hard it was (and is) to come of age in a culture that prizes a woman’s appearance over her substance. And what may seem an idealized portrait of an intact home and family is also the story of a family in danger of being torn apart.

I am precisely the kind of nice upper-middle-class white girl whose relationship to substances has been treated as benign or pitiable - a cause for concern, or a shrug, rather than punishment. No one has ever called me a leper or a psychopath. No doctor has ever pointed a gun at me. No cop has ever shot me at an intersection while I was reaching for my wallet, for that matter, or even pulled me over for drunk driving, something I've done more times than I could count. My skin is the right color to permit my intoxication. When it comes to addiction, the abstraction of privilege is ultimately a question of what type of story gets told about your body: Do you need to be shielded from harm, or prevented from causing it? My body has been understood as something to be protected, rather than something to be protected from.

It showed a tiny baby girl floating in a clear glass vessel. The baby held a silver rose in one hand, a golden rose in the other. On its feet were tiny wings, and drops of red liquid showered down on the baby’s long black hair. Underneath the image was a label written in thick black ink indicating that it was a depiction of the philosophical child—an allegorical representation of a crucial step in creating the philosopher’s stone, the chemical substance that promised to make its owner healthy, wealthy, and wise. The colors were luminous and strikingly well preserved. Artists had once mixed crushed stone and gems into their paints to produce such powerful colors. And the image itself had been drawn by someone with real artistic skill. I had to sit on my hands to keep them from trying to learn more from a touch here and there.

I nod, then let the conversation drop. But secretly I'm wondering if Haymitch sobered up long enough to help Peeta and me because he thought we just might have the wits to survive. Maybe he wasn't always a drunk. Maybe, in the beginning, he tried to help the tributes. But then it got unbearable. It must be hell to mentor two kids and then watch them die. Year after year after year. I realize that if I get out of here, that will become my job. To mentor the girl from District 12. The idea is so repellent, I thrust it from my mind.

A person stops maturing at the age that they start abusing substances,

Any five-year-old girl – though boys would do – gave substance to her continued

Boy-meets-girl has always been an irreducible convention that occurs early in the telling, to be followed by the trials, tribulations, and triumphs of love.

she was suffering from “poisoning by a radioactive substance.

On the hearth, in front of a back-brand to give substance, blazed a fire of thorns, that crackled 'like the laughter of the fool.' Nineteen persons were gathered here. Of these, five women, wearing gowns of various bright hues, sat in chairs along the wall; girls shy and not shy filled the window-bench; four men, including Charley Jake the hedge-carpenter, Elijah New the parish-clerk, and John Pitcher, a neighboring dairyman, the shepherd's father-in-law, lolled in the settle; a young man and maid, who were blushing over tentative pourparlers on a life companionship, sat beneath the corner-cupboard; and an elderly engaged man of fifty or upward moved restlessly about from spots where his betrothed was not to the spot where she was. Enjoyment was pretty general, and so much the more prevailed in being unhampered by conventional restrictions. Absolute confidence in each other's good opinion begat perfect ease, while the finishing stroke of manner, amounting to a truly princely serenity, was lent to the majority by the absence of any expression or trait denoting that they wished to get on in the world, enlarge their minds, or do any eclipsing thing whatever - which nowadays so generally nips the bloom and bonhomie of all except the two extremes of the social scale. ("The Three Strangers")

I feel like there are fifty ways it's my fault. I fantasized. I took the big pill and the small pill, stuffed myself with substances to make being out in the world with people my own age a little bit easier. To lessen the space between me and everyone else. I was hungry to be seen. But I also know that at no moment did I consent to be handled that way. I never gave him permission to be rough, to stick himself inside me without a barrier between us. I never gave him permission. In my deepest self I know this, and the knowledge of it has kept me from sinking.

What is the age of the soul of man? As she hath the virtue of the chameleon to change her hue at every new approach, to be gay with the merry and mournful with the downcast, so too is her age changeable as her mood. No longer is Leopold, as he sits there, ruminating, chewing the cud of reminiscence, that staid agent of publicity and holder of a modest substance in the funds. He is young Leopold, as in a retrospective arrangement, a mirror within a mirror (hey, presto!), he beholdeth himself. That young figure of then is seen, precociously manly, walking on a nipping morning from the old house in Clambrassil street to the high school, his booksatchel on him bandolierwise, and in it a goodly hunk of wheaten loaf, a mother's thought. Or it is the same figure, a year or so gone over, in his first hard hat (ah, that was a day!), already on the road, a fullfledged traveller for the family firm, equipped with an orderbook, a scented handkerchief (not for show only), his case of bright trinketware (alas, a thing now of the past!), and a quiverful of compliant smiles for this or that halfwon housewife reckoning it out upon her fingertips or for a budding virgin shyly acknowledging (but the heart? tell me!) his studied baisemoins. The scent, the smile but more than these, the dark eyes and oleaginous address brought home at duskfall many a commission to the head of the firm seated with Jacob's pipe after like labours in the paternal ingle (a meal of noodles, you may be sure, is aheating), reading through round horned spectacles some paper from the Europe of a month before. But hey, presto, the mirror is breathed on and the young knighterrant recedes, shrivels, to a tiny speck within the mist. Now he is himself paternal and these about him might be his sons. Who can say? The wise father knows his own child. He thinks of a drizzling night in Hatch street, hard by the bonded stores there, the first. Together (she is a poor waif, a child of shame, yours and mine and of all for a bare shilling and her luckpenny), together they hear the heavy tread of the watch as two raincaped shadows pass the new royal university. Bridie! Bridie Kelly! He will never forget the name, ever remember the night, first night, the bridenight. They are entwined in nethermost darkness, the willer and the willed, and in an instant (fiat!) light shall flood the world. Did heart leap to heart? Nay, fair reader. In a breath 'twas done but - hold! Back! It must not be! In terror the poor girl flees away through the murk. She is the bride of darkness, a daughter of night. She dare not bear the sunnygolden babe of day. No, Leopold! Name and memory solace thee not. That youthful illusion of thy strength was taken from thee and in vain. No son of thy loins is by thee. There is none to be for Leopold, what Leopold was for Rudolph.

I had before me an object lesson, I thought: two ways to face the world. One way as embodied by this old woman—simple, unassuming, a kind of peasant dignity, a naturalness inherent in her every move. The other, exemplified by the girl—smartness, sophistication, veneer without substance. I was conscious that I have now opted for the old woman’s way, have thrown in my lot with a creature I would have jeered at a year ago. My present trip to the mountains is indeed a trip to that wellspring of naturalness she symbolized. And I admired my choice: the correct choice, the only choice for a sensitive and moral man in my dilemma.

The very same substance, yet destined to have completely different effects on me. The same illness can evolve; and a sweet poison comes to be less tolerated when, with the years, the heart’s resistance has weakened.

An understanding of classical music - something adults say they wish they knew more about but don't - gives a girl weight in a world that wants her to be weightless, gives her substance in a culture that asks her to be insubstantial.

Books are more than just a prop to pose around with when you're trying to convince people you've got a bit of substance. Books are an escape route. A refuge. They can be a connection to a stranger, someone you've never met, who writes something that you hadn't considered anyone in the world to have felt but you. When you grow up feeling too big for a place, and you make that kind of connection with a book, it’s like a link; it’s a tunnel to the outside world. A glimmer of something beyond.

I want to grab her and confess that I'm an unbeliever. That being on that machine makes me feel like I'm running in some sucking substance worse than mud. I can find no foothold, no traction. That I feel out of control, inches from the lip of the abyss. That while we've been sitting here, there's this angry, hungry maw in me that is fathoms deep. But even though Ruth's only a hair thinner than I am, she's way on the other side of the fat girl spectrum, looking at me from the safe, slightly smug distance of her own control and conviction.

Uneasy Rider" Falling in love with a mustache is like saying you can fall in love with the way a man polishes his shoes which, of course, is one of the things that turns on my tuned-up engine those trim buckled boots (I feel like an advertisement for men’s fashions when I think of your ankles) Yeats was hung up with a girl’s beautiful face and I find myself a bad moralist, a failing aesthetician, a sad poet, wanting to touch your arms and feel the muscles that make a man’s body have so much substance, that makes a woman lean and yearn in that direction that makes her melt/ she is a rainy day in your presence the pool of wax under a burning candle the foam from a waterfall You are more beautiful than any Harley-Davidson She is the rain, waits in it for you, finds blood spotting her legs from the long ride.

I was doing my little stand-up shtick, the one I did for pretty girls, so they’d like me quickly and wouldn’t try too hard to actually get to know me beyond my role as wisecracking Cameron the orphan. Maybe it was a little like flirting, but also a kind of protection: Don’t get too close; I’m just jokes without substance.

Our furthest-reaching resolutions are always made in a short-lived state of mind. I could barely conceive that the strange substance inhering in Gilberte, and radiating from her parents and the house where she lived, making me feel indifferent to everything else, could detach itself from her person and migrate into another.

Poling says your feet they will crack and the germs they will have the field day, Hattie So she obliges, even though the body makes its own oil, if you allow the pores to breathe Although try telling that to the women in her family who slather themselves in unguents and other toxic substances in the name of beauty Then wonder why they get cancer

When describing both the act of defecating and the substance of fecal matter itself, biologists prefer to use the scientific term "poop." It's both a noun and a verb. A popular field of biology called scatology is the study of scat, which is not to be confused with mere poop. Although technically they're the same, we call it "scat" if we are studying it to learn something about the health and diet of an animal. When the animal has pooped on us or has ruined something with his pooping, we tend to use the term "shit," as in, "Oh, man, he just shit down the back of my neck." So if it's on the ground, it's poop. If it's under your microscope, it's scat. If it's running down your neck, it's shit.

LEVELS OF EMOTIONAL FUNCTIONING IN BORDERLINE PERSONALITY 1. Depressed, bored, and lonely 2. Angry, controlling, paranoid, and manipulative behaviors in response to anticipated loss of attachment 3. Nihilistic dissociation and raging fights, often fueled by the disinhibiting effects of alcohol or substance abuse —JOHN GUNDERSON, Borderline Personality Disorder: A Clinical Guide

I am sure, sir, I should never mistake informality for insolence: one I rather like, the other nothing free-born would submit to, even for a salary.” “Humbug!  Most things free-born will submit to anything for a salary; therefore, keep to yourself, and don’t venture on generalities of which you are intensely ignorant.  However, I mentally shake hands with you for your answer, despite its inaccuracy; and as much for the manner in which it was said, as for the substance of the speech; the manner was frank and sincere; one does not often see such a manner: no, on the contrary, affectation, or coldness, or stupid, coarse-minded misapprehension of one’s meaning are the usual rewards of candour.  Not three in three thousand raw school-girl-governesses would have answered me as you have just done.  But I don’t mean to flatter you: if you are cast in a different mould to the majority, it is no merit of yours: Nature did it.  And then, after all, I go too fast in my conclusions: for what I yet know, you may be no better than the rest; you may have intolerable defects to counterbalance your few good points.” “And so may you,” I thought.  My eye met his as the idea crossed my mind: he seemed to read the glance, answering as if its import had been spoken as well as imagined— “Yes, yes, you are right,” said he; “I have plenty of faults of my own: I know it, and I don’t wish to palliate them, I assure you. 

The girl had a special way of saying “anything”. The gods had blessed her voice with a special monopoly. It delivered an acoustic chocolate that was laced with all flavours of euphoria. The substance led to surges in testosterone in all types of men, including the average botanist. “Anything.” The way she handled the word endowed it with so many possibilities. Professor Khupe decided to investigate how many of these Ketiwe would let him explore. To his delight the parameters of the word had proven to be quite elastic.

In the beginning, there was the Bog. And the Bog covered the world and the Bog was the world and the world was the Bog. But the Bog was lonely. It wanted a world. It wanted eyes with which to see the world. It wanted a strong back with which to carry itself from place to place. It wanted legs to walk and hands to touch and a mouth that could sing. And so the Bog was a Beast and the Beast was the Bog. And then the Beast sang the world into being. And the world and the Beast and the Bog were all of one substance, and they were bound by infinite love.

I write about the social and personal drama in the lives of familiar people who struggle for survival of self in hostile environments. My books expresses a special concern with exploring the oppression's, the insanity, the loyalties and the triumphs of black women is necessary to remind everyone to be fearless in their struggle for survival of self! To Dance With Ugly People IS the next blockbuster in the genre of For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide / When the Rainbow Is Enuf, Precious, and The Color Purple with a splash of Waiting to Exhale!

Negative body image in adolescent girls is of growing concern in the modern society. As girls go through puberty, their bodies gain adipose and move farther away from the thin childish appearance. You simply need to take a look at a fashion magazine to see how the fake ideal feminine body represented in it is often asexual and childlike. Such a medium influences the girls and causes them to become dissatisfied with their natural appearance. And this leads to depression. Importantly, depression is a significant risk factor for substance abuse and suicide attempts.

Once upon a time there was a child who had a golden brain. His parents only discovered this by chance when he injured his head and gold instead of blood flowed out. They then began to look after him carefully and would not let him play with other children for fear of being robbed. When the boy was grown up and wanted to go out into the world, his mother said: “We have done so much for you,we ought to be able to share your wealth.” Then her son took a large piece of gold out of his brain and gave it to his mother. He lived in great style with a friend who, however, robbed him one night and ran away. After that the man resolved to guard his secret and to go out to work, because his reserves were visibly dwindling. One day he fell in love with a beautiful girl who loved him too, but no more than the beautiful clothes he gave her so lavishly. He married her and was very happy, but after two years she died and he spent the rest of his wealth on her funeral, which had to be splendid. Once, as he was creeping through the streets,weak,poor, and unhappy, he saw a beautiful little pair of boots that would have been perfect for his wife. He forgot that she was dead- perhaps because his emptied brain no longer worked- and entered the shop to buy the boots. But in that very moment he fell, and the shopkeeper saw a dead man lying on the ground. This story sounds as though it were invented, but it is true from beginning to end. There are people who have to pay for the smallest things in life with their very substance and their spinal cord. That is a constantly recurring pain, and then when they are tired of suffering… Does not mother love belong to the ‘smallest’, but also indispensable, things in life, for which many people paradoxically have to pay by giving up their living selves?

Be a kid of honesty. Wave it like a banner for all to see. Also, while I’m thinking about it—be a kid who loves surprises. Squeal with delight over puppies and cupcakes and birthday parties. Be curious, but content. Be loyal, but independent. Be kind. To everyone. Treat every day like you’re making waffles. Don’t settle for the first guy (or girl) unless he’s the right guy (or girl). Live your effing life. Do so with gusto, because my God, there’s nothing sorrier than a gusto-less existence. Know yourself. Love yourself. Be a good friend. Be a kid of hope and substance. Be a kid of appetite, Iz. You know what I mean, don’t you? ==========

...when we talk about curing addiction in secular culture, it's predicated on this capitalist idea of a self-regulating subject, someone who, if left to their own devices, could control their own behavior and decisions. Denise talked about how indigenous communities where people are more heavily connected to one another and dependent on the community to regulate their bodies and behaviors (rather than being alienated like white and/or capitalist communities and just having to do self-regulation) often have different relationships to substances and addiction, but that when those same communities become colonized and people start having more alienated capitalist first-world lives, addiction problems suddenly spring up.

Friendship is not merely devoid of virtue, like conversation, it is fatal to us as well. For the sense of boredom which those of us whose law of development is purely internal cannot help but feel in a friend’s company (when, that is to say, we must remain on the surface of ourselves, instead of pursuing our voyage of discovery into the depths)—that first impression of boredom our friendship impels us to correct when we are alone again, to recall with emotion the words which our friend said to us, to look upon them as a valuable addition to our substance, when the fact is that we are not like buildings to which stones can be added from without, but like trees which draw from their own sap the next knot that will appear on their trunks, the spreading roof of their foliage.

this reaction. This was on college campuses, exactly the kind of environment where I had expected curiosity, lively debate, and, yes, the thrill and energy of like-minded activists. Instead almost every campus audience I encountered bristled with anger and protest. I was accustomed to radical Muslim students from my experience as an activist and a politician in Holland. Any time I made a public speech, they would swarm to it in order to shout at me and rant in broken Dutch, in sentences so fractured you wondered how they qualified as students at all. On college campuses in the United States and Canada, by contrast, young and highly articulate people from the Muslim student associations would simply take over the debate. They would send e-mails of protest to the organizers beforehand, such as one (sent by a divinity student at Harvard) that protested that I did not “address anything of substance that actually affects Muslim women’s lives” and that I merely wanted to “trash” Islam. They would stick up posters and hand out pamphlets at the auditorium. Before I’d even stopped speaking they’d be lining up for the microphone, elbowing away all non-Muslims. They spoke in perfect English; they were mostly very well-mannered; and they appeared far better assimilated than their European immigrant counterparts. There were far fewer bearded young men in robes short enough to show their ankles, aping the tradition that says the Prophet’s companions dressed this way out of humility, and fewer girls in hideous black veils. In the United States a radical Muslim student might have a little goatee; a girl may wear a light, attractive headscarf. Their whole demeanor was far less threatening, but they were omnipresent. Some of them would begin by saying how sorry they were for all my terrible suffering, but they would then add that these so-called traumas of mine were aberrant, a “cultural thing,” nothing to do with Islam. In blaming Islam for the oppression of women, they said, I was vilifying them personally, as Muslims. I had failed to understand that Islam is a religion of peace, that the Prophet treated women very well. Several times I was informed that attacking Islam only serves the purpose of something called “colonial feminism,” which in itself was allegedly a pretext for the war on terror and the evil designs of the U.S. government. I was invited to one college to speak as part of a series of

Why haven’t you told me that story before?” Simon paused, as if trying to decide how best to explain. “I don’t know . . . maybe because you and I don’t talk about those kinds of things. You’re the guy I talk to about a fun, random hookup. Or about some hot girl whose number I got while waiting in line at the deli on my lunch break. I guess I just didn’t think you’d understand something that’s not so, you know, shallow.” Vaughn blinked. No offense taken. Simon quickly backtracked. “I mean, not that I think you are shallow. Just that, well, lately, none of your relationships with women have had much substance, you know? And that’s cool; that’s your perspective—hey, I used to be in that place myself.” “Before you left and went to the deeper place.” Vaughn pretended to think about that. “Question: can I still hang out with you, now that you’re in this deeper place? Obviously, I’m used to the shallower stuff, but maybe I can wear a pair of water wings, or hold onto one of those pool noodles or something.” “I’m going to be getting shit for the ‘shallow’ comment for a while, aren’t I?

It is a hot summer day in Tennessee in the midst of the sixth decade of this century. The girl has climbed the fence to get to the swimming hole she has visited so many summers of her life in the time before this part of the land was enclosed. She stands now at the edge of it. Her body is sticky with heat. The surface of the water moves slightly. Sunlight shimmers and dances in a green reflection that seems as she stares at it to pull her in even before her skin is wet with it. Drops of water on the infant’s head. All the body immersed for baptism. Do these images come to her as she sinks into the coolness? The washing of hands before Sunday’s midday meal. All our sins washed away. Water was once the element for purification. But at the bottom of this pool, There is no telling what is there now. This is what the girl’s father will say to her finally: corroded cans of chemical waste, some radioactive substances. That was why they put the fence there. She is not thinking of that now. The words have not yet been said, and so for her no trouble exists here. The water holds up her body. She is weightless in this fulsome element, the waves her body makes embracing her with their own benediction. Beneath her in the shadowy green, she feels the depth of the pond. In this coolness as the heat mercifully abates, her mind is set free, to dream as the water dreams.

A couple of years ago, I was driving in Cincinnati with Usha, when somebody cut me off. I honked, the guy flipped me off, and when we stopped at a red light (with this guy in front of me), I unbuckled my seat belt and opened the car door. I planned to demand an apology (and fight the guy if necessary), but my common sense prevailed and I shut the door before I got out of the car. Usha was delighted that I’d changed my mind before she yelled at me to stop acting like a lunatic (which has happened in the past), and she told me that she was proud of me for resisting my natural instinct. The other driver’s sin was to insult my honor, and it was on that honor that nearly every element of my happiness depended as a child—it kept the school bully from messing with me, connected me to my mother when some man or his children insulted her (even if I agreed with the substance of the insult), and gave me something, however small, over which I exercised complete control. For the first eighteen or so years of my life, standing down would have earned me a verbal lashing as a “pussy” or a “wimp” or a “girl.” The objectively correct course of action was something that the majority of my life had taught me was repulsive to an upstanding young man. For a few hours after I did the right thing, I silently criticized myself. But that’s progress, right? Better that than sitting in a jail cell for teaching that asshole a lesson about defensive driving.

The reason for which a work of genius is not easily admired from the first is that the man who has created it is extraordinary, that few other men resemble him. It was Beethoven’s Quartets themselves (the Twelfth, Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth) that devoted half a century to forming, fashioning and enlarging a public for Beethoven’s Quartets, marking in this way, like every great work of art, an advance if not in artistic merit at least in intellectual society, largely composed to-day of what was not to be found when the work first appeared, that is to say of persons capable of enjoying it. What artists call posterity is the posterity of the work of art. It is essential that the work (leaving out of account, for brevity’s sake, the contingency that several men of genius may at the same time be working along parallel lines to create a more instructed public in the future, a public from which other men of genius shall reap the benefit) shall create its own posterity. For if the work were held in reserve, were revealed only to posterity, that audience, for that particular work, would be not posterity but a group of contemporaries who were merely living half-a-century later in time. And so it is essential that the artist (and this is what Vinteuil had done), if he wishes his work to be free to follow its own course, shall launch it, wherever he may find sufficient depth, confidently outward bound towards the future. And yet this interval of time, the true perspective in which to behold a work of art, if leaving it out of account is the mistake made by bad judges, taking it into account is at times a dangerous precaution of the good. No doubt one can easily imagine, by an illusion similar to that which makes everything on the horizon appear equidistant, that all the revolutions which have hitherto occurred in painting or in music did at least shew respect for certain rules, whereas that which immediately confronts us, be it impressionism, a striving after discord, an exclusive use of the Chinese scale, cubism, futurism or what you will, differs outrageously from all that have occurred before. Simply because those that have occurred before we are apt to regard as a whole, forgetting that a long process of assimilation has melted them into a continuous substance, varied of course but, taking it as a whole, homogeneous, in which Hugo blends with Molière. Let us try to imagine the shocking incoherence that we should find, if we did not take into account the future, and the changes that it must bring about, in a horoscope of our own riper years, drawn and presented to us in our youth. Only horoscopes are not always accurate, and the necessity, when judging a work of art, of including the temporal factor in the sum total of its beauty introduces, to our way of thinking, something as hazardous, and consequently as barren of interest, as every prophecy the non-fulfillment of which will not at all imply any inadequacy on the prophet’s part, for the power to summon possibilities into existence or to exclude them from it is not necessarily within the competence of genius; one may have had genius and yet not have believed in the future of railways or of flight, or, although a brilliant psychologist, in the infidelity of a mistress or of a friend whose treachery persons far less gifted would have foreseen.

Lila who has connected, is connecting, our personal knowledge of poverty and abuse to the armed struggle against the fascists, against the owners, against capital. I admit it here, openly, for the first time: in those September days I suspected that not only Pasquale—Pasquale driven by his history toward the necessity of taking up arms—not only Nadia, but Lila herself had spilled that blood. For a long time, while I cooked, while I took care of my daughters, I saw her, with the other two, shoot Gino, shoot Filippo, shoot Bruno Soccavo. And if I had trouble imagining Pasquale and Nadia in every detail—I considered him a good boy, something of a braggart, capable of fierce fighting but of murder no; she seemed to me a respectable girl who could wound at most with verbal treachery—about Lila I had never had doubts: she would know how to devise the most effective plan, she would reduce the risks to a minimum, she would keep fear under control, she would be able to give murderous intentions an abstract purity, she knew how to remove human substance from bodies and blood, she would have no scruples and no remorse, she would kill and feel that she was in the right. So there she was, clear and bright, along with the shadow of Pasquale, of Nadia, of who knows what others. They drove through the piazza in a car and, slowing down in front of the pharmacy, fired at Gino, at his thug’s body in the white smock. Or they drove along the dusty road to the Soccavo factory, garbage of every type piled up on either side. Pasquale went through the gate, shot Filippo’s legs, the blood spread through the guard booth, screams, terrified eyes. Lila, who knew the way well, crossed the courtyard, entered the factory, climbed the stairs, burst into Bruno’s office, and, just as he said cheerfully: Hi, what in the world are you doing around here, fired three shots at his chest and one at his face. Ah yes, militant anti-fascism, new resistance, proletarian justice, and other formulas to which she, who instinctively knew how to avoid rehashing clichés, was surely able to give depth. I imagined that those actions were necessary in order to join, I don’t know, the Red Brigades, Prima Linea, Nuclei Armati Proletari. Lila would disappear from the neighborhood as Pasquale had. Maybe that’s why she had tried to leave Gennaro with me, apparently for a month, in reality intending to give him to me forever. We would never see each other again. Or she would be arrested, like the leaders

I tell Jack by accident. We’re talking on the phone about unprotected sex, how it isn’t good for people with our particular temperament, our anxiety like an incorrigible weed. He asks if I’ve had any sex that was “really stressful,” and out the story comes, before I can even consider how to share it. Jack is upset. Angry, though not at me. I’m crying, even though I don’t want to. It’s not cathartic, or helping me prove my point. I still make joke after joke, but my tears are betraying me, making me appear clear about my pain when I’m not. Jack is in Belgium. It’s late there, he’s so tired, and I’d rather not be having this conversation this way. “It isn’t your fault,” he tells me, thinking it’s what I need to hear. “There’s no version of this where it’s your fault.” I feel like there are fifty ways it’s my fault. I fantasized. I took the big pill and the small pill, stuffed myself with substances to make being out in the world with people my own age a little bit easier. To lessen the space between me and everyone else. I was hungry to be seen. But I also know that at no moment did I consent to being handled that way. I never gave him permission to be rough, to stick himself inside me without a barrier between us. I never gave him permission. In my deepest self I know this, and the knowledge of it has kept me from sinking. I curl up against the wall, wishing I hadn’t told him. “I love you so much,” he says. “I’m so sorry that happened.” Then his voice changes, from pity to something sharper. “I have to tell you something, and I hope you’ll understand.” “Yes?” I squeak. “I can’t wait to fuck you. I hope you know why I’m saying that. Because nothing’s changed. I’m planning how I’m going to do it.” “You’re going to do it?” “All different ways.” I cry harder. “You better.” I have to go put on a denim vest for a promotional appearance at Levi’s Haus of Strauss. I tell Jack I have to hang up now, and he moans “No” like I’m a babysitter wrenching him from the arms of his mother who is all dressed up for a party. He’s sleepy now. I can hear it. Emotions are exhausting to have. “I love you so much,” I tell him, tearing up all over again. I hang up and go to the mirror, prepared to see eyeliner dripping down my face, tracks through my blush and foundation. I’m in LA, so bring it on, universe: I can only expect to go down Lohan style. But I’m surprised to find that my face is intact, dewy even. Makeup is all where it ought to be. I look all right. I look like myself.

Long ago there was a little boy who lived in the wood with his father and his sister. One night, the three of them were out collecting firewood when they heard a low, delicate whimper. The father realised it was an injured animal and ordered the children to fetch water from the lake, whilst he followed the sound. Hours past but the father did not return. The children became fearful for their father’s safety and in their moment of fright, they disobeyed their father in order to find him. And find him they did. However, he was no longer the man he once was. Both his eyes were slit through their centre, oozing blood down the paleness of his face. His neck had been torn open. The entirety of his midsection was split but nothing, not one, single organ, seemed to be left within. Each limb still remained, however they had been dragged, with some exceptional force, in the opposite direction to which they were designed. The children screamed and ran, though the image of their father’s mangled corpse seemed to chase after them. They slept. Within the whisper of the wind came the sweet tune of a woman’s song. The little girl awoke to the feeling of happiness, security and motherly love that the song carried with it. She needed to find the woman it had come from. Leaving her brother, she took off into the wood to try and find the singer. The little boy quickly entered into a spit of panic when he found his sister missing. He didn’t know whether he should call out for her, look for her or wait. But waiting could mean the worst, he thought, and so he took off into the woods after her. He had searched everywhere, every dark corner and decrepit tree, before reaching the lake. The moon reflected off its black surface, which drew his attention to something bobbing within the ripples. It was a leg. When he caught sight of the foot, the boy fell to his knees. He recognised the shoe. It was his sister’s shoe; his sister’s leg. Soon enough, the other body parts came drifting to join the leg, forming a rough manifestation of what was once his sister’s living body. Firstly, there was a head facing down in the water, then arms seemingly blue under the moonlight, and lastly a torso coated in her favourite dress. He felt sick, lost, terrified to his very core. Just as thoughts of never being whole again began to pain his chest, the boy heard the snapping of a twig behind him. He dared to turn around but all he found was a small, black-furred wolf. The wolf approached him timidly, whining deep in its throat to say to the boy that he too was lonely and afraid. The boy put out his hand for the wolf to join him and they sat together. Perhaps he would be OK. Perhaps all that had happened had led to this; something new. He rustled the fur of his new friend, starting with its back then its ear before going under its snout. His hand touched something wet and sticky. He drew it from the wolf to get a better look, only to find a crimson substance now clinging to his small hands. Blood. The wolf turned on the boy as its eyes became a pale blue before thwack! He tore the boy’s face from his head…

When describing both the act of defecating and the substance of fecal matter itself, biologists prefer to use the scientific term “poop.” It’s both a noun and a verb. A popular field of biology called scatology is the study of scat, which is not to be confused with mere poop. Although technically they’re the same, we call it “scat” if we are studying it to learn something about the health and diet of an animal. When the animal has pooped on us or has ruined something with his pooping, we tend to use the term “shit,” as in, “Oh, man, he just shit down the back of my neck.” So if it’s on the ground, it’s poop. If it’s under your microscope, it’s scat. If it’s running down your neck, it’s shit.

The incubi had sensed great power in her, and believed she could destroy them, but if she could speak their language, she’d tell them they had the wrong girl. Mari was what was known as an underachiever, which even an underachiever knew was sociology code for “overfailer.” She was famous in the Lore for the simple fact that one day she might be worth being famous. All hype—no substance. That was Mari. Everyone in the covens expected her to do something epic and always kept an eye on her. They wanted her to be worth “awaiting.” Even other factions in the Lore monitored her with anticipation because, while most witches possessed the strength of one, two, or very rarely, three of the five castes of witches, Mari was the only witch ever to possess the strengths of all of them. In theory, Mari was a witch warrior, healer, conjurer, seeress, and an enchantress. In reality, Mari had lost her college scholarship, couldn’t manage even the simplest spells, and kept blowing things up. She couldn’t even balance her checkbook.

I think maybe they come out into the grounds in nightwear. But no, in typical anorexic stype they have read the fashion magazines literally. This is their version of thin girls in strappy clothes. The girl in the petticoat talks to me, as Emma has done on occsasion, in a rather grand style, as if she is a 'lady' of some substance and I a visiting guest. Do they chat much about clothes? I ask Emma in the car. She shakes her head. So, does she, Emma, see the difference between underwear or nightwear and 'going out' clothes? 'Yes,' she says, her voices strained again. 'But it's one of the things you don't know properly when you're ill and confused. You see these pictures and the people in the magazines are real for you.

You Are My Spring Joy Where does life seek eternity? Not in daily struggles or toil, but in that endearing destiny, Where thoughts, pursuits, likings all merge to create a happy existence, Where happiness leaps from every act and every substance. Just like spring flowers that spread joy, To all alike: a woman, a man, a little girl and a young boy, They live for moments very brief, Yet they always manage to delight the heart immersed in grief. They last for a day or moments few, With a promise that next year they shall bloom anew, Leaving behind sweet memories and hopes profound, And even in a moment of existence they live in eternity that time’s snares can not confound. Similarly my love Irma, your smiles, your beauty nourish my existence, You, your love, your endless beauty are what I need for sustenance, My eternity lies in you, and only you, Eternity will be virtueless if it is not spent thinking about you and loving you. I seek thee with all my senses and my mind and heart, From me the reflections of your beauty never depart, And I lie wrapped in them day and night, Without the glimpse of your beautiful smile I cannot establish the brightness in any form of light. Perhaps someday the sun may not rise, And the Moon may not shine , to me it shall be no surprise, But for me living without loving you is not possible, As for the Moon to shine without the Sun is impossible. So let us be like the Sun and the moonshine, Where both exist to create the life giving sunshine and the romantic moonshine, You be a daffodil, winter jasmine, iris, primrose and be merry and always sing, And I promise, I will always be the unfailing Spring, just your Spring!

An understanding of classical music—something adults say they wish they knew more about but don’t—gives a girl weight in a world that wants her to be weightless, gives her substance in a culture that asks her to be insubstantial.

Even the form of a great act of repentance like this one does have something ridiculous about it. Oh, don't believe that you won't prevail!' he exclaimed almost in ecstasy. 'Even this form will prevail' (he pointed at the pages) 'if only you will sincerely accept being slapped and spat upon. The end result has always been that the most shameful cross becomes a great glory and a great power, if the great deed has been sincerely humble. Perhaps you will find consolation even in your lifetime!' 'And so, what you find ridiculous is just in the form, in the style?' 'And in the substance. The ugliness will kill it,' Tikhon whispered, lowering his eyes. 'What's that? Ugliness? Where's the ugliness?' 'Of the crime. There are crimes that are truly ugly. In crimes, of whatever kind, the more blood and horror there is, the more appealing they are, or, so to speak, picturesque. But there are shameful crimes, disgraceful ones that transcend any horror, so to speak, even too inelegant, actually...' Tikhon, did not finish speaking. 'In other words,' an agitated Stavrogin picked up his thought, 'you find that I cut a highly ridiculous figure when I kissed the foot of the dirty little girl... and everything I said about my temperament, and... well, and everything else... I understand. I understand you very well. And you despair of me precisely because it's not pretty, its disgusting - no, not so much disgusting as shameful and ridiculous, and you think that's what I wont be able to bear most of all?

Mothers not only pass the harms of endocrine-disrupting chemicals on to their fetuses but on to even more distant generations. When a mother is exposed to EDCs, so too are her fetus's germ cells, which develop into eggs or sperm. "It's thought that during that exposure, the chemical can target those germ cells and do what we call reprogramming, or making epigenetic changes," says Flaws. "That can be a permanent change that gets carried through generations, because those germ cells will eventually be used to make the next generation, and those fetuses will have abnormal germ cells that would then go on to make the next generation." In the mid-20th century, scientists documented this in women who took a synthetic form of estrogen, called diethylstilbestrol or DES, to prevent miscarriages.? The drug worked as intended, and the women gave birth to healthy babies. But once some of those children hit puberty, the girls developed vaginal and breast cancer. The boys developed testicular cancer, and some suffered abnormal development of the penis. Scientists called them DES daughters and sons. "When those DES daughters and sons had children, we now have DES granddaughters and grandsons, and a lot of them have increased risk of those same cancers and reproductive problems," says Flaws. "Even though it was their great-grandmother that took DES and they don't have any DES in their system-their germ cells have been reprogramming, and they're passing down some of these disease traits." And now toxicologists are gathering evidence that mothers are passing microplastics and nanoplastics complete with EDCs and other toxic substances- to their fetuses. In 2021, scientists announced that they'd found microplastics in human placentas for the first time, both on the fetal side and maternal side.Later that year, another team of researchers found the same, and they also tested meconium-a newborn's first feces and discovered microplastic there too. Children are consuming microplastics, then, before they're even born.

Half-way into the stuck substance of sky clay-white dome of the day-moon pokes... Unkempt and in rags as I am my girl's dressed all in dots: in skirts and flowery blouses I spin her round and tie bows in little doll shoes to match her tails asking even dogs how she looks— stupidly, doting on her…. By amber candlelit warmth, I played cards in your sisters’ ambience: it was like you said: the warmth of their smiles charmed me, their enfolding talk, and eyes that wink…. A field of grass lay half-way between boughs and the sky I contemplate the clouds… solid and amassed, clouds topple on top of clouds clouds up into peaks culminate and yet are only clouds dissolving to a shroud and shadow in the sky…. Shh!— past sapling fleets and swift trunks she sprints quickly on feet and calves and finds me where I lounge, painting clouds— in her glass head radiant eyes like blue-glass shine blushing color bleeds lustrous through her cheeks to hover and float, floating just beneath the skin…. On my second helping of leek- and-potato stew, ladled like melting goo in my bowl— I watched you, bobbing, in the solving resolve of their womb-like steadiness, cooing and aspiring…. Insulating sun lushens in the grass— already afternoon shadows long out…. Root-grip to root-grip ahead I mark twists in the trail by way of the young-girl bulbs of her legs the deep churning spread of her waist swimming in my head and in my head quietly drowning…. Harvest-time’s swelling our baskets— spring in the fruiting grove… with her mouth stained red in seeded-berries and those cheeks just-flushed in blood, I'll pounce high on that raised bounce of her waist….

On Writing The most important is that the writer’s original perception of a character or characters may be as erroneous as the readers. Running a close second was the realization that stopping a piece of work just because it’s hard, either emotionally or imaginatively is a bad idea. Sometimes you have to go on when you don’t feel like it, and sometimes you’re doing god work when it feels like all you’re managing is to shovel shit from a sitting position. The idea that creative endeavor and mind-altering substances are entwined is one of the great pop-intellectual myths of our time. Four twentieth century writers; Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Sherwood Anderson and the poet Dylan Thomas. They are the writers who largely formed our vision of an existential English speaking wasteland where people have been cut off from one another and live in an atmosphere of strangulation and despair. These concepts are very familiar to most alcoholics; the common reaction to them is amusement. Substance abusing writers are just substance abusers - common garden variety drunks and druggies, in other words. Any claims that the drugs and alcohol are necessary to dull a finer sensibility are just the usual self-serving bullshit…. for an addict, the right to the drink or drug of choice must be preserved at all costs. Hemingway and Fitzgerald didn’t drink because they were creative, alienated, or morally weak. They drank because that’s what alkies are wired up to do. Creative people probably do run a greater risk of alcoholism and addiction than those in some other jubs, but so what? We all look pretty much the same when we’re puking in the gutter. You can approach the act of writing with nervousness, excitement, hopefulness, or even despair - the sense that you can never completely put on the pages what’s in your mind and heart. You can come to the act with fists clenched and your eyes narrowed, ready to kick ass and take names. You can come to it because you want a girl to marry you, or because you want to change the world. Come to it any way but lightly. Let me say it again, you must not come lightly to the blank page. I am not asking you to come reverently or unquestioningly; I’m not asking you to be politically correct or to cast aside your sense of humor (please God you have one). This isn’t a popularity contest, it isn’t the moral olympics and it’s not church. But it’s writing, damn it, not washing the car. If you take it seriously, we can do business. If you can’t or won’t, it’s time for you to close the book and do something else.

I told you I don't want to meet 'girls' and I'm not going to find a woman of any substance at the bars where you yahoos hang out." "Then set up one of those online dating accounts. They have them for older folks now." "Older folks?" Rohn let out a snort as that hit him hard, like a punch to the gut. "Great. Thanks a lot." How the hell old did these kids think he was, anyway? Rohn had quite a few years left before he turned fifty....

Somewhere," he told her, "somewhere else lived a boy and a girl beside the sea and as they grew older they grew more transparent. At first blue blood vessels and then bones bloomed beneath the skin but soon they could see the shapes of the world behind their bodies, the shudder of leaves like shadows in the brain, a butterfly's flutter in the mutter of the heart, beetles in the coils of the bowels. They watched wine whirl down each other's throats and the sun rise up each other's spines, stepping vertically vertebra to vertebra. Soon the only substance they obtained was when their bodies overlapped and so they clasped each other, peering for the vestiges of eyes, teeth, ears, smears against the landscape. And one day they kissed and disappeared.

He was never his own best friend, Alexander. On the battlefield, he was solid, calm, and brave, but afterwards, he was like a boy after his first girl-all bragging and no substance. How could the god become so very human?

The cut was only the beginning. With Goldi acting as art director, a couple of girls in pink smocks swooped in and painstakingly separated strands of his hair and painted them with a noxious substance. Then they carefully encased the locks in foil so he resembled a Star Trek extra. He was placed in a chair where—no lie—they lowered a plastic dome over his head and set it on Bake. Under the plastic dryer-dome, Bo sat there like an abductee and pondered what else his captors had in mind. He wondered when they were going to bring out the probe.

Once upon a time there was a child who had a golden brain. His parents only discovered this by chance when he injured his head and gold instead of blood flowed out. They then began to look after him carefully and would not let him play with other children for fear of being robbed. When the boy was grown up and wanted to go out into the world, his mother said: “We have done so much for you,we ought to be able to share your wealth.” Then her son took a large piece of gold out of his brain and gave it to his mother. He lived in great style with a friend who, however, robbed him one night and ran away. After that the man resolved to guard his secret and to go out to work, because his reserves were visibly dwindling. One day he fell in love with a beautiful girl who loved him too, but no more than the beautiful clothes he gave her so lavishly. He married her and was very happy, but after two years she died and he spent the rest of his wealth on her funeral, which had to be splendid. Once, as he was creeping through the streets,weak,poor, and unhappy, he saw a beautiful little pair of boots that would have been perfect for his wife. He forgot that she was dead- perhaps because his emptied brain no longer worked- and entered the shop to buy the boots. But in that very moment he fell, and the shopkeeper saw a dead man lying on the ground. Daudet, who was to die from an illness of the spinal cord, wrote following this story: This story sounds as though it were invented, but it is true from beginning to end. There are people who have to pay for the smallest things in life with their very substance and their spinal cord. That is a constantly recurring pain, and then when they are tired of suffering… Does not mother love belong to the ‘smallest’, but also indispensable, things in life, for which many people paradoxically have to pay by giving up their living selves?

I felt like I’d mixed two lethal substances together and I had no idea how to cope with the aftermath.

To listen to criticism and act on it if it is valid and ignore it if it is not is a sign of intelligence.

Homeopaths make medicines out of such unlikely substances as dog’s ear wax, dental plaque, vomit, tears from a weeping young girl, polyurethane, Braille paper, mercury, Stonehenge, arsenic, New York City, live scorpions, blood from an AIDS patient, and cancerous tumors. Some homeopathic remedies are not material but “imponderables” such as moonlight (luna), computer-terminal rays, wind (ventus), the north pole of a magnet (magnetis polus arcticus), and a vacuum (i.e., empty space).

From where I stood it was a pose that collapsed many periods in her life into one: mother and lover, big sister, best friend, superstar and diplomat, billionaire and street kid, foolish girl and woman of substance.

Indeed, research has long established that teens whose parents are highly permissive—whether they are indulgent, neglectful, or just reluctant to step in—are more likely to abuse substances and misbehave at school than teens whose parents articulate and enforce limits.

I hadn’t pegged him as a family annihilator, but I remembered a study I’d read that talked about substance abusers who were also jealous and overly possessive of their partners. It was a lethal cocktail.

You Are My Spring Joy Where does life seek eternity? Not in daily struggles or toil, but in that endearing destiny, Where thoughts, pursuits, likings all merge to create a happy existence, Where happiness leaps from every act and every substance. Just like spring flowers that spread joy, To all alike: a woman, a man, a little girl and a young boy, They live for moments very brief, Yet they always manage to delight the heart immersed in grief. They last for a day or moments few, With a promise that next year they shall bloom anew, Leaving behind sweet memories and hopes profound, And even in a moment of existence they live in eternity that time’s snares can not confound. Similarly my love Irma, your smiles, your beauty nourish my existence, You, your love, your endless beauty are what I need for sustenance, My eternity lies in you, and only you, Eternity will be virtueless if it is not spent thinking about you and loving you. I seek thee with all my senses and my mind and heart, From me the reflections of your beauty never depart, And I lie wrapped in them day and night, Without the glimpse of your beautiful smile I cannot establish the brightness in any form of light. Perhaps someday the sun may not rise, And the Moon may not shine , to me it shall be no surprise, But for me living without loving you is not possible, As for the Moon to shine without the Sun is impossible. So let us be like the Sun and the moonshine, Where both exist to create the life giving sunshine and the romantic moonshine, Let you be the the daffodils, winter jasmine, iris, primrose ,and be merry and sing, And I will always be the unfailing Spring, just your Spring!

To understand this, you need frist to Know some words which are formed from Arabic to English by me : 1- farcashize (V) : يُفركش 2- farcashization (N) : الفركشة 3- farcashized/farcashizational (Adj) : مُفركش 4- farcashizationally (Adv) : مُفركشآ The logic of the dating does not express the relationship, it is the relationship, otherwise the time that I spend with special someone is a neutral phenomenon and the observation of the neutral phenomenon in the term of the relationships changes its nature. Like every single Sudanese man, I know that I would like to be a one-man multinational fashion phenomenon but to be described as farcashizational man by some students is something I don't expect it at all. The phenomenon of farcashization becomes a part of Sudanese girl's speech, unfortunately it is like gossiping, I was chicken-hearted when my closed friend told me that many female students at EDC said that we were in love together and then you were farcashized by me. At that time we were laughing but deeply inside myself, an idea was rambling which was "maybe I am one of their desires" because when one has achieved the object of one's desires, it is evident that one's real desire was not the ignorant possession of the desired object but to know it as possessed as actually contemplated as within one, so maybe I was farcashizationally farcashized by my friend in thier mind as a wish that the same thing to be done with me by them and that leads to say "girls are dangerous creatures especially when they are your students". When there is both love and friendship, we dwell in the realm of the relationship and when there is neither love nor friendship, we exist in a vacuity of relationships, we can feel and we can express feelings but the more we feel, the further off we are, so what is not yet felt can't be shown and what is already desired can't be hidden so farcashization and desire are not distant, it's their principle that can't be seen. It would be a very naive sort of dogmatism to assume that every beautiful girl is an impossible creature to be got or to accept the man as he is and she is always going to embarrass and farcashize him, as if she is an indocile black wild cat, the beautiful girl is not a unique and homogeneous but she is immensely diversified, having as many different schemes and patterns as there are different ways of beauty, so the phenomenons which we find in our certain relationships such as farcashization are not transferable with all people but the attitude of the relationship, therefore the dating of two people is like the contact of two chemical substances, if there is any reaction between them depending on that attitude, both are transformed. Finally there is no relationship between any two partners looks like what we really see, yours doesn't, mine doesn't and people are much more complicated than what we imagine, then their relationships are more perplexing too, so you can't judge any relationship according the actions of the relationship's partners, it is true of every relation.

Let's just say you've got an honest way about you- and a sharper eye than I initially thought." She brushed her fingers over the nearest table. "Not a speck of dust." "Oh." Cinderella felt little pride from the compliment. "It is my job," was all she said. "I'm glad you understand that, girl. Though no one told you to reorganize my books." There was a note of accusation in the duchess's voice, and Cinderella didn't know how to respond. "I apologize, ma'am. I-" "Most of my attendants arrange them like flowers, by color and size, but you did it by substance and author. You couldn't have done that without reading them." She swallowed. "I didn't have time to read any, ma'am... but I couldn't resist skimming a few.

It has always been easy to dismiss substance out of dislike for style.

This second wave of synaptogenesis is not confined to the frontal lobes. When the UCLA team scanned the brains of nineteen normal children and adolescents, ages seven and sixteen, they found that the parietal lobes (which integrate information from far-flung neighborhoods of the brain, such as auditory, tactile, and visual signals) are still maturing through the midteens. The long nerve fibers called white matter are probably still being sheathed in myelin, the fatty substance that lets nerves transmit signals faster and more efficiently. As a result, circuits that make sense of disparate information are works in progress through age sixteen or so. The parietal lobes reach their gray matter peak at age ten (in girls) or twelve (in boys) and are then pruned. But the temporal lobes, seats of language as well as emotional control, do not reach their gray matter maximum until age sixteen, Giedd finds. Only then do they undergo pruning. The teen brain, it seems, reprises one of the most momentous acts of infancy, the overproduction and then pruning of neuronal branches. “The brain,” says Sowell, “undergoes dynamic changes much later than we originally thought.

How to Get the Best Facial Wash for Men People alike wish to keep their epidermis fresh and clean. But also for quite a long time, it's hard for us men to look for a good facial wash that's formulated for our skin. Most skincare brands often have products only formulated for girls. Thankfully, gone were those days and there are extra products specially made for guys that will be out in your skin care market. And that means you no longer need to worry about not finding a skin care item that you'll require. Men's epidermis has its needs which explains why it is important that we use a facial rinse or any other skincare product that's made especially for our skin. Here's how to find the best facial wash for guys. 1. Find out your skin layer type first. Let me give you, know your skin type as each skin type has different needs. A facial rinse for oily skin might not exactly work that very well on dry skin hence before getting one, ensure that this facial clean is formulated for your skin layer type. 2. Determine if it can address your current skincare needs. There are different sorts of facial wash and each individual you have different functions based on what your skin needs. Some facial clean helps increase hydration while others are created for acne. Additionally, there are cleansers that dual as skincare for shaving due to the fact shaving is a major part of man's skincare routine. 3. Search for its ingredients. What makes something a powerful is its materials. Be sure that the facial clean you are getting contains all the substances that you'll require for your skin. Also, discover a facial wash that contains things that optimize cellular renewal as it restores your skin's pure processes and facilitates it heal better.

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Nevaeh- When you toss something or someone away, where does it go? It is just the same as not missing a family that I have never had- I guess. I was left to be buried under more useless substances, in a heap of forgetfulness, yet I dug myself back up, and out of the burial ground, they put me on top of, time and time again. Just for them to track me down and cover me over once more with their dirt as if I am trash. Besides, society just wants more matter to throw away, instead of embracing what they once had. This reminds me of the fact that a lot of girls out there are used and then thrown away when the boys are left to go on as someone new and do it all over again. As well as, break yet another girl's heart. I should know it happened to me! Just like they can keep trying to kill me, yet I know I will stay thriving! Just when I thought, all was lost completely and everything was helpless, while I have hit rock bottom once more.

Tess was at the top of the tallest plum tree in the orchard, picking furiously. She had a canvas bucket slung across her chest and she was competing with several wasps who thought their right to the fruit was every bit as good as hers. The plums in the orchard, it seemed to the girls, had been hard one day and ripe the next, though of course Tess knew that this was not so. It was just because there had been a late raspberry crop which had kept the girls too busy to think about plums, and when Mr Turnbull had announced that the fruit was ripe and needed picking, it had seemed only yesterday that they had been spraying the trees and cursing windy days because then the spray in the guns was apt to blow back into their faces, coating them with an unpleasant sticky substance and leaving the aphids as healthy as before.

So how is wanting to become paper different than wanting to become a novel?" I asked, getting a bit more serious. "If you took that matter a bit more to heart, I think you'd see what I mean for yourself. But to answer you anyway, in elementary school I was working with some papier mâché and I realized that it was a lot like brains. You know how you make papier mâché, right? You soak newspaper in water until it gets soggy and starts to mash up, and then you add some glue. So, in other words, within this gluey substance are countless words and letters all smashed together. It's like my brain as I read books and then think, my thoughts forming out of the mashed-up words I've put into my memory that I rearrange to make something new. Brains are just so much papier mâché." "So your brain is hardened and stiff?" "I just have to make sure it isn't exposed to the air. Anyway, I began to think of myself as formed out of papier mâché, which made me better able to understand how it must feel to be paper itself." "Such anthropomorphism is quite typical of young girls." "It's not anthropomorphism. Pay attention. What I realized was that the feeling of having no feelings was how it felt to be paper. In other words, I was attracted to paper, but paper itself, as banal as it sounds, has no inner self, can only absorb characters and words into itself without assigning them meaning. That's how I wanted to be, I realized. And I simultaneously realized that the more I wanted to be paper, the farther I got from actually being like it, which made me sad.

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The note of self-righteousness in his voice set fire to a larger and more diffuse pool of the gas, a combustible political substance that had seeped into her from her mother and then from certain college professors and certain gross-out movies and now also from Annagret, a sense of the unfairness of what one professor had called the anisotropy of gendered relationships, wherein boys could camouflage their objectifying desires with the language of feelings while girls played the boys’ game of sex at their own risk, dupes if they objectified and victims if they didn’t.

I remember having a conversation with a teacher who could not figure out why her relationship with her African American students felt strained. She was especially troubled that several African American girls in her class had refused to participate in a mask-making activity in which the kids placed plaster strips across their face all the way up to their hairline. One girl spoke up and told the teacher that her mother would be upset with her if she got water or the grainy plaster in her hair. The teacher causally dismissed their concerns and insisted they do the activity along with everyone else. The teacher was unfamiliar with the significance of hair in African American culture—how it’s cared for, its connection to self-esteem and self-expression. In turn, she missed an opportunity to affirm the students’ cultural needs by simply making scarves available in the classroom when doing activities with water, sand, or any other substance that might mess up their hair. Whether it’s being insensitive to Muslim students fasting during Ramadan by having a class party with food and drink or ignoring a low-income family’s ability to provide money for a field trip, these small actions chip away at trust and personal regard that are at the core of authentic relationships. This lack of care leads to mistrust, which, over time, can put students (and parents) on the defensive. This underlying mistrust is the reason some parents seem antagonistic. They become defensive and protective based on the perception that the teacher doesn’t care.

a clear night in early October 2004. Standing beneath the trees on the riverbank, I stared across at North Korea. The mountains were black against the constellations. Hyesan itself was in utter darkness. I could have been looking at forest, not at a city. It was almost as if the sky was the substance. The city was the void, the nothing. My country lay silent and still. I felt immensely sad for it. It seemed as lifeless as ash.

JACK AND JIM WILL ALWAYS BE THERE FOR THE GOOD TIMES...BUT EVEN THEY LEAVE FEELING EMPTY.

Do you have or know of any plants that produce a thick, sticky substance?” I asked Talise one day while we were having our midday meal. “There are quite a few,” she said as she tapped her chin in thought, “like sugarcane and aloe.” “I need something sticky,” I shook my head, “but it needs to harden once it dries without becoming too heavy.” “You’re not going to like this,” she laughed, “but the ganjika you so affectionately call weed does exactly that if you boil it long enough. I must insist you do it outside, though. The smell is quite heinous.” I blinked in surprise. Of course good old marijuana was the answer to everything.

Do you consider yourself valuable? Do you value yourself less than or more than other people? Describe your self-esteem and how you exhibit self-love. Are you vulnerable—either too much or not enough? Do you have issues protecting yourself, and do you become resentful at others’ behaviors? Have you been known for being “bad” or rebellious, or have you been committed to becoming perfect, the good girl or boy in your family or life? How are these behaviors related to and reflected in your spirituality? Does your faith correspond or conflict with them? Are you too dependent on other people or are you too independent? Do you fear you are dependent on other things—substances like food, alcohol, drugs, or nicotine? Do you use shopping/spending or relationships to shape your identity? Do you consider yourself mature or have you struggled with the idea that you are immature? Do you self-punish over loss of control, believing that by managing your life you prove your maturity? Do you have issues with moderation or intimacy—unsure of how to create whole and healthy boundaries in your life? After you have finished this self-concept, set it aside. Much later, you will be revisiting it, seeing the ways in which you have changed, and the new behaviors and messages you will be incorporating in your life to honor that new self.

I was angry at him and he was angry at me. Angry that I couldn’t be the girl from his songs who just gives and gives until there’s nothing left to her of any substance.