The Strokes Senior Quotes

He regarded his briefcase. It was full of student papers—114 essays entitled “What I Wish.” He had been putting off reading them for over a week. He opened the briefcase, then paused, reluctant to look inside. How many student papers had he read in these twelve years? How many strokes of his red pen had he made? How many times had he underlined it’s and written its. Was there ever a student who didn’t make a mischievous younger brother the subject of an essay? Was there ever a student who didn’t make four syllables out of “mischievous”? This was the twelfth in a series of senior classes that Miles was trying to raise to an acceptable level of English usage, and like the previous eleven, this class would graduate in the spring to make room for another class in the fall, and he would read the same errors over again. This annual renewal of ignorance, together with the sad fact that most of his students had been drilled in what he taught since they were in the fifth grade, left him with a vague sense of futility that made it hard for him to read student writing. But while he had lost his urge to read student papers, he had not lost his guilt about not reading them, so he carried around with him, like a conscience...

The fears of militarization Holbrooke had expressed in his final, desperate memos, had come to pass on a scale he could have never anticipated. President Trump had concentrated ever more power in the Pentagon, granting it nearly unilateral authority in areas of policy once orchestrated across multiple agencies, including the State Department. In Iraq and Syria, the White House quietly delegated more decisions on troop deployments to the military. In Yemen and Somalia, field commanders were given authority to launch raids without White House approval. In Afghanistan, Trump granted the secretary of defense, General James Mattis, sweeping authority to set troop levels. In public statements, the White House downplayed the move, saying the Pentagon still had to adhere to the broad strokes of policies set by the White House. But in practice, the fate of thousands of troops in a diplomatic tinderbox of a conflict had, for the first time in recent history, been placed solely in military hands. Diplomats were no longer losing the argument on Afghanistan: they weren’t in it. In early 2018, the military began publicly rolling out a new surge: in the following months, up to a thousand new troops would join the fourteen thousand already in place. Back home, the White House itself was crowded with military voices. A few months into the Trump administration, at least ten of twenty-five senior leadership positions on the president’s National Security Council were held by current or retired military officials. As the churn of firings and hirings continued, that number grew to include the White House chief of staff, a position given to former general John Kelly. At the same time, the White House ended the practice of “detailing” State Department officers to the National Security Council. There would now be fewer diplomatic voices in the policy process, by design.

she whispers into my truculence and I succumb to that thing called faith that blind old hag who left her brothers and sisters under the overpass she strokes her way into my soul a divining rod slips from the heavens a greasy old senior citizen with stale coffee breath and a proverb for any situation she recounts the transgressions from a lifetime ago with a glassine vision the images move in a circular sway, dashing from light to dark truisms to falsehoods this is a woman, my friend, with whom you can ride the river and gaze at the mountain this is a woman with a heart fired by the very furnace of Hell yet beats with the sonnets of God

Yup. Still got it.” Shane caps it off with a playful grin. I can’t tell if he’s referring to football or his looks. Yes to both, but he doesn’t need his ego stroked. “Eh.” I shrug, feigning indifference. His jaw drops. “What do you mean, ‘eh’? You saw me play in high school.” “A few times.” He snorts. “Yeah, right. You went to all the games. You’d sit up on the right side, near the announcer booth. It was like it was your spot. For years.” I frown. “You saw me there?” He never told me that. I assumed I didn’t exist to him before that summer we dated. “Of course, I did. You wore this long, red-and-black sweater that you’d hug around your body like you were cold, even when it was seventy degrees out. I always felt like I should run up there and give you a hug.” I did always wear that sweater. It was old and ratty, and I loved it. And my fifteen- and sixteen-year-old self would have died from happiness had Shane Beckett run into the stands to even acknowledge me. “You stopped coming senior year,” he murmurs, more to himself, his brow puckering.

I’m a decade her senior. I was a friend of her father, and I’m sure she looks upon me like a benevolent uncle. Even if she didn’t, I promised Charles I wouldn’t lay a hand on her.” The Earl of Marsden had been one of his dearest friends-practically his only friend. A promise to such a friend should not be easily broken. Archer jerked back, disbelief coloring his angular features. “Why the hell did you do that?” Grey shrugged. “He asked it of me.” Shaking his head, Archer exhaled a breath. “You never told me that before.” “I suppose I was ashamed.” And hurt, even though he understood his friend only made the request to protect his only child from a man whose sexual conquests had resulted in his being marked for like. Were the situation reversed, Grey might have very well demanded the same promise. And despite being a libertine, he was a man of his word. Archer stared at him for a long moment, elbow braced on the table, chin resting on his thumb as his index finger stroked his stubbled upper lip. “Devil take it, Grey. Charles Danvers was one cruel bugger.” A bitter smile curved Grey’s lips at the insult to his late friend. “Quite.

Your belly’s getting big,” he said one night. “I know,” I answered, looking down. It was kind of hard to deny. “I love it,” he said, stroking it with the palm of his hand. I recoiled a little, remembering the black bikini I’d worn on our honeymoon and how comparatively concave my belly looked then, and hoping Marlboro Man had long since put the image out of his mind. “Hey, what are we naming this thing?” he asked, even as the “thing” fluttered and kicked in my womb. “Oh, man…” I sighed. “I have no idea. Zachary?” I pulled it out of my wazoo. “Eh,” he said, uninspired. “Shane?” Oh no. Here go the old movies. “I went to my senior prom with a Shane,” I answered, remembering dark and mysterious Shane Ballard. “Okay, scratch that,” he said. “How about…how about Ashley?” How far was he going to take this? I remembered a movie we’d watched on our fifteenth date or so. “How about Rooster Cogburn?” He chuckled. I loved it when he chuckled. It meant everything was okay and he wasn’t worried or stressed or preoccupied. It meant we were dating and sitting on his old porch and my parents weren’t divorcing. It meant my belly button wasn’t bulbous and deformed. His chuckles were like a drug to me. I tried to elicit them daily. “What if it’s a girl?” I said. “Oh, it’s a boy,” he said with confidence. “I’m positive.” I didn’t respond. How could I argue with that?

A Jewish boy comes to his father and asks, ‘Dad, why shouldn’t we eat pork?’ The father strokes his long white beard thoughtfully and answers, ‘Well, Yankele, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but if we eat pork, God will punish us and we will come to a bad end. It isn’t my idea. It’s not even the rabbi’s idea. If the rabbi had created the world, maybe he would have created a world in which pork was perfectly kosher. But the rabbi didn’t create the world – God did it. And God said, I don’t know why, that we shouldn’t eat pork. So we shouldn’t. Capeesh?’ In 1943 a German boy comes to his father, a senior SS officer, and asks, ‘Dad, why are we killing the Jews?’ The father puts on his shiny leather boots, and meanwhile explains, ‘Well, Fritz, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but if we allow the Jews to live, they will cause the degeneration and extinction of humankind. It’s not my idea, and it’s not even the Führer’s idea. If Hitler had created the world, maybe he would have created a world in which the laws of natural selection did not apply, and Jews and Aryans could all live together in perfect harmony. But Hitler didn’t create the world. He just managed to decipher the laws of nature, and then instructed us how to live in line with them. If we disobey these laws, we will come to a bad end. Is that clear?!’ In 2016 a British boy comes to his father, a liberal MP, and asks, ‘Dad, why should we care about the human rights of Muslims in the Middle East?’ The father puts down his cup of tea, thinks for a moment, and says, ‘Well, Duncan, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but all humans, even Muslims in the Middle East, have the same nature and therefore enjoy the same natural rights. This isn’t my idea, nor a decision of Parliament. If Parliament had created the world, universal human rights might well have been buried in some subcommittee along with all that quantum physics stuff. But Parliament didn’t create the world, it just tries to make sense of it, and we must respect the natural rights even of Muslims in the Middle East, or very soon our own rights will also be violated, and we will come to a bad end. Now off you go.’ Liberals, communists and followers of other modern creeds dislike describing their own system as a ‘religion’, because they identify religion with superstitions and supernatural powers. If you tell communists or liberals that they are religious, they think you accuse them of blindly believing in groundless pipe dreams. In fact, it means only that they believe in some system of moral laws that wasn’t invented by humans, but which humans must nevertheless obey. As far as we know, all human societies believe in this. Every society tells its members that they must obey some superhuman moral law, and that breaking this law will result in catastrophe.

A Jewish boy comes to his father and asks, ‘Dad, why shouldn’t we eat pork?’ The father strokes his long white beard thoughtfully and answers, ‘Well, Yankele, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but if we eat pork, God will punish us and we will come to a bad end. It isn’t my idea. It’s not even the rabbi’s idea. If the rabbi had created the world, maybe he would have created a world in which pork was perfectly kosher. But the rabbi didn’t create the world – God did it. And God said, I don’t know why, that we shouldn’t eat pork. So we shouldn’t. Capeesh?’ In 1943 a German boy comes to his father, a senior SS officer, and asks, ‘Dad, why are we killing the Jews?’ The father puts on his shiny leather boots, and meanwhile explains, ‘Well, Fritz, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but if we allow the Jews to live, they will cause the degeneration and extinction of humankind. It’s not my idea, and it’s not even the Führer’s idea. If Hitler had created the world, maybe he would have created a world in which the laws of natural selection did not apply, and Jews and Aryans could all live together in perfect harmony. But Hitler didn’t create the world. He just managed to decipher the laws of nature, and then instructed us how to live in line with them. If we disobey these laws, we will come to a bad end. Is that clear?!’ In 2016 a British boy comes to his father, a liberal MP, and asks, ‘Dad, why should we care about the human rights of Muslims in the Middle East?’ The father puts down his cup of tea, thinks for a moment, and says, ‘Well, Duncan, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but all humans, even Muslims in the Middle East, have the same nature and therefore enjoy the same natural rights. This isn’t my idea, nor a decision of Parliament. If Parliament had created the world, universal human rights might well have been buried in some subcommittee along with all that quantum physics stuff. But Parliament didn’t create the world, it just tries to make sense of it, and we must respect the natural rights even of Muslims in the Middle East, or very soon our own rights will also be violated, and we will come to a bad end. Now off you go.’ Liberals, communists and followers of other modern creeds dislike describing their own system as a ‘religion’, because they identify religion with superstitions and supernatural powers. If you tell communists or liberals that they are religious, they think you accuse them of blindly believing in groundless pipe dreams. In fact, it means only that they believe in some system of moral laws that wasn’t invented by humans, but which humans must nevertheless obey. As far as we know, all human societies believe in this. Every society tells its members that they must obey some superhuman moral law, and that breaking this law will result in catastrophe.

A Jewish boy comes to his father and asks, ‘Dad, why shouldn’t we eat pork?’ The father strokes his long white beard thoughtfully and answers, ‘Well, Yankele, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but if we eat pork, God will punish us and we will come to a bad end. It isn’t my idea. It’s not even the rabbi’s idea. If the rabbi had created the world, maybe he would have created a world in which pork was perfectly kosher. But the rabbi didn’t create the world – God did it. And God said, I don’t know why, that we shouldn’t eat pork. So we shouldn’t. Capeesh?’ In 1943 a German boy comes to his father, a senior SS officer, and asks, ‘Dad, why are we killing the Jews?’ The father puts on his shiny leather boots, and meanwhile explains, ‘Well, Fritz, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but if we allow the Jews to live, they will cause the degeneration and extinction of humankind. It’s not my idea, and it’s not even the Führer’s idea. If Hitler had created the world, maybe he would have created a world in which the laws of natural selection did not apply, and Jews and Aryans could all live together in perfect harmony. But Hitler didn’t create the world. He just managed to decipher the laws of nature, and then instructed us how to live in line with them. If we disobey these laws, we will come to a bad end. Is that clear?!’ In 2016 a British boy comes to his father, a liberal MP, and asks, ‘Dad, why should we care about the human rights of Muslims in the Middle East?’ The father puts down his cup of tea, thinks for a moment, and says, ‘Well, Duncan, that’s how the world works. You are still young and you don’t understand, but all humans, even Muslims in the Middle East, have the same nature and therefore enjoy the same natural rights. This isn’t my idea, nor a decision of Parliament. If Parliament had created the world, universal human rights might well have been buried in some subcommittee along with all that quantum physics stuff. But Parliament didn’t create the world, it just tries to make sense of it, and we must respect the natural rights even of Muslims in the Middle East, or very soon our own rights will also be violated, and we will come to a bad end. Now off you go.’ Liberals, communists and followers of other modern creeds dislike describing their own system as a ‘religion’, because they identify religion with superstitions and supernatural powers. If you tell communists or liberals that they are religious, they think you accuse them of blindly believing in groundless pipe dreams. In fact, it means only that they believe in some system of moral laws that wasn’t invented by humans, but which humans must nevertheless obey. As far as we know, all human societies believe in this. Every society tells its members that they must obey some superhuman moral law, and that breaking this law will result in catastrophe.

That fall Harry Rantz abruptly returned from Canada, bought a lot in Spokane, and began to construct a new house, trying to piece his life back together. Like his older son, he needed a wife to make the new house a home, and like his son he found just what he was looking for in the other Lafollette twin. Thelma's sister, Thula, at twenty-two, was a lovely, slender, elfin-faced girl with a whimsical pile of black curls and a fetching smile. Harry was seventeen years her senior, but that was not about to stop him, or her. The basis of Harry's attraction was obvious. The basis of Thula's was less so, and somewhat a mystery to her family... Matters proceeded apace. Harry completed the house in Spokane. He and Thula slipped across the state line and married on the shores of Lake Coeur d'Alene, Idaho in April 1921, to the great displeasure of Thula's parents. In a stroke Thula became her twin sister's mother-in-law.

See, I failed to realize that by loving him, by pouring every ounce of energy I had into our lives and his future, I didn’t leave room for more, something I didn’t realize until after I had my first stroke Noah’s senior year in high school. From that day on, in the back of my mind has been fear.

Fuck.” I unzip my jeans and pull out my dick. Spitting on my hand, I slowly start to stroke it, imagining I have one hand in her hair that’s shoving her mouth on my cock. She steps in what I know is her shower, and I see water spraying onto her body. Closing my eyes, I pick up the pace with my hand and see her on her knees inside the shower. Her pretty blue eyes look up at me while her parted lips just beg to be fucked. “Whatever my girl wants,” I pant, my hips bucking in the driver’s seat. I wrap my hands into her wet, dark hair and slide my cock inside her hot, wet mouth and begin to fuck it. “Blake.” I moan, my hand picking up the pace as I imagine her pretty blue eyes crying while I fuck that pretty face. My balls tighten, and my breath quickens seconds before I come in my hand. “Fuck,” I hiss, reaching up, I remove my shirt and use it to clean up my mess. Looking up at her window, I see the light to her bathroom turn off, then the one to her bedroom. Taking a deep breath, I lean my head against the headrest, trying to calm my racing heart. “Soon, Blake. Soon.” I won’t have to use my hand or imagination. I’ll have her mouth, pussy, and ass to use. I will fucking own her. JUNIOR YEAR I exit the room and start walking down the hallway to my bedroom. Shoving the door open, I slam it shut to find Matt sitting on the side of my bed. “Get the fuck out.” I walk past him toward my adjoining bathroom. He jumps to his feet. “What in the fuck did you tell Lincoln?” Spinning around, I shove his chest. “I didn’t say shit!” He stumbles back and then shakes his head, giving a rough laugh. “You should have my back.” “And you should have known not to fucking touch her,” I shout back. “If you would have let me fuck her …” “You mean rape her?” I correct him. “Fuck, Matt! What in the hell were you thinking?” Abstinence is part of our oath, until our senior year when we are granted a chosen. If I had told Lincoln that he was going to rape the woman, he’d for sure be stripped of his Lord title. Matt

It was almost as if, the nearer people are to the other side, whether they've just come into the world or are close to leaving it, the more sleep they need. And she wondered, too, if it was really sleep at all. If it wasn't simply their way of touching what was behind the veil. Infants reaching back to where they had been. Seniors reaching forward to where they were soon going.

At the same time, the Establishment and their media allies were in full cry. Lord McGregor, the Chairman of the Press Complaints Commission, issued a statement condemning the hysteria that the book immediately generated as ‘An odious exhibition of journalists dabbling their fingers in the stuff of other people’s souls.’ In fact, this criticism was never made of the book itself; indeed, Lord McGregor has since told me that the issue was the ‘most difficult’ of his tenure. The Archbishop of Canterbury worried publicly about the effects of the publicity on Princes William and Harry; Lord St John of Fewsley condemned the book’s publication, while a pot-pourri of MPs were keen to see me locked away in the Tower; it was, too, a torrid time for Diana’s supporters. As loyalists rallied to the flag, ignoring the message while deriding the messenger, the public gradually began to accept the book’s veracity through statements by Diana’s friends, further confirmed when she visited her old friend Carolyn Bartholomew, who had spoken about the Princess’s bulimia. Unfortunately, that casual call upon an old and trusted friend had bitter consequences for Diana. Senior courtiers, including the Queen’s private secretary, Sir Robert Fellowes, pointed accusing fingers at Diana when they saw the front-page coverage of the visit. Aggrieved and hurt, the Princess flew by helicopter to Merseyside for a visit to a hospice, her first official engagement since Diana, Her True Story hit the headlines. It proved to be an emotional meeting between Diana and her public for, touched by the show of affection from waiting wellwishers, she burst into tears, overcome by the distressing echoes of her morning meeting with Palace officials, and by the underlying strain of the decision she and Prince Charles had taken. As she later told a friend: ‘An old lady in the crowd stroked my face and that triggered something inside me. I simply couldn’t stop myself crying.’ The public tears did not surprise her close friends, who knew only too well the private anguish of her lonely position, the strain she had borne for 18 months. As one remarked: ‘She is a brilliant actress who has disguised her private sorrow.

Swift Antelope caught Hunter’s arm before he could go inside his mother’s lodge. “Hunter, about the little yellow-hair.” “Yes, what about her?” Swift Antelope glanced uneasily at Bright Star, then plunged ahead. “I would like to make arrangements with you--to take her as my wife. Not right away, of course. When she grows old enough.” The young warrior straightened his shoulders. “I will pay a fine bride price, fifty horses and ten blankets.” Hunter smothered a grin. After a year of raiding, Swift Antelope had only ten horses. How much horse stealing did he plan to do? “Swift Antelope, I don’t think she even likes you.” “Your yellow-hair doesn’t like you too well, either.” He had a point. Hunter stroked his chin, acutely aware of a sparrow singing nearby, of cottonwood leaves rustling in the gentle breeze. Such a peaceful sound. He had enough problems without Swift Antelope adding to them. “Can we discuss this another time?” “No! I mean…well, I’ve heard some other warriors talking. I’m not the only one who wants her. If I wait, you may accept the suit of another. She is very fine, is she not?” Hunter wondered if they were talking about the same skinny girl. Then he focused on Swift Antelope, who was only a few years Amy’s senior. He supposed a younger man might find Amy’s coltish prettiness appealing. “I can see your concern. But you forget one thing, Swift Antelope. You have proven yourself my loyal friend. I will not accept the suit of another. Does that ease your mind?” Swift Antelope still gripped Hunter’s arm. “May I visit with her?” “I don’t know about that. She’s been through a terrible time. Having a young man around might upset her.” “Old Man told me what happened to her. But someone must help her walk back to the sunshine, eh?” Again, Hunter had to concede the point. A difficult path lay ahead of Amy, and her way would be made easier if she had a good friend, a young man who could teach her to trust again. “You will take great care with her?” Swift Antelope grinned. “I will protect her with my life. Your mother says she will be strong enough to go on a walk tomorrow. May I take her?” Hunter placed a heavy hand on the boy’s shoulder. “She won’t want to go. You do realize that?” Swift Antelope nodded. “I can handle her until she gets used to me.” “She’s a fighter.” “And I am twice her size.” Hunter almost wished he could go on this walk. It might prove interesting. Little did Swift Antelope know how useless strength could be when tussling with a frightened female. “Come to my lodge late tomorrow afternoon.” Swift Antelope beamed. “I think we should change her name. Aye-mee? It sounds like a sheep baaing. Golden One. That is a good name for her.

In a single stroke an inexperienced Episcopal bishop became one of the senior generals in the budding Confederate army.

It was almost as if, the nearer people are to the other side, whether they’ve just come into the world or are close to leaving it, the more sleep they need. And she wondered, too, if it was really sleep at all. If it wasn’t simply their way of touching what was behind the veil. Infants reaching back to where they had been. Seniors reaching forward to where they were soon going.