The Young Bucks Quotes

Now, five years is nothing in a man's life except when he is very young and very old... - Wang Lung

The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible -- and achieve it, generation after generation.

I already know your sister is smarter. She's prettier than me too, but I didn't bet on that. I just wanted you to call her in here so she'd look at me again. It was worth the five bucks.

A better man wouldn’t play this ‘sweethearts’ game with her when he knew very well it couldn’t lead to more. But he wasn’t a better man. He was Colin Sandhurst, reckless, incorrigible rogue—and damn it, he couldn’t resist. He wanted to amuse her, spoil her, feed her sweets and delicacies. Steal a kiss or two, when she wasn’t expecting it. He wanted to be a besotted young buck squiring his girl around the fair. In other words, he wanted to live honestly. Just for the day.

Our society must make it right and possible for old people not to fear the young or be deserted by them, for the test of a civilization is the way that it cares for its helpless members.

My mom told me once that she wouldn't be a kid again for a million bucks. She said things hurt more when you don't have any perspective on pain. That's true. But doesn't everyone want to be young and hot forever? They only think they want it, Parker. But nobody really wants anything forever. Just for longer than they get it.

When foreigners come into a nation, the best way is to make them no longer foreign. That is to say, let us marry our young together and let there be children. War is costly, love is cheap.

Thinking like a Mountain We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes - something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters' paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.…I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail of replacement in as many decades. So also with cows. The cowman who cleans his range of wolves does not realize that he is taking over the wolf's job of trimming the herd to fit the range. He has not learned to think like a mountain. Hence we have dustbowls, and rivers washing the future into the sea.

You must hang onto the scraps of the bucking moment as if your sanity and life depended on it - because actually they do.

The Quitter When you're lost in the Wild, and you're scared as a child, And Death looks you bang in the eye, And you're sore as a boil, it's according to Hoyle To cock your revolver and . . . die. But the Code of a Man says: "Fight all you can," And self-dissolution is barred. In hunger and woe, oh, it's easy to blow... It's the hell-served-for-breakfast that's hard. "You're sick of the game!" Well, now, that's a shame. You're young and you're brave and you're bright. "You've had a raw deal!" I know — but don't squeal, Buck up, do your damnedest, and fight. It's the plugging away that will win you the day, So don't be a piker, old pard! Just draw on your grit; it's so easy to quit: It's the keeping-your-chin-up that's hard. It's easy to cry that you're beaten — and die; It's easy to crawfish and crawl; But to fight and to fight when hope's out of sight — Why, that's the best game of them all! And though you come out of each gruelling bout, All broken and beaten and scarred, Just have one more try — it's dead easy to die, It's the keeping-on-living that's hard.

The very young are not ready for much knowledge. It must be given to them slowly, in proportion to their years of life. One must first live before he can safely know.

Akela, the great gray Lone Wolf, who led all the Pack by strength and cunning, lay out at full length on his rock, and below him sat forty or more wolves of every size and color, from badger-colored veterans who could handle a buck alone, to young black three-year-olds who thought they could. The Lone Wolf had led them for a year now. He had fallen twice into a wolf-trap in his youth, and once he had been beaten and left for dead; so he knew the manners and customs of men.

The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible – and achieve it, generation after generation.’ Pearl S. Buck

As parents, we have a chance when our children are young to turn them into good citizens rather than wait for the government to raise them for us.

For the soul of man is born fresh in every child, and there is an age in every creature, unless he is debased too young, when for a time he sees clearly the difference between truth and falsehood, and hypocrisy infuriates him. He cannot forgive those who should be true and instead are liars. This fury, I believe, is the first cause for revolutions throughout history.

Mitchell Maxwell’s Maxims • You have to create your own professional path. There’s no longer a roadmap for an artistic career. • Follow your heart and the money will follow. • Create a benchmark of your own progress. If you never look down while you’re climbing the ladder you won’t know how far you’ve come. • Don’t define success by net worth, define it by character. Success, as it’s measured by society, is a fleeting condition. • Affirm your value. Tell the world “I am an artist,” not “I want to be an artist.” • You must actively live your dream. Wishing and hoping for someday doesn’t make it happen. Get out there and get involved. • When you look into the abyss you find your character. • Young people too often let the fear of failure keep them from trying. You have to get bloody, sweaty and rejected in order to succeed. • Get your face out of Facebook and into somebody’s face. Close your e-mail and pick up the phone. Personal contact still speaks loudest. • No one is entitled to act entitled. Be willing to work hard. • If you’re going to buck the norm you’re going to have to embrace the challenges. • You have to love the journey if you’re going to work in the arts. • Only listen to people who agree with your vision. • A little anxiety is good but don’t let it become fear, fear makes you inert. • Find your own unique voice. Leave your individual imprint on the world, not a copy of someone else. • Draw strength from your mistakes; they can be your best teacher.

In America the quirk was that people were things. Best to cut your losses on an old man who won’t survive a trip across the ocean. A young buck from strong tribal stock got customers into a froth. A slave girl squeezing out pups was like a mint, money that bred money. If you were a thing—a cart or a horse or a slave—your value determined your possibilities.

We were the untamed young bucks, testosterone and beer fueling our charge, fear alone left in the wake. Everybody thought we were a little dangerous, and that was cool.

Ah well, Liang was her husband and she would never have another. Even had she been young and beautiful she would not have run from man to man as women did nowadays. But she was neither young nor beautiful and she was grateful for Liang. It was honorable to be his wife, and if he had a peevish temper at home, he might have been worse. He had never beaten her, and she had learned, after all these years, how to torture him.

Nothing breaks my heart more than seeing that person who’s struggling to lose weight who thinks that they need to run 20 miles a week. They have no desire to do it, their knees hurt, they hate it, and they’re not losing weight. And I’d like to say, ‘Well, I’ve got great news for you. You don’t ever need to run another step a day in your life, because there’s no value in that.’ “There is value in exercise, though, and I think that the most important type of exercise, especially in terms of bang for your buck, is going to be really high-intensity, heavy strength training. Strength training aids everything from glucose disposal and metabolic health to mitochondrial density and orthopedic stability. That last one might not mean much when you’re a 30-something young buck, but when you’re in your 70s, that’s the difference between a broken hip and a walk in the park.

Once Buck gets a saddle on a young clinic horse he goes through all the same actions he had previously done with the horse unsaddled. This is to reinforce that the horse has nothing to fear after the saddle is cinched up.

Whatever her purposes, I won’t have my grandsons raised by an invertebrate.” “Sebastian,” she chided softly, although her lips quivered with amusement. “I mean for her to partner with Weston Ravenel. A healthy young buck with sharp wits and a full supply of manly vigor. He’ll do her much good.” “Let’s allow Phoebe to decide if she wants him,” Evie suggested. “She had better decide soon, or Westcliff will snap him up for one of his daughters.

People who have never canoed a wild river, or who have done so only with a guide in the stern, are apt to assume that novelty, plus healthful exercise, account for the value of the trip. I thought so too, until I met the two college boys on the Flambeau. Supper dishes washed, we sat on the bank watching a buck dunking for water plants on the far shore. Soon the buck raised his head, cocked his ears upstream, and then bounded for cover. Around the bend now came the cause of his alarm: two boys in a canoe. Spying us, they edged in to pass the time of day. ‘What time is it?’ was their first question. They explained that their watches had run down, and for the first time in their lives there was no clock, whistle, or radio to set watches by. For two days they had lived by ‘sun-time,’ and were getting a thrill out of it. No servant brought them meals: they got their meat out of the river, or went without. No traffic cop whistled them off the hidden rock in the next rapids. No friendly roof kept them dry when they misguessed whether or not to pitch the tent. No guide showed them which camping spots offered a nightlong breeze, and which a nightlong misery of mosquitoes; which firewood made clean coals, and which only smoke. Before our young adventurers pushed off downstream, we learned that both were slated for the Army upon the conclusion of their trip. Now the motif was clear. This trip was their first and last taste of freedom, an interlude between two regimentations: the campus and the barracks. The elemental simplicities of wilderness travel were thrills not only because of their novelty, but because they represented complete freedom to make mistakes. The wilderness gave them their first taste of those rewards and penalties for wise and foolish acts which every woodsman faces daily, but against which civilization has built a thousand buffers. These boys were ‘on their own’ in this particular sense. Perhaps every youth needs an occasional wilderness trip, in order to learn the meaning of this particular freedom.

The wild things and places belong to all of us. So while I can't fix the bigger problems of race in the United States - can't suggest a means by which I, and others like me, will always feel safe - I can prescribe a solution in my own small corner. Get more people of color "out there." Turn oddities into commonplace. The presence of more black birders, wildlife biologists, hunters, hikers, and fisher-folk will say to others that we, too, appreciate the warble of a summer tanager, the incredible instincts of a whitetail buck, and the sound of wind in the tall pines. Our responsibility is to pass something on to those coming after. As young people of color reconnect with what so many of their ancestors knew - that our connections to the land run deep, like the taproots of mighty oaks; that the land renews and sustains us - maybe things will begin to change.

All Carolina folk are crazy for mayonnaise, mayonnaise is as ambrosia to them, the food of their tarheeled gods. Mayonnaise comforts them, causes the vowels to slide more musically along their slow tongues, appeasing their grease-conditioned taste buds while transporting those buds to a place higher than lard could ever hope to fly. Yellow as summer sunlight, soft as young thighs, smooth as a Baptist preacher's rant, falsely innocent as a magician's handkerchief, mayonnaise will cloak a lettuce leaf, some shreds of cabbage, a few hunks of cold potato in the simplest splendor, restyling their dull character, making them lively and attractive again, granting them the capacity to delight the gullet if not the heart. Fried oysters, leftover roast, peanut butter: rare are the rations that fail to become instantly more scintillating from contact with this inanimate seductress, this goopy glory-monger, this alchemist in a jar. The mystery of mayonnaise-and others besides Dickie Goldwire have surely puzzled over this_is how egg yolks, vegetable oil, vinegar (wine's angry brother), salt, sugar (earth's primal grain-energy), lemon juice, water, and, naturally, a pinch of the ol' calcium disodium EDTA could be combined in such a way as to produce a condiment so versatile, satisfying, and outright majestic that mustard, ketchup, and their ilk must bow down before it (though, a at two bucks a jar, mayonnaise certainly doesn't put on airs)or else slink away in disgrace. Who but the French could have wrought this gastronomic miracle? Mayonnaise is France's gift to the New World's muddled palate, a boon that combines humanity's ancient instinctive craving for the cellular warmth of pure fat with the modern, romantic fondness for complex flavors: mayo (as the lazy call it) may appear mild and prosaic, but behind its creamy veil it fairly seethes with tangy disposition. Cholesterol aside, it projects the luster that we astro-orphans have identified with well-being ever since we fell from the stars.

Tea, tea, tea - what? What?' I said. It wasn't what I had meant to say. My idea had been to be a good deal more formal, and so on. Still, it covered the situation. I poured her out a cup. She sipped it and put the cup down with a shudder. 'Do you mean to say, young man,' she said, frostily, ' that you expect me to drink this stuff?' 'Rather! Bucks you up, you know.' 'What do you mean by the expression "Bucks you up"?' 'Well, makes you full of beans, you know. Makes you fizz.' 'I don't understand a word you say. You're English, aren't you?' I admitted it. She didn't say a word. And she did it in a way that made it worse than if she had spoken for hours. Somehow it was brought home to me that she didn't like Englishmen, and that if she had had to meet an Englishman I was the one she'd have chosen last. Conversation languished once more after that. Then I tried again. I was becoming more convinced every moment that you can't make a real lively salon with a couple of people, especially if one of them lets it go a word at a time.

And that is the reason why a young buck with an intelligent looking calf's head before him, is somehow one of the saddest sights you can see. The head looks a sort of reproachfully at him, with an "Et tu Brute!" expression.

That’s your project,” he said. “You can do something no one has done: you can examine Mormonism not just as a religious movement, but as an intellectual one.” I began to reread the letters of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. As a child I’d read those letters as an act of worship; now I read them with different eyes, not the eyes of a critic, but also not the eyes of a disciple. I examined polygamy, not as a doctrine but as a social policy. I measured it against its own aims, as well as against other movements and theories from the same period. It felt like a radical act. My friends in Cambridge had become a kind of family, and I felt a sense of belonging with them that, for many years, had been absent on Buck’s Peak. Sometimes I felt damned for those feelings.

When I venture to point out the unfairness of this, I am reminded of the second item on my list. Apparently the only acceptable destiny for a young female mem​b​er of the house of Windsor is to marry into another of the royal houses that still seem to litter Europe, even though there are precious few reigning monarchs these days. it seems that even a very minor Windsor like myself is a desirable commodity for those wishing a tenuous alliance with Britain at this unsettled time. I am constantly being reminded that is is my duty to make a good match with some half-lunatic, buck-toothed, chinless, spinele​s​s​​​, and utterly awful European royal, thus cementing ties with a potential enemy. My cousin Alex did this, poor thing. I have learned from her tragic example.

Gilbert: How Clark Gable turn every women's head so? Foolish young English girls would see a movie star in every GI with the same Yankee-doodle voice. Glamour in US privates named Jed, Buck or Chip, with their easy-come-by-gifts and Uncle Sam sweet-talk. Dreamboats in hooligans from Delaware or Arizona with fingernails that still carried soil from home, and eyes that crossed with any attempt at reading. Heart-throbs from men like those in the tea-shop, who dated their very close relatives and knew cattle as their mental equal.

The Quitter When you're lost in the Wild, and you're scared as a child, And Death looks you bang in the eye, And you're sore as a boil, it's according to Hoyle To cock your revolver and . . . die. But the Code of a Man says: "Fight all you can," And self-dissolution is barred. In hunger and woe, oh, it's easy to blow . . . It's the hell-served-for-breakfast that's hard. "You're sick of the game!" Well, now, that's a shame. You're young and you're brave and you're bright. "You've had a raw deal!" I know -- but don't squeal, Buck up, do your damnedest, and fight. It's the plugging away that will win you the day, So don't be a piker, old pard! Just draw on your grit; it's so easy to quit: It's the keeping-your-chin-up that's hard. It's easy to cry that you're beaten -- and die; It's easy to crawfish and crawl; But to fight and to fight when hope's out of sight -- Why, that's the best game of them all! And though you come out of each gruelling bout, All broken and beaten and scarred, Just have one more try -- it's dead easy to die, It's the keeping-on-living that's hard.

My love for him was indisputable, but my allegiance to him wasn’t. We were no longer married, and as I settled alongside the Three Young Bucks into the bed I used to share with Paul, I felt a kind of acceptance of that, a kind of clarity where there’d been so much uncertainty.

What gives you your sense of importance and makes you feel special? Who and what bring out the best in you? What does it take to make you feel like a million bucks and ready to take on the world? When people make you feel important, doesn’t it elevate them in your eyes? Learn to do the same for others.

Families are only a means of exploitation,' he declared. 'Parents treat children as capital assests and children wait for parents to die so that they will have an unearned income.' 'So children spy on fathers,' Mercy put in, 'and sons are sent far from their parents--' 'That the young may not inherit the prejudices of the old.

In America the quirk was that people were things. Best to cut your losses on an old man who won’t survive a trip across the ocean. A young buck from strong tribal stock got customers into a froth. A slave girl squeezing out pups was like a mint, money that bred money. If you were a thing—a cart or a horse or a slave—your value determined your possibilities. She minded her place.

A brusque whisper coaxed Phillip from slumber. Someone had called his name. The cot squeaked as he sat up and squinted at a featureless silhouette. “Who is it?” “Rise. Quick. Bring your medicine maker.” The ragged voice belonged to True Seeker. Tasked with keeping a watchful eye on Milly, the young man would come to Phillip at this hour for only one reason. He swung his legs to the ground. With one foot going into his trousers, he took a wide step across the narrow barracks and jostled Buck’s shoulder. His friend was on his feet and half-dressed before Phillip left the building, alarm urging his feet to a gallop. No one need tell him which direction to go. He buckled his sword belt as he went. The scabbard slapped his leg with each footfall, bringing to mind a similar night not long enough ago. His stride lengthened. This time, he would run Collins clean through.

As awkward as our first night together was, our honeymoon was even worse. As soon as we arrived in Hawaii, I became ill with strep throat. I mostly slept and lay in the bathtub in our hotel room for a week shaking violently with a fever. Missy looked out the window at the beautiful beach and Pacific Ocean and cried. It was miserable. I was sweating profusely and thought I was going to die. We’d saved our money for months--about eight hundred dollars--to go to Hawaii, and it ended up being the worst trip of our lives. My getting sick actually saved us from the embarrassment of realizing that we couldn’t do much on eight hundred bucks anyway. We laugh now at being so naïve and young. When we went back to Hawaii for the season finale of Duck Dynasty last year, Missy was determined to make up for a lot of bad memories. I did everything she wanted to do. We went on helicopter rides, boat rides, romantic dinners, and everything else you could do in Hawaii. She got her money’s worth the second time!

Go on and educate me, then,” Senan says to Cal. “What’s a yeet?” “A what?” Cal says. “A yeet. I’m sitting on the sofa tonight after my tea, doing a bit of digesting, and my youngest lad comes running in, launches himself onto my feckin’ belly like he’s been shot from a cannon, yells ‘Yeet!’ out of him right in my face, and legs it out again. I asked one of my other fellas what he was on about, but he only laughed his arse off and told me I’m getting old. Then he asked me for twenty quid to go into town.” “Did you give it to him?” Cal asks. “I did not. I told him to fuck off and get a job. What the hell is a yeet?” “You never saw a yeet?” Cal says. He finds himself fed up to the back teeth with being tossed around by these guys like a beach ball. “They’re pet animals. Like hamsters, only bigger and uglier. Great big fat faces and little piggy eyes.” “I haven’t got a fat fuckin’ face. You’re telling me my young lad’s after calling me a hamster?” “Well,” Cal says, “that word’s used for something else, too, but I hope your boy wouldn’t know about that. How old is he?” “Ten.” “He got the internet?” Senan is swelling up and turning red. “If that little fecker’s been looking at porn, he can say good-bye to his drum kit, and his Xbox, and his—everything. What’s a yeet? Did he call his own father a prick?” “He’s only winding you up, ye eejit,” the buck-naked window guy tells him. “He’s no more notion of yeets than you have.” Senan glares at Cal. “Never heard of ’em,” Cal says. “But you’re cute when you’re angry.

If you could put the benefits of exercise in a pill, it would be an astonishing pill,” says Simon Melov, a researcher at the Buck Institute who has studied exercise extensively. “The data is now coming out on the effects of chronic exercise, and it is astonishing in terms of its ability to prevent all sorts of age-related disease, everything from cancer through to neurodegenerative disease to heart disease, even arthritis. All of these things have vastly lowered risk in people who exercise regularly—and if that was in a pill, it would be insane.

George is very far, right now, from sneering at any of these fellow creatures. They may be crude and mercenary and dull and low, but he is proud, is glad, is almost indecently gleeful to be able to stand up and be counted in their ranks—the ranks of that marvelous minority, The Living. They don't know their luck, these people on the sidewalk, but George knows his—for a little while at least—because he is freshly returned from the icy presence of The Majority, which Doris is to join. I am alive, he says to himself, I am alive! And life-energy surges hotly through him, and delight, and appetite. How good to be in a body—even this beat-up carcass—that still has warm blood and semen and rich marrow and wholesome flesh! The scowling youths on the corners see him as a dodderer no doubt, or at best as a potential score. Yet he claims a distant kinship with the strength of their young arms and shoulders and loins. For a few bucks he could get any one of them to climb into the car, ride back with him to his house, strip off butch leather jacket, skin-tight Levi's, shirt and cowboy boots and take a naked, sullen young athlete, in the wrestling bout of his pleasure. But George doesn't want the bought unwilling bodies of these boys. He wants to rejoice in his own body—the tough triumphant old body of a survivor. The body that has outlived Jim and is going to outlive Doris.

For a wolf, no," said Tabaqui, "but for so mean a person as myself a dry bone is a good feast. Who are we, the Gidur-log [the jackal people], to pick and choose?" He scuttled to the back of the cave, where he found the bone of a buck with some meat on it, and sat cracking the end merrily. "All thanks for this good meal," he said, licking his lips. "How beautiful are the noble children! How large are their eyes! And so young too! Indeed, indeed, I might have remembered that the children of kings are men from the beginning." Now, Tabaqui knew as well as anyone else that there is nothing so unlucky as to compliment children to their faces. It pleased him to see Mother and Father Wolf look uncomfortable.

window of his home on the Missouri River, and Patrick commented that his father’s writing could be compared with nature—a starkly beautiful and complex world that is richly patterned. At that moment two young whitetail bucks ambled up to a willow tree not more than fifteen feet away—a bucolic scene. Patrick moved closer to the window and suggested we watch to see what the two bucks did next. He explained that the annual whitetail rut was just beginning—a time when young males like the two before us typically sparred, instinctual behavior that was a kind of training for when they would compete for a mate. No sooner had he finished his explanation when the two deer squared off and began locking their antlers in playful combat.

On the first day I walked into Simon’s bustling headquarters, just across from City Hall, I encountered an intense young fund-raiser sitting in an open cubicle, working his quarry over the phone. Curious, I stopped to watch the spectacle. “Five hundred bucks? Five hundred bucks! You know what you’re telling me? You don’t give a shit about Israel,” the intense, wiry young man shouted at God knows which mover and shaker on the other end of the line. “I’d be embarrassed for you to take your five hundred bucks.” The kid hung up and stared at the phone, which rang an instant later. “Yeah, that’s better,” he said, in a markedly calmer tone. “Thanks.” Even at twenty-four, Rahm Emanuel had a gift for getting his point across, a quality I would see on display many times as we teamed up in the decades to come.

Although I don’t know for sure, I’d bet my dog and lot that John Grisham never worked for the mob. All of that is total fabrication (and total fabrication is the fiction-writer’s purest delight). He was once a young lawyer, though, and he has clearly forgotten none of the struggle. Nor has he forgotten the location of the various financial pitfalls and honeytraps that make the field of corporate law so difficult. Using plainspun humor as a brilliant counterpoint and never substituting cant for story, he sketches a world of Darwinian struggle where all the savages wear three-piece suits. And—here’s the good part—this is a world impossible not to believe. Grisham has been there, spied out the land and the enemy positions, and brought back a full report. He told the truth of what he knew, and for that if nothing else, he deserves every buck The Firm made.

And meanwhile we decayed. When I was born, when I grew up in the fifties, we believed our country was the land of opportunity, where nobody was doomed to remain poor, where every person of goodwill had a chance to rise. By the time my child was born in the nineties, beggars were crowding the streets of every city, accosting shoppers in the malls. There were camps of homeless in the parks and empty lots, young people going to war with each other for drugs and booze and a few bucks. Our compassion eroded faster than the topsoil, and when we began to notice the earth changes, the droughts and the warming and the die-offs of the animals, the hole in the ozone layer and the epidemics of strange diseases that showed our own immune systems faltering, when we still had a chance to save so much and avert the worst of what followed, we continued to distract ourselves with war.

There’s an old Taoist parable about a farmer whose horse ran away. “How unlucky!” his brother tells him. The farmer shrugs. “Good thing, bad thing, who knows,” he says. A week later, the wayward horse finds its way home, and with it is a beautiful wild mare. “That’s amazing!” his brother says, admiring the new horse with no small envy. Again, the farmer is unmoved. “Good thing, bad thing, who knows,” he says. A few days later, the farmer’s son climbs up on the mare, hoping to tame the wild beast, but the horse bucks and rears, and the boy, hurled to the ground, breaks a leg. “How unlucky!” his brother says, with a tinge of satisfaction. “Good thing, bad thing, who knows,” the farmer replies again. The next day, the young men of the village are called into military service, but because the son’s leg is broken, he is excused from the draft. His brother tells the farmer that this, surely, is the best news of all. “Good thing, bad thing, who knows,” the farmer says. The farmer in this story didn’t get lost in “what if” but instead focused on “what is.” During my monk training, we were taught, “Don’t judge the moment.

Amy?" he breathed. Two dancers, caught up in the dance, didn't see him standing there and collided with him, nearly knocking him down. "Lord Charles!  I beg your pardon!" But he never heard them.  He never saw them.  He had eyes only for the stunning beauty who was being swept around the dance floor by Gareth's friend Perry.  She was a ravishing young woman in shimmering peacock and royal blue whose beauty commanded the eye, the attention, the heart — and made every other woman in the room pale to insignificance. Charles's mouth went dry.  His heartbeat cracked his chest and he forgot to breathe. Another set of dancers collided with him, knocking him to his senses.  Angrily, he stared into the amused eyes of Gareth's friend Neil Chilcot, another Den of Debauchery member who was partnering a grinning Nerissa.  "Gorgeous young woman, isn't she?" quipped Chilcot, sweeping Nerissa past.  "You should've stuck around to see her announced, Charles.  Not that you'll ever have a chance of claiming a dance with her now, what with all the young bucks before you already waiting . . ." Charles had heard enough.  But as he stalked across the dance floor, he heard even more. "Well, His Grace told me she's an heiress . . ." "Not just an heiress, but a princess from some vast Indian nation in America . . ." ". . . came here to offer her tribe's help in the war against the Americans . . ." Charles clenched his fists.  Lucien.  No one else could have, would have, started and circulated such a preposterously crazy rumor!  What the hell was his brother trying to do, get Amy married off to some handsome young swain and out of Charles's life forever?  This was no training for a lady's maid, that was for damned sure! His jaw tight, he stormed across the dance floor toward Amy.  He saw her hooped petticoats swirling about her legs and exposing a tantalizing bit of ankle with every step she took, the laughter in her face even though she kept glancing over Perry's shoulder in search of someone, the studied grace in her movements that, a week ago, he would've sworn she didn't have. She had not seen him yet, and as Perry, a handsome man who had something of a reputation with the ladies, led her through the steps, Charles felt a surge of jealousy so fierce, so violent, that it made him think of doing something totally irrational. Such as calling Perry out for dancing with his woman. Such as killing Lucien for whatever little game he was playing. Such

Jamie was sidling cautiously up along one side of the mare, who was watching his approach with considerable suspicion. He placed his one free arm lightly on her back, talking softly, ready to pull back if the mare objected. She rolled her eyes and snorted, but didn’t move. Moving slowly, he leaned across the blanket, still muttering to the mare, and very gradually rested his weight on her back. She reared slightly and shuffled, but he persisted, raising his voice just a trifle. Just then the mare turned her head and saw me and the boy approaching. Scenting some threat, she reared, whinnying, and swung to face us, crushing Jamie against the paddock fence. Snorting and bucking, she leapt and kicked against the restraining tether. Jamie rolled under the fence, out of the way of the flailing hooves. He rose painfully to his feet, swearing in Gaelic, and turned to see what had caused this setback to his work. When he saw who it was, his thunderous expression changed at once to one of courteous welcome, though I gathered our appearance was still not as opportune as might have been wished. The basket of lunch, thoughtfully provided by Mrs. Fitz, who did in fact know young men, did a good deal to restore his temper. “Ahh, settle then, ye blasted beastie,” he remarked to the mare, still snorting and dancing on her tether.

Preparation - Poem by Malay Roy Choudhury Who claims I'm ruined? Because I'm without fangs and claws? Are they necessary? How do you forget the knife plunged in abdomen up to the hilt? Green cardamom leaves for the buck, art of hatred and anger and of war, gagged and tied Santhal women, pink of lungs shattered by a restless dagger? Pride of sword pulled back from heart? I don't have songs or music. Only shrieks, when mouth is opened wordless odour of the jungle; corner of kin & sin-sanyas; Didn't pray for a tongue to take back the groans power to gnash and bear it. Fearless gunpowder bleats: stupidity is the sole faith-maimed generosity- I leap on the gambling table, knife in my teeth Encircle me rush in from tea and coffee plateaux in your gumboots of pleasant wages The way Jarasandha's genital is bisected and diamond glow Skill of beating up is the only wisdom in misery I play the burgler's stick like a flute brittle affection of thev wax-skin apple She-ants undress their wings before copulating I thump my thighs with alternate shrieks: VACATE THE UNIVERSE get out you omnicompetent conchshell in scratching monkeyhand lotus and mace and discuss-blade Let there be salt-rebellion of your own saline sweat along the gunpowder let the flint run towards explosion Marketeers of words daubed in darkness in the midnight filled with young dog's grief in the sicknoon of a grasshopper sunk in insecticide I reappear to exhibit the charm of the stiletto. (Translation of Bengali poem 'Prostuti')

she feels lucky to have a job, but she is pretty blunt about what it is like to work at Walmart: she hates it. She’s worked at the local Walmart for nine years now, spending long hours on her feet waiting on customers and wrestling heavy merchandise around the store. But that’s not the part that galls her. Last year, management told the employees that they would get a significant raise. While driving to work or sorting laundry, Gina thought about how she could spend that extra money. Do some repairs around the house. Or set aside a few dollars in case of an emergency. Or help her sons, because “that’s what moms do.” And just before drifting off to sleep, she’d think about how she hadn’t had any new clothes in years. Maybe, just maybe. For weeks, she smiled at the notion. She thought about how Walmart was finally going to show some sign of respect for the work she and her coworkers did. She rolled the phrase over in her mind: “significant raise.” She imagined what that might mean. Maybe $2.00 more an hour? Or $2.50? That could add up to $80 a week, even $100. The thought was delicious. Then the day arrived when she received the letter informing her of the raise: 21 cents an hour. A whopping 21 cents. For a grand total of $1.68 a day, $8.40 a week. Gina described holding the letter and looking at it and feeling like it was “a spit in the face.” As she talked about the minuscule raise, her voice filled with anger. Anger, tinged with fear. Walmart could dump all over her, but she knew she would take it. She still needed this job. They could treat her like dirt, and she would still have to show up. And that’s exactly what they did. In 2015, Walmart made $14.69 billion in profits, and Walmart’s investors pocketed $10.4 billion from dividends and share repurchases—and Gina got 21 cents an hour more. This isn’t a story of shared sacrifice. It’s not a story about a company that is struggling to keep its doors open in tough times. This isn’t a small business that can’t afford generous raises. Just the opposite: this is a fabulously wealthy company making big bucks off the Ginas of the world. There are seven members of the Walton family, Walmart’s major shareholders, on the Forbes list of the country’s four hundred richest people, and together these seven Waltons have as much wealth as about 130 million other Americans. Seven people—not enough to fill the lineup of a softball team—and they have more money than 40 percent of our nation’s population put together. Walmart routinely squeezes its workers, not because it has to, but because it can. The idea that when the company does well, the employees do well, too, clearly doesn’t apply to giants like this one. Walmart is the largest employer in the country. More than a million and a half Americans are working to make this corporation among the most profitable in the world. Meanwhile, Gina points out that at her store, “almost all the young people are on food stamps.” And it’s not just her store. Across the country, Walmart pays such low wages that many of its employees rely on food stamps, rent assistance, Medicaid, and a mix of other government benefits, just to stay out of poverty. The

It was about time he opened his eyes to see just to whom he was speaking. After several quick blinks, he managed to do just that, gazing up into a small, heart-shaped face. A pretty face. Not one of a curvy seductress or a cool-hearted courtesan, but a feminine, delicately featured face. He knew this face. He adored this face. "Miss Charlotte Greene," he stated finally, taking a risk and raising his head to get a better look. Sitting at his side, the white skirt of her thick night rail tucked around her legs, she smiled down at him with concerned eyes of deep blue. Gorgeous sapphire eyes often hidden behind the rims of small, round spectacles. Truthfully, she happened to be the complete opposite of what he was usually attracted to. She was a bit too thin, too short, and too quiet for his tastes, which had always leaned toward the voluptuous, the tall, and the spirited. Normally, she wasn't one to stand out. And he rather suspected she preferred it that way. However, while most young bucks readily discounted her merits and furtively joked about her quirky behavior behind her back, Rothbury had always sensed a subtle undercurrent of passion in her dark blue gaze. Unlike the "diamonds" of the ton and demimonde, who slinked across assembly rooms completely aware of their beauty and the power that accompanied it, Miss Greene moved like a woman who hadn't yet realized how utterly fetching she truly was. She clung to the walls, sometimes barely raising her eyes from the floor, rarely spoke but to her closest friends, and shied away from situations that demanded she converse with the opposite sex. Strange it was for him to notice those facets in such an unassuming woman. Strange it was he should have noticed her at all. But he always did. The second she walked into a room.

Why did you come here-that is, why did you agree to reconsider my proposal?” The question alarmed and startled her. Now that she’d seen him she had only the dimmest, possibly even erroneous recollection of having spoken to him at a ball. Moreover, she couldn’t tell him she was in danger of being cut off by her uncle, for that whole explanation was to humiliating to bear mentioning. “Did I do or say something during our brief meetings the year before last to mislead you, perhaps, into believing I might yearn for the city life?” “It’s hard to say,” Elizabeth said with absolute honesty. “Lady Cameron, do you even remember our meeting?” “Oh, yes, of course. Certainly,” Elizabeth replied, belatedly recalling a man who looked very like him being presented to her at Lady Markham’s. That was it! “We met at Lady Markham’s ball.” His gaze never left her face. “We met in the park.” “In the park?” Elizabeth repeated in sublime embarrassment. “You had stopped to admire the flowers, and the young gentleman who was your escort that day introduced us.” “I see,” Elizabeth replied, her gaze skating away from his. “Would you care to know what we discussed that day and the next day when I escorted you back to the park?” Curiosity and embarrassment warred, and curiosity won out. “Yes, I would.” “Fishing.” “F-fishing?” Elizabeth gasped. He nodded. “Within minutes after we were introduced I mentioned that I had not come to London for the Season, as you supposed, but that I was on my way to Scotland to do some fishing and was leaving London the very next day.” An awful feeling of foreboding crept over Elizabeth as something stirred in her memory. “We had a charming chat,” he continued. “You spoke enthusiastically of a particularly challenging trout you were once able to land.” Elizabeth’s face felt as hot as red coals as he continued, “We quite forgot the time and your poor escort as we shared fishing stories.” He was quiet, waiting, and when Elizabeth couldn’t endure the damning silence anymore she said uneasily, “Was there…more?” “Very little. I did not leave for Scotland the next day but stayed instead to call upon you. You abandoned the half-dozen young bucks who’d come to escort you to some sort of fancy soiree and chose instead to go for another impromptu walk in the park with me.” Elizabeth swallowed audibly, unable to meet his eyes. “Would you like to know what we talked about that day?” “No, I don’t think so.” He chucked but ignored her reply, “You professed to be somewhat weary of the social whirl and confessed to a longing to be in the country that day-which is why we went to the park. We had a charming time, I thought.” When he fell silent, Elizabeth forced herself to meet his gaze and say with resignation, “And we talked of fishing?” “No,” he said. “Of boar hunting.” Elizabeth closed her eyes in sublime shame. “You related an exciting tale of a wild board your father had shot long ago, and of how you watched the hunt-without permission-from the very tree below which the boar as ultimately felled. As I recall,” he finished kindly, “you told me that it was your impulsive cheer that revealed your hiding place to the hunters-and that caused you to be seriously reprimanded by your father.” Elizabeth saw the twinkle lighting his eyes, and suddenly they both laughed. “I remember your laugh, too,” he said, still smiling, “I thought it was the loveliest sound imaginable. So much so that between it and our delightful conversation I felt very much at ease in your company.” Realizing he’d just flattered her, he flushed, tugged at his neckcloth, and self-consciously looked away.

Paul H. Dunn, of the First Council of Seventy, spoke of McKay’s attitude toward those who were outside the mainstream—not in action, but in thought. After spending a decade as a teacher in the Institutes of Religion, Dunn was called by McKay to be a General Authority at the unusually young age of thirty-nine: Here I am a young buck coming into the system, and the circulation is, “Let’s excommunicate the Sterling McMurrins of the Church, and weed out the liberals.” That got thrown around a lot. Even poor Lowell Bennion got thrown into some of that. If it hadn’t been for President McKay, we’d have had a fiasco on Lowell Bennion. There’s one of the sweetest, great Christians of the world. I would be totally surprised if all of heaven isn’t a Lowell Bennion philosophy. There isn’t a kinder, more gentle Christian in the world. And yet there were those in the system who tried to weed him out, because he kept the President McKay kind of vision open…. The George Boyds and the Lowell Bennions kept people in the Church whom nobody else could have. Philosophically, they could go with you on the trip through your frustration in thinking, and bring you back. Not many people could do that. I worked with George for many years down at the University of Southern California. I watched him save kids that nobody else could. And yet there was that element in the Church that tried to get him bumped, because he didn’t teach what they taught. I’ve found in the Church, and this is what gave me great comfort with President McKay, that there is room for all of them, not just a few, not just those here or there, but the whole spectrum. President McKay would say, and two or three times I heard him say privately, and once or twice publicly in meetings where I sat, that “if you would have to take action on that kind of a person thinking that way, you’d better take action on me, too

She told him the origins of the “buck dance,” when “white people would come up and say ‘N____r, dance’, and then start shooting around the feet of blacks so that they would dance like everything.” 45 Big Ma was an important presence in Jimmy’s childhood and adolescence, and he credited her with giving him a unique and powerful sense of historical change. “When she talked about slavery,” he recalled, “she always talked not about how they freed the slaves, but about how [slaveholders] surrendered. There was a big difference. She saw the change as something that had been won by somebody, not something that had been given. She realized that there had been a struggle and that somebody had to lose.” 46 It would not take much for young Jimmy to see a historical connection and a continuity in struggle between these two moments—the buck dance that Big Ma witnessed in her childhood and the marauding Selma sheriff who came to town “shooting and raising Cain to see the colored folks run” during his childhood. Big Ma lived until the mid-1930s, when Jimmy was in his teens. By this time he could see new spaces of struggle emerging from shifts in the region’s economy and black people’s employment patterns. These shifts had impacted his family, specifically through his father’s work opportunities, and would shape his own prospects. Cotton continued to be an important part of the economy, both in the state and in the Black Belt region, but its significance declined relative to Alabama’s growing industrial economy. African Americans saw expanded employment opportunities, as labor shortages, strikes, and union organizing during the first two decades of the century led companies to open up jobs previously unavailable to black workers. The steel industry, which had previously satisfied its need for cheap labor with immigrant workers, came to rely heavily on black labor after World War I. 47

a young Goldman Sachs banker named Joseph Park was sitting in his apartment, frustrated at the effort required to get access to entertainment. Why should he trek all the way to Blockbuster to rent a movie? He should just be able to open a website, pick out a movie, and have it delivered to his door. Despite raising around $250 million, Kozmo, the company Park founded, went bankrupt in 2001. His biggest mistake was making a brash promise for one-hour delivery of virtually anything, and investing in building national operations to support growth that never happened. One study of over three thousand startups indicates that roughly three out of every four fail because of premature scaling—making investments that the market isn’t yet ready to support. Had Park proceeded more slowly, he might have noticed that with the current technology available, one-hour delivery was an impractical and low-margin business. There was, however, a tremendous demand for online movie rentals. Netflix was just then getting off the ground, and Kozmo might have been able to compete in the area of mail-order rentals and then online movie streaming. Later, he might have been able to capitalize on technological changes that made it possible for Instacart to build a logistics operation that made one-hour grocery delivery scalable and profitable. Since the market is more defined when settlers enter, they can focus on providing superior quality instead of deliberating about what to offer in the first place. “Wouldn’t you rather be second or third and see how the guy in first did, and then . . . improve it?” Malcolm Gladwell asked in an interview. “When ideas get really complicated, and when the world gets complicated, it’s foolish to think the person who’s first can work it all out,” Gladwell remarked. “Most good things, it takes a long time to figure them out.”* Second, there’s reason to believe that the kinds of people who choose to be late movers may be better suited to succeed. Risk seekers are drawn to being first, and they’re prone to making impulsive decisions. Meanwhile, more risk-averse entrepreneurs watch from the sidelines, waiting for the right opportunity and balancing their risk portfolios before entering. In a study of software startups, strategy researchers Elizabeth Pontikes and William Barnett find that when entrepreneurs rush to follow the crowd into hyped markets, their startups are less likely to survive and grow. When entrepreneurs wait for the market to cool down, they have higher odds of success: “Nonconformists . . . that buck the trend are most likely to stay in the market, receive funding, and ultimately go public.” Third, along with being less recklessly ambitious, settlers can improve upon competitors’ technology to make products better. When you’re the first to market, you have to make all the mistakes yourself. Meanwhile, settlers can watch and learn from your errors. “Moving first is a tactic, not a goal,” Peter Thiel writes in Zero to One; “being the first mover doesn’t do you any good if someone else comes along and unseats you.” Fourth, whereas pioneers tend to get stuck in their early offerings, settlers can observe market changes and shifting consumer tastes and adjust accordingly. In a study of the U.S. automobile industry over nearly a century, pioneers had lower survival rates because they struggled to establish legitimacy, developed routines that didn’t fit the market, and became obsolete as consumer needs clarified. Settlers also have the luxury of waiting for the market to be ready. When Warby Parker launched, e-commerce companies had been thriving for more than a decade, though other companies had tried selling glasses online with little success. “There’s no way it would have worked before,” Neil Blumenthal tells me. “We had to wait for Amazon, Zappos, and Blue Nile to get people comfortable buying products they typically wouldn’t order online.

Men traveling alone develop a romantic vertigo. Bech had already fallen in love with a freckled embassy wife in Russia, a buck-toothed chanteuse in Rumania, a stolid Mongolian sculptress in Kazakhstan. In the Tretyakov Gallery he had fallen in love with a recumbent statue, and at the Moscow Ballet School with an entire roomful of girls. Entering the room, he had been struck by the aroma, tenderly acrid, of young female sweat. Sixteen and seventeen, wearing patchy practice suits, the girls were twirling so strenuously their slippers were unraveling. Demure student faces crowned the unconscious insolence of their bodies. The room was doubled in depth by a floor-to-ceiling mirror. Bech was seated on a bench at its base. Staring above his head, each girl watched herself with frowning eyes frozen, for an instant in the turn, by the imperious delay and snap of her head. Bech tried to remember the lines of Rilke that expressed it, this snap and delay: did not the drawing remain/that the dark stroke of your eyebrow/swiftly wrote on the wall of its own turning? At one point the teacher, a shapeless old Ukrainian lady with gold canines, a prima of the thirties, had arisen and cried something translated to Bech as, “No, no, the arms free, free!” And in demonstration she had executed a rapid series of pirouettes with such proud effortlessness that all the girls, standing this way and that like deer along the wall, had applauded. Bech had loved them for that. In all his loves, there was an urge to rescue—to rescue the girls from the slavery of their exertions, the statue from the cold grip of its own marble, the embassy wife from her boring and unctuous husband, the chanteuse from her nightly humiliation (she could not sing), the Mongolian from her stolid race. But the Bulgarian poetess presented herself to him as needing nothing, as being complete, poised, satisfied, achieved. He was aroused and curious and, the next day, inquired about her of the man with the vaguely contemptuous mouth of a hare—a novelist turned playwright and scenarist, who accompanied him to the Rila Monastery. “She lives to write,” the playwright said. “I do not think it is healthy.

Inside the Mousery the smell was overpowering, but it is doubtful if any of the three noticed it. Down the center of the single long room ran a brick path on either side of which were shelves three deep, divided into roomy sections. The admiral stopped before one of them, ‘Golden Agouti’, he remarked. He took hold of a rectangular box, the front of which was wired; very slyly he lifted a lid set into the top panel, and lowered the cage so that the children might look in. Inside, midway between floor and lid was a smaller box five inches long; a little hole at one end of this inner box gave access to the interior of the cage, and from it a miniature ladder slanted down to the sawdust strewn floor. In this box were a number of little heaving pink lumps, by the side of which crouched a brownish mouse. Her beady eyes peered up anxiously, while the whiskers on her muzzle trembled. The admiral touched her gently with the tip of his little finger. ‘She’s a splendid doe’, he said affectionately; ‘a remarkably careful mother and not at all fussy!’ He shut the door and replaced the cage. ‘There’s a fine pair here’, he remarked, passing to a new section; ‘what about that for color!’ He put his hand into another cage and caught one of the occupants deftly by the tail. Holding the tail between his finger and thumb he let the mouse sprawl across the back of his other hand, slightly jerking the feet into position. The children gazed. ‘What color is that?’ they inquired. ‘Chocolate’, replied the admiral. ‘I rather fancy the Self varieties, there’s something so well-bred looking about them; for my part I don’t think a mouse can show his figure if he’s got a pied pelt on him, it detracts. Now this buck for instance, look at his great size, graceful too, very gracefully built, legs a little coarse perhaps, but an excellent tail, a perfect whipcord, no knots, no kinks, a lovely taper to the point!’ The mouse began to scramble. ‘Gently, gently!’ murmured the admiral, shaking it back into position. He eyed it with approbation, then dropped it back into its cage, where it scurried up the ladder and vanished into its bedroom. They passed from cage to cage; into some he would only let them peep lest the does with young should get irritable; from others he withdrew the inmates, displaying them on his hand. ‘Now this’, he told them, catching a grey-blue mouse. ‘This is worth your looking at carefully. Here we have

Real Quick" [Intro:] Valuable lesson, man I had to grow up That's why I never ask for help I'll do it for you niggaz and do it for myself [Chorus:] I go 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, whole squad on that real shit 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, real fuckin quick nigga 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, whole squad on that real shit 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, real fuckin quick nigga! [50 Cent:] I'll run my blade 'cross a nigga ass {"real quick"} I'm so for real I'm on some real real nigga shit You playin boy I'll get you hit {"real quick"} You better hope the parademics come {"real quick"} Got me fucked up you think it's different now a nigga rich Before I get to cuttin know you niggaz better cut the shit Boy, you gon' have ya head popped, pull a trigger for me And my lil' niggaz trigger op' like it's legal homie No game when I bang, boy I empty the clip You run like a bitch, you ain't 'bout that shit Hey hey hey hey, I'll catch you another day day day day It's the Unit back to the bullshit [Tony Yayo:] Yeah! Nothin in life is out of bounds AK hold about a hundred rounds 60 shots like K.D. at the Rucker's Okay! When I see you on respirators Southside nigga 'til the day I'm gone Indulge in the violence when the drama on Yeah, these rap niggaz lukewarm I'm two sleeves of dope, when the mic on [Chorus] [Kidd Kidd:] Real quick, Rida Gang fuck nigga, huh! Don't Tweet me, see me when you see me Down to make the news just to say that I'm on TV (Kidd Kidd) This clip rated R, niggaz PG Them shells burn like a bootleg CD (huh?) Fuck love, I want the money When you get too much of it they gon' say you actin funny "Kidd, how you feel now that the Unit's back?" Like a million bucks, muh'fucker do the math! [Young Buck:] Cold-blooded, boy my heart don't feel shit Get with me, ask 50, I'll take the hit {"real quick"} Balenciagas, you can still get ya ass kicked Take a rapper nigga bitch and make a real flick I know I'm different from what you usually be dealin with Don't need a mic, give me some white to make a million with Single borough, six shots on the Brooklyn Bridge I'll let the nigga Drake tell you what I just did (yeah) [Chorus] [Lloyd Banks:] Nigga gettin money new to you (uh) I give a fuck if shit get ugly, there'll be a beautiful funeral You fit the script I'm gon' assume it's true Can't manuever through the street without a strategy, ain't nobody to tutor you And man was lucky Unit's through, you know why he flows 15 years, switchin dealers like casinos And my goon'll clip you on the arm (uhh) I'm out the country every week and dumpin ash out on the Autobahn Auto-pilot's always on Rather better livin, I've been [?] green bills callin me all day long This is homicide, more tears in your mama eyes More reason to wake up, real niggaz arrive [Chorus]

When I swung open the door, there he was: Marlboro Man, wearing Wranglers and a crisp white shirt and boots. And a sweet, heart-melting smile. What are you doing here? I thought. You’re supposed to be in the shower. You’re supposed to be with the sex kitten. “Hey,” he said, wasting no time in stepping through the door and winding his arms around my waist. My arms couldn’t help but drape over his strong shoulders; my lips couldn’t help but find his. He felt soft, warm, safe…and our first kiss turned into a third, and a sixth, and a seventh. It was the same kiss as the night before, when the phone call alerting him to the fire had come. My eyes remained tightly closed as I savored every second, trying to reconcile the present with the horror movie I’d imagined just moments earlier. I had no idea what was going on. At that point, I didn’t even care. “Ummmmm!!! I’m t-t-t-ttellin’!” Mike teased from the top of the stairs, just before running down and embracing Marlboro Man in a bear hug. “Hi, Mike,” Marlboro Man said, politely patting him on the back. “Mike?” I said, smiling and blinking my eyes. “Will you excuse us for a couple of minutes?” Mike obliged, giggling and oooo-ing as he walked toward the kitchen. Marlboro Man picked me up and brought my eyes to the level of his. Smiling, he said, “I’ve been trying to call you this afternoon.” “You have?” I said. I hadn’t even heard the phone ring. “I, um…I sort of took a nine-hour nap.” Marlboro Man chuckled. Oh, that chuckle. I needed it badly that night. He set my feet back down on the floor. “So…,” he teased. “You still cranky?” “Nope,” I finally answered, smiling. So, who is that woman in your house? So…what did you do all day? “Did you ever get any sleep?” So, who is that woman in your house? “Well,” he began. “I had to help Tim with something this morning, then I crashed on the couch for a few hours…it felt pretty good.” Who was the woman? What’s her name? What’s her cup size? He continued. “I would’ve slept all day, but Katie and her family showed up in the middle of my nap,” he said. “I forgot they were staying at my house tonight.” Katie. His cousin Katie. The one with the two young kids, who had probably just gone to bed when I’d called earlier. “Oh…really?” I said, my chest relaxing with a long, quiet exhale. “Yeah…but it’s a little crowded over there,” he said. “I thought I’d come over here and take you to a movie.” I smiled, stroking his back with my hand. “A movie sounds perfect.” The busty, bronze mystery girl slowly faded into oblivion. Mike came barreling out of the kitchen, where he’d been listening to every word. “Hey--if you guys are goin’ to the movie, c-c-c-can you drive me to the mall?” he yelled. “Sure, Mike,” Marlboro Man said. “We’ll drive you to the mall. It’ll cost you ten bucks, though.” And as the three of us made our way outside to Marlboro Man’s diesel pickup, I had to bite my lip to keep myself from articulating the only seven words in the English language that were in my vocabulary at that moment: God help me--I love that man.

Once it had been simple. Civil rights supporters knew who their enemies were: special interests such as the real estate associations (who lobbied against the Mathias compromise for making something evil “palatable to the American people”). The lunatic far right (the executive director of the Liberty Lobby testified that King’s movement employed “mass brainwashing” just like “in Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Communist Russia, and Communist China”). The old-line racist Dixie gargoyles (they kept on rehearsing for a revival of Birth of a Nation: Senator George Smathers wondering why “when a colored boy rapes a white girl, he gets off easier”; Representative William C. Cramer raising the specter of the “Social Security widow in my district” forced to rent to a black man—and you could almost picture the lusty young buck he had in mind). This opposition was predictable. The curveball was the new opposition: the Pucinskis and the Rostenkowskis; the Jerry Fords, moderate Republicans who used to be the backbone of every civil rights vote. Now, the Dixie gargoyles were gloating, an ancient piece of Southern political folk wisdom was receiving its vindication: that once civil rights bills started affecting North as much as South, it wouldn’t just be Southerners filibustering civil rights bills.

and they looked with coming hatred and with fear upon this young man, saying in their hearts they knew he lied, because they could not believe there was in the whole world a man who would choose an earthen house when he might have a great one.

Dollars to donuts you’re looking at ODs there,” said Kemper, pointing to some young people getting out of cars and heading to one of the gravesites. “Over eighty thousand people in America this year alone,” she added. “More than died in Vietnam and the wars in the Middle East combined. And far more than die in traffic accidents or by guns, and it’s only getting worse. Next year we’ll probably be looking at over a hundred thousand dead. The opioid crisis is actually responsible for the life expectancy in this country starting to go down. Can you wrap your head around that? Nearly a half million dead since 2000. Drug overdoses are the leading cause of death for Americans under age fifty. We had a recent study done at DEA. Life insurance companies value a human life at about five million bucks. Using that number and other factors, our people projected the economic loss to the country each year due to the opioid crisis at about a hundred billion dollars. A third of the population is on medication for pain. And they’re not getting addicted on street corners. They’re getting addicted at their doctors’ offices.” “From prescription painkillers.

There’s a great story that Roger Hawkins tells. He’s the drummer on some of Aretha Franklin’s most iconic songs, like “Respect” and “Chain of Fools.” As part of a group of studio musicians in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, he was drumming on hugely important R&B songs when he was just a teenager, far too young to have any sense of, or ego about, his talent. So one day Hawkins was playing on a session that Jerry Wexler from Atlantic Records was producing. Out of the blue, Hawkins claims, Wexler walked down from the control room and into the studio and told him, “Roger, you are a great drummer.” Wexler wasn’t involved in some larger conversation with Hawkins. He just wanted to tell him. Hawkins’s reaction to it, in his own words: “So I became one.” That story always made sense to me. I’ve had that same moment of feeling like everything’s changed because of one compliment, one tiny bit of encouragement. That, in a nutshell, is what Peter Buck did for me. Not that he ever walked into the studio just to tell me how great I was. No, but he made me feel like an equal.

She shook her head. “I don’t know one pretty young man from the other,” she declared.

I’m a good dog,” says Lynch. “Woof, woof! I had fun. I did exactly what you’d expect a young fucking buck to do when he’s off the leash. He fucking runs, shits everywhere, and has a ball. You’re supposed to go, ‘Get ’em, Bosco!’ You’re not supposed to train him.

the moose easily stomped past him, crashing through the thick wall of willows and into the pond.

Younger Kindred often thought it was a big deal to steal stupid things just because they were vampires, but Lucita had found that it was the stupid things that most often led to trouble. Steal some gas and you piss of the station owner. Piss off the station owner and he calls the cops. The cops get called, they look for you, and all of a sudden feeding without complications becomes nigh impossible (because God knows that a cop would rather look for a gas thief than mix it up with someone likely to be packing, or interrupt a domestic disturbance). And so it went, and it was easier to pay the twelve bucks and avoid complications. If the situation had demanded, she would have had no compunction about killing the old man and putting his blood to good use, but since the situation didn’t warrant such, there was no point to causing trouble for herself. After all, normal young ladies who did normal things tended to fade from the memory of those that saw them—and Lucita didn’t like to be remembered. That was the whole logic behind the damn Masquerade, to be honest. It wasn’t because there were any vampires out there who were “good guys” (though some folks spent years, decades, or even centuries trying to play the role) and the Masquerade was some great and altruistic thing done for the sake of humanity. No, it made working easier. It made feeding easier. And it meant less competition and fewer hassles from kine with torches and shotguns. So few kindred on either side of the fence understood that. It wasn’t about kowtowing to the Antedeluvians or keeping the world safe for poor fragile humanity. It was about getting things done with a minimum of effort. There was no idealism involved. Lucita just liked avoiding unnecessary complications.

They were young no more, their passion spent unused, but the memory of love remained eternal. Indeed, her mellowed heart was more tender now than ever toward him and there was nothing left that she could not forgive him.

The time had come for him to use a dangerous weapon. “Venerable,” he said, “if the Emperor’s manhood was destroyed, how is it that he begot a son and one so sturdy as the young Emperor?

Leverage is the overachiever’s approach to getting more bang for her proverbial buck. It’s how brand-new startups scale and young sci-fi geeks become movie directors. It’s how below-average school systems turn around and revolutions are won. It’s how surfers take championships and artists go from homeless to the Grammys.

A Jew ain't only a religion, and it ain't a race. It isn't an ethnicity, and you aren't disqualified if you're good at spreading mayonnaise on white bread or bad at money or good at sports or bad at guilt. It ain't about whether your mother is Jewish or your father converted or both parents fasted on Yom Kippur. It don't matter if you were bar or bat mitzvahed, or if your grandma's recipe for chicken soup kicked Campbell's ass, or any of that. It ain't about a toe in Israel, or an opinion on Palestine, or an uncle who died of a heart attack in Brooklyn or Queens, or a family story from Ellis Island, or an aunt who was murdered by nazis or Russian pogromchiks, or whether or not three-fifths of your person is scared shitless of Auggie's "schvartzes," or at least the young bucks you see walking with guns out and half their pants down.

Brave young American men climbed the rugged slopes of Korean mountains and fought in homesickness and desperate weariness for the sake of a people strange to them and for reasons they scarcely understood, even when they yielded up their lives. With such noble impulse and final sacrifice, let the past be forgot, except for what it teaches for the future.

which owed $1.3 million to the Marine National Bank, premised on fictitious collateral. Of such knowledge, Grant was as innocent as a child. Still hobbling on crutches, he agreed to see William H. Vanderbilt and plead with him for $150,000. The son of Commodore Vanderbilt, and heir to a vast railroad empire, William was a heavyset man with flaring sideburns. Unlike Grant, he paid dutiful attention to business. At first Grant balked at borrowing from Vanderbilt, afraid he wouldn’t be repaid at once. But Ward insisted that Grant would simply be swapping guaranteed checks with Vanderbilt. Grabbing his crutches, Grant escorted Ward and Buck to Vanderbilt’s palatial Fifth Avenue residence. Receiving the group in his ornate home, Vanderbilt was startled by their request. He had never done such a thing before, he said, but he revered Grant and handed him a check for $150,000. In exchange, Grant gave him a Grant & Ward check with the proviso that he not cash it for a day or two. With Vanderbilt’s check in hand, Ward assured Grant everything was now fine. The former two-term president and hero of the Civil War had been reduced to an errand boy for a young charlatan. When a friend called on him that evening, Grant was in a cheerful mood and invited him to attend a poker game that Tuesday night. “Ward is certainly

So take three instances at random. A young white college sophomore throws a Molotov cocktail that burns down a black-owned deli, and he does this because he wants to register his deep dissatisfaction with the police treatment of blacks in that city. Or another person, as timid as they come, is out for a walk on a bike path, two miles out of town, all by herself, and she is wearing a mask. Or someone else thinks that it can cost two dollars to get a gallon of milk to market, but also thinks that we can make the make the greedster grocer sell it for a buck fifty, and yet still have milk on the shelf. What do these, and countless other instances, have in common? What they all have in common is that these people received a lousy education. As we watch this great parade of duncical folly every night on the news, one thought should come back to haunt us with every fresh insult to right reason. And that thought should be, "Who educated these people?" And the follow-up question should be, "And why haven't they been sacked?

Around 5 in the morning, I walked back, plowing through the snow to my parents' home, and I thought, "Wouldn't it be nice; I'll shovel the walk—young tribal buck shovels the walk." So I started to shovel the walk and my parents' faces appeared at the upstairs window. "Come to bed, you idiot. Nobody shovels snow at 5 in the morning." And I looked up at them and I heard the external voice I had been listening to for 30 years, and inside me, something said, "It's all right to shovel snow and it's all right to be happy." And I looked up at them and I laughed and did a jig and went back to shoveling snow. And they closed the windows and then I looked up and inside they were smiling too. That was my first experience of giving a contact high! But also, you can see in that moment in the early morning the seeds of the breakaway. The seeds of the ability to be able to confront, and even disagree with, an existing institution and know and trust that inside place that says it's all right.

Let’s switch gears. I have a question for you, Darren. As a young Black man, how are you able to go into work and sell a product you know has the potential to kill young women, especially young Black women, like Donesha Clark?

They say he goes to it with every stable boy and every young buck at the court, and where will that get him when all know it is a sin in the eyes of the Lord, and one day the devil will stick a red-hot poker up his nether parts for all damnation.

Lenny had twelve residential clients in the small town of New Brighton deep in the Adirondack Mountains. He plowed them out for twenty-five bucks a pop. Most of them were older people; all the young ones either had their own plows or shoveled out by hand.

be and often is a private sector, for-profit activity. How might someone make a buck and also reduce drunk driving? It took hours in Wisconsin bars talking to young men for Michael Rothschild of the University of Wisconsin School of Business to hone a winning formula. His grand insight? Use limousines.

So when can I meet your young man?” “He isn’t my young man.” Anna shook her head, rose, and found something fascinating to stare at out the window. “He was my employer, and he is a gentleman, so he and his brothers came to my aid.” “Fine-looking fellow,” Grandmama remarked innocently. “You’ve met him?” “Morgan and I ran into him and his younger brother when she took me to the park yesterday. Couple of handsome devils. In my day, bucks like that would have been brought to heel.” “This isn’t your day”—Anna smiled—“but as you are widowed, you shouldn’t feel compelled to exercise restraint on my behalf.” “Your dear grandfather gave me permission to remarry, you know.” Grandmother peered at a tray of sweets as she spoke. “At the time, I told him I could never love another, and I won’t—not in the way I loved him.” “But?” Anna turned curious eyes on her grandmother and waited. “But he knew me better than I know myself. Life is short, Anna James, but it can be long and short at the same time if you’re lonely. I think that was part of your brother’s problem.” “What do you mean?” Anna asked, not wanting to point out the premature use of the past tense. “He was too alone up there in Yorkshire.” Grandmother bit into a chocolate. “The only boy, then being raised by an old man, too isolated. There’s a reason boys are sent off to school at a young age. Put all those barbarians together, and they somehow civilize each other.” “Westhaven wasn’t sent to school until he was fourteen,” Anna said. “He is quite civilized, as are his brothers.” “Civilized, handsome, well heeled, titled.” Grandmother looked up from the tray of sweets. “What on earth is not to like?” Anna

2014 Continuation of Andy’s message   On a different note, this is how I remember Baron Pierre’s 1967 ‘G’ A-go-go soiree. Like you, I had no idea where the busload of young bucks and sassy striplings had come from. All I knew was that I was tempted to bed a number of them.☺ Hence, I asked Dubois to watch you during and after your go-go performance. Yet somehow, your professor neglected to tell me that he had presented you to a mystery admirer, who tailgated us all the way to London and Daltonbury Hall after your encounter. He would have abducted you to god only knows where if I hadn’t told him to back off.

It may be that mothers have a hard time discerning between when sons need comforting and when they need bucking up. Here's a rule of thumb: If he hasn't faced the trial yet, or he's in the midst of it - encourage him. If he's been to the wars and is limping home wounded - comfort him. Once the wounds are bound up, encourage him to rise and face the fight again.

We proceeded into the bedchamber. It became immediately clear that he was the aggressor. Rizq was a handsome and virile young buck, with stubble.

Well?" "Is that — a proposal?" "It is trying to be a proposal.  I can rephrase it, if you wish." She could only stare at him.  "Oh, Damon!" "Shall I rephrase it?  I can bow over your hand like a gallant young buck and say, 'My dear Lady Simms, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?'  That is the traditional approach. Or — " She giggled, drinking him up with her eyes, loving every inch of him. " — I can do it as a pirate might, by sweeping you off your feet and carrying you straight to the nearest clergyman without giving you a chance to deny me —" She laughed, and reached out to swat playfully at his shoulder.  "And how might the Black Wolf do it?" He stared at her, momentarily taken aback.  Then, swiftly recovering, he smiled and murmured, "I suppose he would kidnap you and wrap you in his black cape, and adopt much the same method as would our pirate." "And how do you know he has a black cape?" "Well, if I were the Black Wolf, I'd certainly wear a black cape." "Oh, Damon.  I do so wish you'd ravish me." "Consent to be my marchioness, and I shall consider it.

Real Quick [Intro:] Valuable lesson, man I had to grow up That's why I never ask for help I'll do it for you niggaz and do it for myself [Chorus:] I go 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, whole squad on that real shit 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, real fuckin quick nigga 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, whole squad on that real shit 0 to 100 nigga, real quick Real quick, real fuckin quick nigga! [50 Cent:] I'll run my blade 'cross a nigga ass {"real quick"} I'm so for real I'm on some real real nigga shit You playin boy I'll get you hit {"real quick"} You better hope the parademics come {"real quick"} Got me fucked up you think it's different now a nigga rich Before I get to cuttin know you niggaz better cut the shit Boy, you gon' have ya head popped, pull a trigger for me And my lil' niggaz trigger op' like it's legal homie No game when I bang, boy I empty the clip You run like a bitch, you ain't 'bout that shit Hey hey hey hey, I'll catch you another day day day day It's the Unit back to the bullshit [Tony Yayo:] Yeah! Nothin in life is out of bounds AK hold about a hundred rounds 60 shots like K.D. at the Rucker's Okay! When I see you on respirators Southside nigga 'til the day I'm gone Indulge in the violence when the drama on Yeah, these rap niggaz lukewarm I'm two sleeves of dope, when the mic on [Chorus] [Kidd Kidd:] Real quick, Rida Gang fuck nigga, huh! Don't Tweet me, see me when you see me Down to make the news just to say that I'm on TV (Kidd Kidd) This clip rated R, niggaz PG Them shells burn like a bootleg CD (huh?) Fuck love, I want the money When you get too much of it they gon' say you actin funny "Kidd, how you feel now that the Unit's back?" Like a million bucks, muh'fucker do the math! [Young Buck:] Cold-blooded, boy my heart don't feel shit Get with me, ask 50, I'll take the hit {"real quick"} Balenciagas, you can still get ya ass kicked Take a rapper nigga bitch and make a real flick I know I'm different from what you usually be dealin with Don't need a mic, give me some white to make a million with Single borough, six shots on the Brooklyn Bridge I'll let the nigga Drake tell you what I just did (yeah) [Chorus] [Lloyd Banks:] Nigga gettin money new to you (uh) I give a fuck if shit get ugly, there'll be a beautiful funeral You fit the script I'm gon' assume it's true Can't manuever through the street without a strategy, ain't nobody to tutor you And man was lucky Unit's through, you know why he flows 15 years, switchin dealers like casinos And my goon'll clip you on the arm (uhh) I'm out the country every week and dumpin ash out on the Autobahn Auto-pilot's always on Rather better livin, I've been [?] green bills callin me all day long This is homicide, more tears in your mama eyes More reason to wake up, real niggaz arrive [Chorus]

Ian and Sarah’s new open carriage rolled through Hyde Park several days later on an unusually warm, sunny afternoon in early May, past the debutantes and their mamas eager to see and be seen and young bucks and rogues doing the same. Children played on the lawn with their nurses and governesses ever watchful

tilted her head in gentle inquiry. Lavinia’s laugh floated on the autumn breeze. Thomas wanted suddenly to shout at Lady Hero, to make that gentle expression fall from her face, to shake her until she quit her questions and her perceptive looks, and then he wanted to jump from the carriage and plant a facer in that stupid young buck with Lavinia. But he did none of that, of course. Gentlemen of his rank never acted in such a way. Instead, he merely urged the horses on, waiting interminably to pass Lavinia’s carriage. “She’s in my past,” he said through cold lips. “I met her when I was rather down, I’m afraid.” He remembered when he was the man who she laughed up at, the way it had made his chest swell. And he remembered the sight of her in the morning light, so carnal, so wise. He’d been able to see every single line in her face, the slight sag to her breasts, and strangely it hadn’t made a whit of difference. She’d been

Do you fancy catching a movie at the Sturbridge Theater tonight? That new Robert Pattinson movie is showing,” I ask her, the phone cradled against my chest. “Definitely sign me up for that!” Ari replies, chuckling as I mock scowl. Her easy laugh warms my soul. “We’re in,” I tell Gil, arranging to meet him and his date in the diner later. “So, who is it this time?” Ari asks, resting her chin in her hands. “Anyone we know?” Considering I can count the girls on one hand who have enjoyed more than one date with Gil, I doubt it’ll be someone familiar. “I didn’t ask; guess we’ll find out soon enough.” “Five bucks says it’s a blonde,” Ari quips. “That’s one bet I’m not taking,” I admit, twirling a lock of her hair around my finger. “Gil’s penchant for blondes is world-renowned.

Uber, a car service start-up founded by Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp, has been giving out free rides during Austin’s SXSW conference for several years. During a single week, thousands of potential Uber customers—tech-obsessed, high-income young adults who cannot find a cab—are motivated to try out this service. One year Uber offered free rides. Another year, it offered BBQ delivery. Instead of spending millions on advertising or countless resources trying to reach these potential users in their respective cities, Uber just waited for the one week a year when they were all in one place and did something special. And Uber did this because a few years earlier they’d watched Twitter take SXSW by storm with a similar collaboration with the conference. This is thinking like a growth hacker—it’s how you get the most bang for your buck and how you get it from the right people.

Speaking of those children...."  He tried to turn his head within the curve of Juliet's arm so that he could look at Charlotte. "It appears that one of them ... is yours." "Yes, my daughter. She's just over six months." "Will you lift her up so I may see her? I adore children." Juliet hesitated, thinking that sleeping babes were best left alone. But it was not in her to deny the wishes of a man who might very well be dying. Carefully, she picked up the infant and held her so that Gareth could see her. Charlotte whimpered and opened her eyes. Immediately, the lines of pain about Gareth's mouth relaxed. Smiling weakly, he reached up and ran his fingers over one of the tiny fists, unaware that he was touching his own niece. A lump rose in Juliet's throat. It was not hard at all to imagine that he was Charles, reaching up to touch his daughter. Not hard at all. "You're just ... as pretty as your mama," he murmured. "A few more years ... and all the young bucks shall be after you ... like hounds to the fox."  To Juliet he said, "What is her name?" "Charlotte."  The baby was wide awake now and tugging at the lace of his sleeve. "Charlotte. Such a pretty name ... and where is your papa, little Charlie-girl? Should he ... not be here to ... protect you and your mama?" Juliet stiffened. His innocent words had slammed a fresh bolt of pain through her. Tight-lipped, she pried the lace from Charlotte's fist and cradled her close. Deprived of her amusement, the baby screwed up her face and began to wail at the top of her lungs while Juliet stared out the window, her mouth set and her hand clenched in a desperate bid to control her emotions. Gareth managed to make himself heard over Charlotte's angry screams. "I am sorry. I think I have offended you, somehow...." "No." "Then what is it?" "Her papa's dead." "Oh. I, ah ... I see."  He looked distressed, and remorse stole the brightness that Charlotte had brought to his eyes. "I am sorry, madam. I am forever saying the wrong thing, I fear." Charlotte was now crying harder, beating her fists and kicking her feet in protest. The blanket fell away. Juliet attempted to put it back. Charlotte screamed louder, her angry squalls filling the coach until Juliet felt like crying herself. She made a noise of helpless despair. "Here ... set her on your lap, beside my head," Lord Gareth said at last. "She can play with my cravat." "No, you're hurt." He smiled. "And your daughter is crying. Oblige me, and she will stop."  He stretched a hand toward the baby, offering his fingers, but she batted him away and continued to wail. "I'm told I have a way ... with children." With a sigh, Juliet did as he asked. Immediately, Charlotte quieted and fell to playing with his cravat.

What in hell would you know of ladies?" Travis asked, disgruntled by the exchange. Cade raised his head, much as a buffalo might when aroused to danger. "My mother was a lady. What about yours?" Before Lily could do anything unladylike like slinging the plate she had in her hand, Ephraim put a halt to the bickering. "I don't think either of you is impressing anybody." He turned to his daughter. "Lily, I think it's about time you started making some choices before somebody gets killed. If you've got your heart set on staying here instead of coming home with me, you have to settle on one man and get it over with—unless you like watching grown men behave like young bucks and challenging each other." Lily sent her father a furious look. "I could just tell the lot of them to get the hell out and leave me alone, and that includes you, too. I'm sick to death of men telling me what to do." Cade

February 16 The Inspiration of Spiritual Initiative Arise from the dead. Ephesians 5:14 All initiative is not inspired. A man may say to you—“Buck up, take your disinclination by the throat, throw it overboard, and walk out into the thing!” That is ordinary human initiative. But when the Spirit of God comes in and says, in effect, “Buck up,” we find that the initiative is inspired. We all have any number of visions and ideals when we are young, but sooner or later we find that we have no power to make them real. We cannot do the things we long to do, and we are apt to settle down to the visions and ideals as dead, and God has to come and say—“Arise from the dead.” When the inspiration of God does come, it comes with such miraculous power that we are able to arise from the dead and do the impossible thing. The remarkable thing about spiritual initiative is that the life comes after we do the “bucking up.” God does not give us overcoming life; He gives us life as we overcome. When the inspiration of God comes, and He says—“Arise from the dead,” we have to get up; God does not lift us up. Our Lord said to the man with the withered hand—“Stretch forth thy hand,” and as soon as the man did so, his hand was healed, but he had to take the initiative. If we will do the overcoming, we shall find we are inspired of God because He gives life immediately.

Irene forgot to depress the clutch when she keyed the ignition. The I-H lurched forward, then stalled. Luckily it had been rolling the roads of western Maine since the mid-sixties and it was the sedate jump of an elderly mare rather than the spirited buck of a colt; otherwise Chip McAvoy would once more have lost at least one of his plate-glass windows. Oy scrabbled for balance on Jake’s lap and sprayed out a mouthful of turkey along with a word he had learned from Eddie. Irene stared at the bumbler with wide, startled eyes. “Did that creature just say fuck, young man?

Don’t be so hard on yourself,” said Ellie. “Sometimes it’s difficult for us to comprehend God’s plan, especially when it involves the death of someone so young. But God put Lewis here for a reason, and he called him home for a reason, and if you believe there’s a God in heaven, and I do with all my heart, you must trust that he knows what he’s doing.

The Little Cowboy That Could" Once upon a time, in a dusty, sunbaked town, there was a little cowboy named Cody. Unlike the other cowboys who rode tall in the saddle, Cody was just a young buck with a small pony. Every day, he watched the seasoned cowboys and wished he could wrangle and ride as well as they did. One evening, as the sun dipped low, Old Man Moon peered down and saw Cody looking downhearted. "Why the long face, little cowboy?" asked the Moon. "I'm not as skilled as the others. I want to be a great cowboy too," Cody replied. The Moon chuckled softly and said, "Every cowboy has his day to shine. You've got a special spirit within you, and one day, it'll show." Bolstered by the Moon's words, Cody decided to try harder. He started by helping a lost calf find its way back to the herd. Then, he practiced lassoing as best as he could to help round up the steers. With every good deed, he felt a proud warmth inside. Days turned into weeks, and Cody kept on working hard. One night, as he helped a little lost pup find its way back to the ranch, he felt a sudden glow. Cody looked down and saw the pup wagging its tail, looking up at him with grateful eyes. The pup barked as if to say, "Thank you, little cowboy, for guiding me home." At that moment, Cody felt a burst of happiness and, to his surprise, he found himself riding and roping better than ever before. All the other cowboys noticed and cheered, "Look, Cody is riding like a true cowboy!" From that day on, Cody became known as the cowboy who rode the brightest, not just with his skills, but with his kindness and heart. And he learned that it's not just about how well you ride, but about the help you bring to others' lives. And so, Cody continues to ride, reminding everyone that even the smallest cowboy can make a big difference.

Well, of course," Camilo said, and grinned back at JohnRolandJoseph and his long line of bought and paid for ancestors, as friendly and unselfconscious as though all her life she had been looking for men, black men, big black men--plantation bucks (stud) look at his thighs, look at that back, look at his dingle-dangle--as though all her life she had been looking for colored men to whom she was not married, to whom she would never be married because she was already married to a nice young white man, as though all her life she had told uniformed monkeys who pulled elevators in rundown colored hotels, in Harlem, that she couldn't find, had lost, misplaced, a gentleman of color named Williams.

We keep quiet with unsolicited opinions, to let a woman hear her own voice.

he wanted to live this here life at full tilt, with a little danger thrown in to spice it up, something to remember when he sat on his rocker and played with his grandkids. They’d be looking at an old man smiling like a fool, while he’d be remembering the young buck who’d run through the Tulsa night with Jessie and danced just enough on the other side of the law to say it didn’t own him.

Ms. Buck, I feel like a corpse this morning. What do you advise?" Belva raised an eyebrow. "You might try putting down the bottle one of these nights." Lee was ready for this. "That might help long term, but I'm looking for something more immediate. As in, right now." Belva sighed. "I'm not sure you deserve it, but I don't like seeing you in pain." She dipped into the cooler and pulled out a vial of a bright green liquid. Lee had only been joking, but she was drawn to the vial now, her mouth watering. She took it from Belva, uncapped it, and shot it back. The taste was of plants picked too young--- sweet, raw, and nearly fizzing with life. She waited for something to happen. Nothing. Belva watched her intently, and Lee wondered at her curiosity. She'd probably given this hangover remedy thousands of times. And then Lee felt it. The smell of wet dust and the hum of the fluorescents and the staleness inside of her receded. In its place, the smell of dewy grass and the silent spill of sunshine and the feeling of a new day beginning spread through her. Like a phoenix, she was resurrected.

THE YOUNG MAN Well, I'll tell you. I got stuck onna blind date with a dog, and I just picked up a nice chick, and I was wondering how I'm gonna get ridda the dog. Somebody to take her home, you know what I mean? I be glad to pay you five bucks if you take the dog home for me. MARTY (A little confused) What?