Wakefield Quotes

I love everything that is old; old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wines.

This is an apology letter to the both of us for how long it took me to let things go.

I should have told You before talking in terms of Forever that any given day wears me out and works me sour, that there are nights when the sky is so clear I stand obnoxious underneath it begging for the stars to shoot at me just so I can feel at Home.

Then the room relaxed in cheers and babbling, and she turned in his arms to kiss him hard and cling to him, and he thought perhaps it didn't matter that they faced in opposite directions - so long as they faced each other.' Roger Wakefield {Drums Of Autumn}

I am standing like shoe polish on an overstocked shelf hoping that one day someone will pick me to make things better.

Maybe family were the people who came looking for you when you were lost.

Listen, I’m not entirely comfortable being human.

I have realized that the moon did not have to be full for us to love it. That we are not tragedies stranded here beneath it.

I no longer need you to fuck me as hard as I hated myself.

I armed her against the censures of the world, shewed her that books were sweet unreproaching companions to the miserable, and that if they could not bring us to enjoy life, they would at least teach us to endure it.

Amid the seeming confusion of our mysterious world , individuals are so nicely adjusted to a system, and systems to one another and to a whole, that, by stepping aside for a moment, a man exposes himself to a fearful risk of losing his place forever. (Wakefield)

And I know I’m not perfect. But I believe I was meant to be.

Your cousin might be a pretty face, but you, my darling, courageous, maddening, seductive, mysterious, wonderful Diana, you are the Duchess of Wakefield. My duchess.

Step into this experience with the goose bumps in your heartbeat

Tell me my heart beats a war drum that my eyes are not just armies but my spine is a harpoon.

We can stick anything into the fog and make it look like a ghost but tonight let us not become tragedies. We are not funeral homes with propane tanks in our windows, lookin’ like cemeteries. Cemeteries are just the Earth’s way of not letting go. Let go. Tonight let’s turn our silly wrists so far backwards the razor blades in our pencil tips can’t get a good angle on all that beauty inside. Step into this with your airplane parts. Move forward and repeat after me with your heart: “I no longer need you to fuck me as hard as I hated myself.” Make love to me like you know I am better than the worst thing I ever did. Go slow. I’m new to this. But I have seen nearly every city from a rooftop without jumping. I have realized that the moon did not have to be full for us to love it, that we are not tragedies stranded here beneath it, that if my heart really broke every time I fell from love I’d be able to offer you confetti by now. But hearts don’t break, y’all, they bruise and get better. We were never tragedies. We were emergencies. You call 9 – 1 – 1. Tell them I’m having a fantastic time.

I thought about loneliness. How its not something you catch and mostly we choose it. How a trouble shared is a trouble halved but things like love and joy are multiplied when you have someone to share them with.

Everyone has some they can't contain.

Conscience is a coward, and those faults it has not strength enough to prevent it seldom has justice enough to accuse.

Lord, let me write, leave me autistic and typing until my windows bust into a thousand silver doves and I know the poem is done.

If we were created in God’s image, then when God was a child he smushed fire ants with his fingertips and avoided tough questions.

Well this is me without my prozac, and this is me just shy of nicotine, and mother fuckers, it’s my second time to fail anger management class.

A text message has no soul, no matter how many commas you shift.

You can't always make good choices. Sometimes you have to settle for making a choice you can live with.

law grinds the poor, rich men rule the law

This is an apology letter to the both of us for how long it took me to let things go. It was not my intention to make such a production of the emptiness between us playing tuba on the tombstone of a soprano to try and keep some dead singer’s perspective alive. It’s just that I coulda swore you had sung me a love song back there and that you meant it but I guess sometimes people just chew with their mouth open so I ate ear plugs alive with my throat hoping they’d get lodged deep enough inside the empty spots that I wouldn’t have to hear you leaving

It’s just that I coulda swore you had sung me a love song back there and that you meant it but I guess sometimes people just chew with their mouth open

Some things aren't meant for this world. They're too fragile, and life breaks them.

I am afraid. I'm afraid of everything. I'm afraid of the dark, of closed-in spaces, of being alone and of getting too close. I'm afraid that I'll never again have the life I've always known, my feet in the dust and my heart full. I'm afraid of being alive; I'm afraid to die.

Plus, I want you in my house, putting your finger prints on my things since your hand already holds my heart.

Accidents illustrate that you have no control over your life, because from one moment to the next it could be taken away from you.

I am nothing. I feel like nothing. I want my life to matter. What if one day I'm gone and nobody ever knew I existed?

There are massive stacks of bad choices in my backyard. Haven't finished cleaning the place up but I'm workin' on it and clearly I have not yet reached enlightenment for more than a fleeting moment but I'm tryin' and I found somethin' here I want ya to have. It's not much just a story but it's all I've got so take it.

Children of narcissists learn that love is abuse. The narcissist teaches them that if someone displeases you, it is okay to harm them and call it love.

Sometimes we keep the physical objects until memory is enough

The fact is that sooner or later, Andrew Wakefield will be exonerated, his theory will be accepted, and a vaccine-autism connection will be proven.

Then might I exemplify how an influence beyond our control lays its strong hand on every deed which we do, and weaves its consequences into an iron tissue of necessity. (Wakefield)

As the reputation of books is raised not by their freedom from defect, but the greatness of their beauties, so should that of men be prized not for their exemption from fault, but the size of those virtues they are possessed of.

Make love to me like you know I am better than the worst thing I ever did. Go slow. I’m new to this.

On the face of her phone Wileen programs a message to herself so that when the alarm clock rings the screen flashes: EVERY DAY IS ONE DAY LESS. EVERY DAY IS ONE DAY LESS. For some people happiness it's just a reduction in suffering. Jordan. Jordan tattoos the words FORGIVE ME in thick black letters down the inside of his arm so that when he looks at his wrist he will remember not to hate himself so much. What he keeps forgetting is that there is life after survival.

Griffin leaned across the desk, his arms braced on the now-clear top, and stared into Wakefield’s outraged eyes. “We seem to be under a confusion of communication. I did not come here to ask for your sister’s hand. I came to tell you I will marry Hero, with or without your permission, Your Grace. She has lain with me more than once. She may well be carrying my child. And if you think that I’ll give up either her or our babe, you have not done nearly enough research into my character or history.

What we place most hopes upon, generally proves most fatal.

…The more enormous our wealth, the more extensive our fears, all our possessions are paled up with new edicts every day, and hung round with gibbets to scare every invader.

Throw stones, make waves. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

I know that this is as close as I'll ever get. He's broken in ways I'm not.

For the first time in my life, I fully understand the expression "I can't hear myself think.

The way I see it, you have two options. Run, run like hell, or dive in

I’m no longer interested in watching you rise from the falls you keep taking in vain just for a reason to stand.

Let your head climb back down through your throat and into your body so it can see just how good you look when you're not compared to anything.

Sometimes the best you can do is try not to be one of the bastards

They all count, even the wrong turns; they all add more to who you become. Nobody wants to be a one-way street. There are signposts if you cared to look.

I had to admit, sometimes I sensed the strangeness of the world tugging at my sleeve, like a mischievous toddler, and I wanted to follow it.

Watching someone you love die is like driving through a fog. You know you're headed somewhere but you can't see your hand in front of your face; you're so focused on steering without crashing that you never say the things you want to say.

I have known many of those pretended champions for liberty in my time, yet do I not remember one that was not in his heart and in his family a tyrant.

The nakedness of the indignant world may be cloathed from the trimmings of the vain.

Recollection hurt so much; I could barely remember my unbroken self

I was hard-wired to run when I cared too much

It takes time to believe again

A book may be very amusing with numerous errors, or it may be very dull without a single absurdity.

The beast retires to its shelter, and the bird flies to its nest; but the helpless man can only find refuge in his fellow creature.

What really got me thinking about illustrating children's books was I discovered Hugh Thompson's illustrations for The Vicar of Wakefield in my mother's library and I looked at it and said, 'That's what I'm going to do.

His eyes were dark, dangerous, and not at all cold. He burned with an internal inferno she wanted to touch. She stared into the gaze of a tiger and knew, even as she watched the cat retreat into the camouflage of a gentleman: The Duke of Wakefield was the Ghost of St. Giles.

Narcissistic abuse is a form of psycho-emotional abuse that takes place when a pathological narcissist targets another individual and exposes them to trauma. It can also manifest as physical, financial, spiritual and sexual abuse.

Listen, I know there were days you wanted to die when the sky was so clear you’d stand obnoxious underneath it begging for stars to shoot you just so you could feel at home. I know about the ways you misplaced all the right words, stockpiled every important social cue you ever missed from the first time you learned you were wrong, waited to make it right once everyone stopped watching. I know you let them beat up your beauty in bed because redemption was still alive in you, howling relentless, gathering strength. Felt like ecstasy when they pounded it out of you in the hard dark. Those days of dead weather got all strung together and they spoke for you, wore you down to telling everyone here it was a good life so you could run back into the wails of your windfight. I know the parts of your past that haunt you the most are the days you weren’t being yourself, and I know that’s why most of your past haunts you. There were so many who found you out, and they were right. You were good. So un- numb.

I’ve seen fish hooked who keep more patience in their worst gill than some of you have in your best moods. If you were a sandwich at McDonalds, they’d call you the McGrump.

And if we really do get what we give, then I give up, so I can get up

I'm gonna roll outta here one day, I just might not get to drive

You're so focused on steering without crashing that you never say the things you want to say

Life was short, and if it wasn't sweet you were in the wrong place with the wrong people

We are not to judge the feelings of others by what we might feel in their place.

For the child of a pathological narcissist, love is having your personality rejected and replaced with one the narcissist prefers. Love is neglect, abandonment, tyranny, and subjugation.

My father had left a small collection of books in a little room upstairs, to which I had access (for it adjoined my own) and which nobody else in our house ever troubled. From that blessed little room, Roderick Random, Peregrine Pickle, Humphrey Clinker, Tom Jones, the Vicar of Wakefield, Don Quixote, Gil Blas, and Robinson Crusoe, came out, a glorious host, to keep me company. They kept alive my fancy, and my hope of something beyond that place and time . . .

Dear Angry Older People, over 21-ish, anyone who considers themselves an adult, still bitter: Next time you're wondering what wrong with kids today, you might wanna check the examples you've been giving us to work with. Because if you ever want to make sense of us, you’ve got to make sense to us, without telling us you’re too old to walk that far. You’ve got to try to understand why we like looking like rag dolls, why we like looking like the way we feel, and why we keep our senses floored when it’s you behind the wheel. And if you ever really do want to understand why we seem so angry, well for one, you told us we could be anything we wanted to be, but right now, we’re a little busy dodging bombs.

A jealous woman holds poison on her tongue.

I keep forgetting to put focus on my to-do list.

So you're all alone. And, for a short while, at least until it sinks in, you can fake anything.

Some kinds of crazy you make for yourself, others you inherit

There comes a time when you decide you're done playing the victim. It just came a bit sooner for me.

Life is full of wrong turns and dead ends and pathways that peter out

This is what you wanted, I told myself. To be alone. To keep moving.

I was the sum of two people, one dead, the other unknown.

Mortifications are often more painful than real calamities.

Griffin took one step toward the big desk and swiped his arms across the entire top. Pens, papers, books, a small marbel bust, and an ink well all crashed to the floor. Griffin leaned across the desk, his arms braced on the now-clear top, and stared into Wakefield's outraged eyes. "We seem to be under a confusion of communication. I did not come here to ask for your sisters hand. I came to tell you I will marry Hero, with or without your permission Your Grace. She has lain with me more than once. She may very well be carrying my child. And if you think I'll give up her or our babe, you have not done nearly enough research into my character or history." Griffin pushed himself off the desk before the other man could utter a word and storde out the door.

When the corpses of [Sir John] Franklin's officers and crew were later discovered, miles from their ships, the men were found to have left behind their guns but to have lugged such essentials as monogrammed silver cutlery, a backgammon board, a cigar case, a clothes brush, a tin of button polish, and a copy of "The Vicar of Wakefield." These men may have been incompetent bunglers, but, by God, they were gentlemen.

What are you doing here?" He takes a deep breath. "I came for you." "And how on EARTH did you know I was up here?" "I saw you." He pauses. "I came to make another wish,and I was standing on Point Zero when I saw you enter the tower. I called your name,and you looked around,but you didn't see me." "So you decided to just...come up?" I'm doubtful,despite the evidence in front of me.It must have taken superhuman strength for him to make it past the first flight of stairs alone. "I had to.I couldn't wait for you to come down,I couldn't wait any longer. I had to see you now.I have to know-" He breaks off,and my pulse races. What what what? "Why did you lie to me?" The question startles me.Not what I was expecting.Nor hoping.He's still on the ground,but he stares up at me.His brown eyes are huge and heartbroken. I'm confused. "I'm sorry, I don't know what-" "November.At the creperie. I asked you if we'd talked about anything strange that night I was drunk in your room.If I had said anything about our relationship,or my relationship with Ellie.And you said no." Oh my God. "How did you know?" "Josh told me." "When?" "November." I'm stunned. "I...I..." My throat is dry. "If you'd seen the look on your face that day.In the restaurant. How could I possibly tell you? With your mother-" "But if you had,I wouldn't have wasted all of these months.I thought you were turning me down.I thought you weren't interested." "But you were drunk! You had a girlfriend! What was I supposed to do? God,St. Clair,I didn't even know if you meant it." "Of course I meant it." He stands,and his legs falter. "Careful!" Step.Step.Step. He toddles toward me,and I reach for his hand to guide him.We're so close to the edge. He sits next to me and grips my hand harder. "I meant it,Anna.I mean it." "I don't under-" He's exasperated. "I'm saying I'm in love with you! I've been in love with you this whole bleeding year!" My mind spins. "But Ellie-" "I cheated on her every day.In my mind, I thought of you in ways I shouldn't have,again and again. She was nothing compared to you.I've never felt this way about anybody before-" "But-" "The first day of school." He scoots closer. "We weren't physics partners by accident.I saw Professeur Wakefield assigning lab partners based on where people were sitting,so I leaned forward to borrow a pencil from you at just the right moment so he'd think we were next to each other.Anna,I wanted to be your partner the first day." "But..." I can't think straight. "I doubt you love poetry! 'I love you as certain dark things are loved, secretly,between the shadow and the soul.'" I blink at him. "Neruda.I starred the passage.God," he moans. "Why didn't you open it?" "Because you said it was for school." "I said you were beautiful.I slept in your bed!" "You never mave a move! You had a girlfriend!" "No matter what a terrible boyfriend I was,I wouldn't actually cheat on her. But I thought you'd know.With me being there,I thought you'd know." We're going in circles. "How could I know if you never said anything?" "How could I know if you never said anyting?" "You had Ellie!" "You had Toph! And Dave!

I cannot guarantee my attendance tomorrow morning," Merribeth said in all seriousness. "I distinctly heard my coverlet and pillow conspiring to hold me captive until luncheon. I fear no amount of bravery will save me.

That virtue which requires to be ever guarded is scarce worth the sentinel.

I was in denial of the glaring reality that my existence depended on my willingness to comply with the family policy of me earning the splinter of space they granted to me.

I wanted to live, to take the open road before me.

Where you've been isn't as important as where you're headed

In the dream I was onstage and there were thousands of you goin’ bananas for me, all laughing and clapping, celebrating your brains out, not because I was somethin’ else up there, but because you were just so happy I was finally starting to get it.

Maybe that was the thing about beginnings - they always seemed better than middles or endings. And if only I ever had beginnings and my past was so perfect, then the future would never measure up. I didn't want to live like that.

The masculine voice was low but clear, capturing the senses, running along the back of her neck like a caress, making her shiver in delight. Artemis very much feared she was gaping. The Duke of Wakefield had a voice to make angels—or devils—weep. It wasn’t the type of male voice currently admired—for the high, unnatural voice of the musico was the rage of London at the moment—but his was the sort of voice that would always seduce the ear. Sure and strong, with a vibrating masculinity on the low notes. She could sit and listen to a voice like this for hours.

Barbara Loe Fisher failed to note that many scientists before Wakefield had published papers proving the rare tragic consequences of vaccines without risking their career—for example, William Sawyer, who showed that a yellow fever vaccine had been contaminated with hepatitis B virus; Neil Nathanson, who showed that a polio vaccine wasn’t properly inactivated, causing children to become paralyzed and die; and Trudy Murphy, who showed that an early rotavirus vaccine caused intestinal blockage, killing one child. Scientists and public health officials didn’t marginalize Wakefield because he had challenged the belief that vaccines are absolutely safe; they did it because he was wrong—clearly and inescapably wrong.

Life is too short to wake up in the morning with regrets. So, love the people who treat you right, and forget about the ones who don't. And believe that everything happens for a reason; if you get a chance-take it, if it changes your life-let it. Nobody said that it would be easy, they just promised it would be worth it.

You have something else of mine, Miss Wakefield,” he amended. “I believe you meant to borrow it and return it directly, but you never did return . . . my heart. It’s been in your possession since our first meeting.” She drew in a staggered breath, daring to hope. “Though without a heart, one might wonder how I came to be here, standing before you right now,” he went on, making her heard spin again. “Do you wonder, Miss Wakefield?” When she nodded, he grinned and placed her hand over his chest. “There is a heart in here, but it is not mine. You see, I believe you made a dire mistake our first meeting. When you meant to return mine, instead you gave me yours. Doesn’t it beat strangely beneath my breast?

When you're a child, what you see and hear and comprehend can be sorted into little boxes. Then, as you live and learn, all those boxes open up and become rooms. The more you experience, the bigger those rooms get. If you're lucky enough, there are some people you will love, and who will love you, long enough to see their boxes grow into vast spaces. You'll understand things that had no meaning. You'll find dark corners that only light up for the briefest moments. But when you keep getting lost, you just end up with a pile of boxes.

My friends, my children, and fellow sufferers, when I reflect on the distribution of good and evil here below, I find that much has been given man to enjoy, yet still more to suffer. Though we should examine the whole world, we shall not find one man so happy as to have nothing left to wish for; but we daily see thousands who by suicide shew us they have nothing left to hope. In this life then it appears that we cannot be entirely blest; but yet we may be completely miserable!

Holding her gaze, he sheathed his short sword and pulled the gauntlet off his left hand with his teeth. He held out his bare hand to her. She glanced at the proffered hand before laying her palm in his. Hot strength gripped her tightly as he pulled her upright before him, so close she would’ve had to move only inches to brush her lips across his throat. She watched the pulse of his blood beat there, strong and sure, before she lifted her gaze. His head was cocked almost as if he were examining her—searching for something in her face. She drew in a breath, parting her lips to ask a question.

I told her about the best and the worst. The slow and sleepy places where weekdays rolled past like weekends and Mondays didn’t matter. Battered shacks perched on cliffs overlooking the endless, rumpled sea. Afternoons spent waiting on the docks, swinging my legs off a pier until boats rolled in with crates full of oysters and crayfish still gasping. Pulling fishhooks out of my feet because I never wore shoes, playing with other kids whose names I never knew. Those were the unforgettable summers. There were outback towns where you couldn’t see the roads for red dust, grids of streets with wandering dogs and children who ran wild and swam naked in creeks. I remembered climbing ancient trees that had a heartbeat if you pressed your ear to them. Boomboom-boomboom. Dreamy nights sleeping by the campfire and waking up covered in fine ash, as if I’d slept through a nuclear holocaust. We were wanderers, always with our faces to the sun.