I have every characteristic of a night person--a distaste for bosses, a hatred of the expected, an obsession with gaining an ultim...ately nonexistent freedom--every quality except one. I can't stay awake after a while. I fall asleep.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I have been required to put roots and shoots and little stems and tendrils together much as their author did, to wander discourage...d and confused as Hansel and Gretel through a dark wood of witches, to strike the hot right way suddenly, but just as suddenly to mire, to drag, to speed, to shout Urreek! to fall asleep, to submit to revelations, certainly to curl a lip, to doubt, unnose a disdainful snort, snick a superior snicker, curse, and then at some point not very pleasantly to realize that the game I'm playing is the game of creation itself, because Tender Buttons is above all a book of kits like those from which harpsichords or paper planes or model bottle boats are fashioned, with intricacy no objection, patience a demand, unreadable plans a pleasure.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I have three kinds of "quality time." The first I call "Split-Brain Time" because only one side of my brain is with my children.......The second type of quality time is what I call "Timed Time" and is best characterized by declarations such as, "okay, you children have ten minutes to get in bed and fall asleep...." On the really bad days I settle for the "Quality Greeting"Ma brief "Hi there! or "Sleep tight"Musually uttered from a comfortable chair just before I drift off to sleep.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
There are thousands who are in opinion opposed to slavery and to the war, who yet in effect do nothing to put an end to them; who,... esteeming themselves children of Washington and Franklin, sit down with their hands in their pockets, and say that they know not what to do, and do nothing; who even postpone the question of freedom to the question of free trade, and quietly read the prices-current along with the latest advices from Mexico, after dinner, and it may be, fall asleep over them both. What is the price-current of an honest man and patriot to-day? They hesitate, and they regret, and sometimes they petition; but they do nothing in earnest and with effect. They will wait, well disposed, for others to remedy the evil, that they may no longer have to regret. At most, they give only a cheap vote, and a feeble countenance and God-speed, to the right, as it goes by them. There are nine hundred and ninety-nine patrons of virtue to one virtuous man. But it is easier to deal with the real possessor of a thing than with the temporary guardian of it.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »