Sometimes she'd go a whole day without thinking of him or missing him. Why not? She had quite a full life, and really, he'd often been hard to deal with and hard to live with. A project, the Yankee oldtimers like her very own Dad might have said. And then sometimes a day would come, a gray one (or a sunny one) when she missed him so fiercely she felt empty, not a woman at all anymore but just a dead tree filled with cold November blow. She felt like that now, felt like hollering his name and hollering him home, and her heart turned sick with the thought of the years ahead and she wondered what good love was if it came to this, to even ten seconds of feeling like this.

Might as well try to drink the ocean with a spoon as argue with a lover

Friends don’t spy; true friendship is about privacy, too

Each of us has to do his little bit toward transforming this spirit of the times.

The ideals which have lighted me on my way and time after time given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been truth, goodness, and beauty.

The most important motive for work in school and in life is pleasure in work, pleasure in its result and the knowledge of the value of the result to the community.

The only way to escape the corruptible effect of praise is to go on working.

It is an irony of fate that I myself have been the recipient of excessive admiration and reverence from my fellow-beings, through no fault or merit of my own.

Without deep reflection one knows from daily life that one exists for other people.

Although I have a regular work schedule, I take time to go for long walks on the beach so that I can listen to what is going on inside my head. If my work isn’t going well, I lie down in the middle of a workday and gaze at the ceiling while I listen and visualize what goes on in my imagination.

Be a loner. That gives you time to wonder, to search for the truth. Have holy curiosity. Make your life worth living.

I believe empathy is the most essential quality of civilization.

The ultimate power in life is to be completely self-reliant, completely yourself.

Look at flowers, butterflies, trees, and children with the eyes of compassion. Compassion will change your life and make it wonderful.

I love her, and that’s the beginning and end of everything.

The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.

Beauty is ordained by nature to excite love.

To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.

Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one’s head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace.

At some point, you gotta let go, and sit still, and allow contentment to come to you.

A table, a chair, a bowl of fruit and a violin; what else does a man need to be happy?

All of one’s contemporaries and aging friends are living in a delicate balance, and one feels that one’s own consciousness is no longer as brightly lit as it once was. But then, twilight with its more subdued colors has its charms as well.

To lose balance sometimes for love is part of living a balanced life.

When life is sweet, say thank you and celebrate. When life is bitter, say thank you and grow.