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I Just Gave Them A Little Scare. A Touch Of Psychological Terror. As Joseph Conrad Once Wrote, True Terror Is The Kind That Men Feel Towards Their Imagination. (from Super-frog Saves Tokyo)

-Haruki Murakami

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I Just Gave Them

Haruki Murakami

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I Just Gave Them A Little Scare. A Touch Of Psychological Terror. As Joseph Conrad Once Wrote, True Terror Is The Kind That Men Feel Towards Their Imagination. (from Super-frog Saves Tokyo)

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It Feels Like Everything's Been Decided In Advance That I'm Following A Path Somebody Else Has Already Mapped Out For Me. It Doesn't Matter How Much I Think Things Over, How Much Effort I Put Into It. In Fact, The Harder I Try, The More I Lose My Sense Of Who I Am. It's Like My Identity's An Orbit That I've Strayed Far Away From, And That Really Hurts. But More Than That, It Scares Me. Just Thinking About It Makes Me Flinch.

As With Marathon Runs And Lengths Of Toilet Paper, There Had To Be Standards To Measure Up To.

It's Good When Food Tastes Good, It's Kind Of Like Proof You're Alive.

No Matter How Far You Travel, You Can Never Get Away From Yourself.

Even If We Could Turn Back, We'd Probably Never End Up Where We Started.

We Fell Silent Again. The Thing We Had Shared Was Nothing More Than A Fragment Of Time That Had Died Longe Ago.even So, A Faint Glimmer Of That Warm Memory Still Claimed A Part Of My Heart. And When Death Claim Me, No Doubt I Would Walk Along By That Faint Light In The Brief Instant Before Being Flung Once Again Into The Abyss Of Nothingness

Our Responsibility Begins With Our Imagination.

And, Well, Mine Are Kind Of On The Heavy Side Anyway. The First Day Or Two, I Don't Want To Do Anything. Make Sure You Keep Away From Me Then.' I'd Like To, But How Can I Tell?' I Asked. O.k., I'll Wear A Hat For A Couple Of Days After My Period Starts. A Red One. That Should Work,' She Said With A Laugh. 'if You See Me On The Street And I'm Wearing A Red Hat, Don't Talk To Me, Just Run Away.

The Good Thing About Writing Books Is That You Can Dream While You Are Awake. If It’s A Real Dream, You Cannot Control It. When Writing The Book, You Are Awake; You Can Choose The Time, The Length, Everything. I Write For Four Or Five Hours In The Morning And When The Time Comes, I Stop. I Can Continue The Next Day. If It’s A Real Dream, You Can’t Do That.

The World In Books Seemed So Much More Alive To Me Than Anything Outside. I Could See Things I'd Never Seen Before. Books And Music Were My Best Friends. I Had A Couple Of Good Friends At School, But Never Met Anyone I Could Really Speak My Heart To. We'd Just Make Small Talk, Play Soccer Together. When Something Bothered Me, I Didn't Talk With Anyone About It. I Thought It Over All By Myself, Came To A Conclusion, And Took Action Alone. Not That I Really Felt Lonely. I Thought That's Just The Way Things Are. Human Beings, In The Final Analysis, Have To Survive On Their Own.

When You're Young, You Think You Can Handle Anything. By The Time You Find Out Otherwise, It's Already Too Late. You Got A Stocking Wrapped Around Your Neck.

This Person, This Self, This Me, Finally, Was Made Somewhere Else. Everything Had Come From Somewhere Else, And It Would All Go Somewhere Else. I Was Nothing But A Pathway For The Person Known As Me.

To Be Able To Talk To Your Heart’s Content About A Book You Like With Someone Who Feels The Same Way About It Is One Of The Greatest Joys That Life Can Offer.

But Why Should You Be Interested In Me?" Good Question. I Can’t Explain It Myself Right This Moment. But Maybe – Just Maybe – If We Start Getting Together And Talking, After A While Something Like Francis Lai’s Soundtrack Music Will Start Playing In The Background, And A Whole Slew Of Concrete Reasons Why I’m Interested In You Will Line Up Out Of Nowhere. With Luck, It Might Even Snow For Us.

Don't Let Appearances Fool You. There's Always Only One Reality!

Her Partially Open Lips Now Opened Wide, And Her Soft, Fragrant Tongue Entered His Mouth, Where It Began A Relentless Search For Unformed Words, For A Secret Code Engraved There. Tengo's Own Tongue Responded Unconsciously To This Movement And Soon Their Tongues Were Like Two Young Snakes In A Spring Meadow, Newly Wakened From Their Hibernation And Hungrily Intertwining, Each Led On By The Other's Scent.

In My Younger Days, I Was Trying To Write Sophisticated Prose And Fantastic Stories.

Nothing In The Real World Is As Beautiful As The Illusions Of A Person About To Lose Consciousness.

I've Translated A Lot Of American Literature Into Japanese, And I Think That What Makes A Good Translator Is, Above All, A Feel For Language And Also A Great Affection For The Work You're Translating. If One Of Those Elements Is Missing The Translation Won't Be Worth Much.

Wasn't It Better If They Kept This Desire To See Each Other Hidden Within Them, And Never Actually Got Together? That Way, There Would Always Be Hope In Their Hearts. That Hope Would Be A Small, Yet Vital Flame That Warmed Them To Their Core-- A Tiny Flame To Cup One's Hands Around And Protect From The Wind, A Flame That The Violent Winds Of Reality Might Easily Extinguish.

In Japan, The Writers Have Made Up A Literary Community, A Circle, A Society. I Think 90 Percent Of Japan's Writers Live In Tokyo. Naturally, They Make A Community. There Are Groups And Customs, And So They Are Tied Up In A Way.

I Happen To Like The Strange Ones. People Who Look Normal And Leads Normal Lives - They're The Ones You Have To Watch Out For.

The World Is An Inherently Unfair Place.

That's How People Live In The Real World: Forcing Stuff On Each Other.

The Curious Thing About Individuals Is That Their Singularity Always Goes Beyond Any Category Or Generalization In The Book.

You Said You're Going Far Away," Tamaru Said. "how Far Away Are We Talking About?" "it's A Distance That Can't Be Measured." "like The Distance That Separates One Person's Heart From Another's.

When Someone Is Trying Very Hard To Get Something, They Don't. And When They're Running Away From Something As Hard As They Can, It Usually Catches Up With Them.

Either I'm Funny Or The World's Funny. I Don't Know Which. The Bottle And Lid Don't Fit. It Could Be The Bottle's Fault Or The Lid's Fault. In Either Case, There's No Denying That The Fit Is Bad.

Sometimes I Feel So- I Don’t Know - Lonely. The Kind Of Helpless Feeling When Everything You’re Used To Has Been Ripped Away. Like There’s No More Gravity, And I’m Left To Drift In Outer Space With No Idea Where I’m Going’ Like A Little Lost Sputnik?’ I Guess So.

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A Theory Is A Battlefield In Your Head.

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Her Cry Was The Saddest Sound Of Orgasm That I Had Ever Heard.

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They Sat On A Park Bench, Held Hands, And Told Each Other Their Stories Hour After Hour. They Were Not Lonely Anymore. They Had Found And Been Found By Their 100% Perfect Other. What A Wonderful Thing It Is To Find And Be Found By Your 100% Perfect Other. It's A Miracle, A Cosmic Miracle.

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But Didn't You Say You Were Satisfied With Your Life?" "word Games," I Dismissed. "every Army Needs A Flag.

Sometimes When I Think Of Life, I Feel Like A Piece Of Driftwood Washed Up On Shore.

A Deserted Library In The Morning - There's Something About It That Really Gets To Me. All Possible Words And Ideas Are There, Resting Peacefully.

We Were Young, And We Had No Need For Prophecies. Just Living Was Itself An Act Of Prophecy.

Anyone Who Falls In Love Is Searching For The Missing Pieces Of Themselves. So Anyone Who's In Love Gets Sad When They Think Of Their Lover. It's Like Stepping Back Inside A Room You Have Fond Memories Of, One You Haven't Seen In A Long Time.

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Why Do I Act Like This, Agreeing When I Really Disagree, Letting People Force Me To Do Things I Don't Want To Do?

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Oshima's Silent For A Time As He Gazes At The Forest, Eyes Narrowed. Birds Are Flitting From One Branch To The Next. His Hands Are Clasped Behind His Head. "i Know How You Feel," He Finally Says. "but This Is Something You Have To Work Out On Your Own. Nobody Can Help You. That's What Love's All About, Kafka. You're The One Having Those Wonderful Feelings, But You Have To Go It Alone As You Wander Through The Dark. Your Mind And Body Have To Bear It All. All By Yourself.

What Do I Like About Math? , When I've Got Figures In Front Of Me, It Relaxes Me. Kind Of Like, Everything Fits Where It Belongs.

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Everything Passes. Nobody Gets Anything For Keeps. And That's How We've Got To Live.

Probably." "again With The Probablys." "a World Full Of Probablys," She Said.

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Sometimes We Don't Need Words. Rather, It's Words That Need Us. If We Were No Longer Here, Words Would Lose Their Whole Function. They Would End Up As Words That Are Never Spoken, And Words That Aren't Spoken Are No Longer Words. - (where I'm Likely To Find It)

That's What The World Is , After All: An Endless Battle Of Contrasting Memories.

You Have To Wait Until Tomorrow To Find Out What Tomorrow Will Bring.

I Closed My Eyes And Tried To Sleep. But It Was Not Until Much Later That I Was Able To Get Any Real Sleep. In A Place Far Away From Anyone Or Anywhere, I Drifted Off For A Moment.

I Think Memory Is The Most Important Asset Of Human Beings. It's A Kind Of Fuel; It Burns And It Warms You. My Memory Is Like A Chest: There Are So Many Drawers In That Chest, And When I Want To Be A Fifteen-year-old Boy, I Open Up A Certain Drawer And I Find The Scenery I Saw When I Was A Boy In Kobe. I Can Smell The Air, And I Can Touch The Ground, And I Can See The Green Of The Trees. That's Why I Want To Write A Book.

What I Saw Wasn't A Ghost. It Was Simply--myself. I Can Never Forget How Terrified I Was That Night, And Whenever I Remember It, This Thought Always Springs To Mind: That The Most Frightening Thing In The World Is Our Own Self. What Do You Think?

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It Seems To Me That Very Sad Things Always Contain An Element Of The Comical

Whenever An Occasion Arose In Which She Needed An Opinion On Something In The Wider World, She Borrowed Her Husband's. If This Had Been All There Was To Her, She Wouldn't Have Bothered Anyone, But As Is So Often The Case With Such Women, She Suffered From An Incurable Case Of Of Pretentiousness. Lacking Any Internalized Values Of Her Own, Such People Can Arrive At A Standpoint Only By Adopting Other People's Standards Or Views. The Only Principle That Governs Their Minds Is The Question "how Do I Look?

The Power To Concentrate Was The Most Important Thing. Living Without This Power Would Be Like Opening One’s Eyes Without Seeing Anything.

It Feels Good To Think About You When I'm Warm In Bed. I Feel As If You're Curled Up There Beside Me, Fast Asleep. And I Think How Great It Would Be If It Were True.

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It Was A Strange Feeling, Like Touching A Void.

I Keep To This Routine Every Day Without Variation. The Repetition Itself Becomes The Important Thing; It's A Form Of Mesmerism. I Mesmerize Myself To Reach A Deeper State Of Mind.

According To Chekhov," Tamaru Said, Rising From His Chair, "once A Gun Appears In A Story, It Has To Be Fired." "meaning What?" "meaning, Don't Bring Unnecessary Props Into A Story. If A Pistol Appears, It Has To Be Fired At Some Point. Chekhov Liked To Write Stories That Did Away With All Useless Ornamentation.

I Think People Who Share My Dreams Can Enjoy Reading My Novels. And That's A Wonderful Thing. I Said That Myths Are Like A Reservoir Of Stories, And If I Can Act As A Similar Kind Of "reservoir," Albeit A Modest One, That Would Make Me Very Happy.

Why?" She Screamed. "are You Crazy? You Know The English Subjunctive, You Understand Trigonometry, You Can Read Marx, And You Don't Know The Answer To Something As Simple As That? Why Do You Even Have To Ask? Why Do You Have To Make A Girl Say Something Like This? I Like You More Than I Like Him, That's All. I Wish I Had Fallen In Love With Somebody A Little More Handsome, Of Course. But I Didn't. I Fell In Love With You!

In Ancient Times, People Weren't Just Male Or Female, But One Of Three Types: Male/male, Male/female, Female/female. In Other Words, Each Person Was Made Out Of The Components Of Two People. Everyone Was Happy With This Arrangement And Never Really Gave It Much A Thought. But Then God Took A Knife And Cut Everybody In Half, Right Down The Middle. So After That The World Was Divided Just Into Male And Female, The Upshot Being That People Spend Their Time Running Around Trying To Locate Their Missing Other Half.

The Facts And Techniques Or Whatever They Teach You In Class Isn't Going To Be Veryuseful In The Real World, That's For Sure.

Why Do People Have To Build Such Depressing Places? I'm Not Saying That Every Nook And Cranny Of The World Has To Be Beautiful, But Does It Have To Be This Ugly?

What’s Most Important Is What You Can’t See But Can Feel In Your Heart. To Be Able To Grasp Something Of Value, Sometimes You Have To Perform Seemingly Inefficient Acts. But Even Activities That Appear Fruitless Don’t Necessarily End Up So. That’s The Feeling I Have, As Someone Who’s Felt This, Who’s Experienced It.

Hundreds Of Butterflies Flitted In And Out Of Sight Like Short-lived Punctuation Marks In A Stream Of Consciousness Without Beginning Or End.

Punctuation Marks

Tengo Could Hardly Believe It-- That In This Frantic, Labyrinth-like World, Two People's Hearts-- A Boy's And A Girl's-- Could Be Connected, Unchanged, Even Though They Hadn't Seen Each Other For Twenty Years.

I'll Write To You. A Super-long Letter, Like In An Old-fashioned Novel

The Library Was Like A Second Home. Or Maybe More Like A Real Home, More Than The Place I Lived In. By Going Every Day I Got To Know All The Lady Librarians Who Worked There. They Knew My Name And Always Said Hi. I Was Painfully Shy, Though, And Could Barely Reply.

Once Thing Goes Wrong, Then The Whole House Of Cards Collapses. And There's No Way You Can Extricate Yourself. Until Someone Comes Along To Drag You Out.

Adults Constantly Raise The Bar On Smart Children, Precisely Because They're Able To Handle It. The Children Get Overwhelmed By The Tasks In Front Of Them And Gradually Lose The Sort Of Openness And Sense Of Accomplishment They Innately Have. When They're Treated Like That, Children Start To Crawl Inside A Shell And Keep Everything Inside. It Takes A Lot Of Time And Effort To Get Them To Open Up Again. Kids' Hearts Are Malleable, But Once They Gel It's Hard To Get Them Back The Way They Were.

It Is Sometimes Necessary For Each Person. Fill Up With Delicious Food, Get Drunk, Sing Loudly And Chat Frivolously.

Every One Of Us Is Losing Something Precious To Us. Lost Opportunities, Lost Possibilities, Feelings We Can Never Get Back Again. That’s Part Of What It Means To Be Alive.

Of What Value Is A Civilization That Can't Toast A Piece Of Bread As Ordered?

I Tell Lies Sometimes. The Last Time I Lied Was A Year Ago. I Absolutely Detest Lying. You Could Say That Lying And Silence Are The Two Greatest Sins Of Present Day Society. Actually, I Lie A Lot, And I'm Always Clamming Up.

The Fresh Smell Of Coffee Soon Wafted Through The Apartment, The Smell That Separates Night From Day.

There Is Nothing In This World That Never Takes A Step Outside A Person's Heart.

It Was Spring Break, So The Theater Was Always Packed With High Schools Students. It Was An Animal House. I Wanted To Burn The Place Down.

If Only I Could Fall Sound Asleep And Wake Up In My Old Reality!

Everybody's Born With Some Different Thing At The Core Of Their Existence. And That Thing, Whatever It Is, Becomes Like A Heat Source That Runs Each Person From The Inside. I Have One Too, Of Course. Like Everybody Else. But Sometimes It Gets Out Of Hand. It Swells Or Shrinks Inside Me, And It Shakes Me Up. What I'd Really Like To Do Is Find A Way To Communicate That Feeling To Another Person.

It's The Same With Menus And Men And Just About Anything Else: We Think We're Choosing Things For Ourselves, But In Fact We May Not Be Choosing Anything. It Could Be That Everthing's Being Decided In Advance And We Pretend We're Making Choices. Free Will May Be An Illusion. I Often Think That.

People Need Routines. It's Like A Theme In Music. But It Also Restrictsyour Thoughts And Actions And Limits Your Freedom. It Structures Your Priorities And In Some Cases Distorts Your Logic.

What If I’ve Forgotten The Most Important Thing?

Learning Another Language Is Like Becoming Another Person.

From The Girl Who Sat Before Me Now...surged A Fresh And Physical Life Force. She Was Like A Small Animal That Has Popped Into The World With The Coming Of Spring. Her Eyes Moved Like An Independent Organism With Joy, Laughter, Anger, Amazement, And Despair. I Hadn't Seen A Face So Vivid And Expressive In Ages, And I Enjoyed Watching It Live And Move.

Since I'm A Novelist I'm The Opposite Of You - I Believe That What's Most Important Is What Cannot Be Measured. I'm Not Denying Your Way Of Thinking, But The Greater Part Of People's Lives Consist Of Things That Are Unmeasurable, And Trying To Change All These To Something Measurable Is Realistically Impossible.

Will You Wait For Me Forever?

Stories Lie Deep In Our Souls. Stories Lie So Deep At The Bottom Of Our Hearts That They Can Bring People Together On The Deepest Level. When I Write A Novel, I Go Into Such Depths.

If, As The Dowager Had Said, We Are Nothing But Gene Carriers, Why Do So Many Of Us Have To Lead Such Strangely Shaped Lives? Wouldn't Our Genetic Purpose-to Transmit Dna-be Served Just As Well If We Lived Simple Lives, Not Bothering Our Heads With A Lot Of Extraneous Thoughts, Devoted Entirely To Preserving Life And Procreating? Did It Benefit The Genes In Any Way For Us To Lead Such Intricately Warped, Even Bizarre, Lives?

Then She Took My Hand And Touched It To The Wound Beside Her Eye. I Caressed The Half-inch Scar. As I Did So, The Waves Of Her Consciousness Pulsed Through My Fingertips And Into Me - A Delicate Resonance Of Longing. Probably Someone Should Take This Girl In His Arms And Hold Her Tight, I Thought. Probably Someone Other Than Me. Someone Qualified To Give Her Something. "goodbye, Mr. Wind-up Bird. See You Again Sometime.

Dreams Come From The Past, Not From The Future. Dreams Shouldn't Control You--you Should Control Them.

Don't Let Thoughts Of Me Hold You Back. Just Do What You Want To Do. Otherwise, I Might End Up Taking You With Me, And That Is The One Thing I Don't Want To Do. I Don't Want To Interfere With Your Life.

You Can’t Look Too Far Ahead. Do That And You’ll Lose Sight Of What You’re Doing And Stumble. I’m Not Saying You Should Focus Solely On The Details Right In Front Of You, Mind You. You’ve Got To Look Ahead A Bit Or Else You’ll Bump Into Something. You’ve Got To Conform To The Proper Order And At The Same Time Keep An Eye Out For What’s Ahead. That’s Critical, No Matter What You’re Doing.

Whether In Music Or In Fiction, The Most Basic Thing Is Rhythm. Your Style Needs To Have Good, Natural, Steady Rhythm, Or People Won't Keep Reading Your Work.

If You Want To Talk About Something New, You Have To Make Up A New Kind Of Language.

While They're Still Alive, People Can Become Ghosts.

You Can Have Tons Of Talent, But It Won't Necessarily Keep You Fed. If You Have Sharp Instincts, Through, You'll Never Go Hungry.

Once She Was Out Of The Car And Gone, My World Was Suddenly Hollow And Meaningless.

You Can Keep As Quiet As You Like, But One Of These Days Somebody Is Going To Find You.

Our Faces Were No More Than Ten Inches Apart But She Was Lightyears Away From Me.

I Dream. Sometimes I Think That's The Only Right Thing To Do.

I Write My Novels Personally, Desperately And Non-negligently. When I Write My Novels, I Think About My Novels Only, And Never Do Other Works.

It Was A Small Room With Dim Light Coming In The Window, Reminiscent Of Old Polish Films.

The Best Point Of My Novels, I Think, Is Their Humor. I Want To Keep Many My Works Humorous.

I Wondered If She Was Trying To Convey Something To Me, Something She Could Not Put Into Words - Something Prior To Words That She Could Not Grasp Within Herself And Which Therefore Had No Hope Of Ever Turning Into Words.

I'm Not A Fast Thinker, But Once I Am Interested In Something, I Am Doing It For Many Years.

Writing A Long Novel Is Like Survival Training. Physical Strength Is As Necessary As Artistic Sensitivity.

I'd Be Smiling And Chatting Away, And My Mind Would Be Floating Around Somewhere Else, Like A Balloon With A Broken String.

If You're Going To While Away The Years, It's Far Better To Live Them With Clear Goals And Fully Alive Then In A Fog, And I Believe #‎ Running Helps You To Do That. Exerting Yourself To The Fullest Within Your Individual Limits: That's The Essence Of Running, And A Metaphor For Life.

Artists Are Those Who Can Evade The Verbose.

I Don't Think Of Myself As An Artist. I'm Just A Guy Who Can Write.

That's The Kind Of Death That Frightens Me. The Shadow Of Death Slowly, Slowly Eats Away At The Region Of Life, And Before You Know It Everything's Dark And You Can't See, And The People Around You Think Of You As More Dead Than Alive.

Shadow Of Death

Kids' Hearts Are Malleable, But Once They Gel It's Hard To Get Them Back The Way They Were.

My Father Belongs To The Generation That Fought The War In The 1940s. When I Was A Kid My Father Told Me Stories - Not So Many, But It Meant A Lot To Me. I Wanted To Know What Happened Then, To My Father's Generation. It's A Kind Of Inheritance, The Memory Of It.

It Might Not Be Perfect, But The Fundamental Stance I Adopted With Regard To My Home Was To Accept It, Problems And All, Because It Was Something I Myself Had Chosen. If It Had Problems, These Were Almost Certainly Problems That Had Originated Within Me.

Gazing At The Rain, I Consider What It Means To Belong, To Become Part Of Something. To Have Someone Cry For Me.

Life: I'll Never Understand It.

As I Already Explaned, I Don't Have Any Form. I'm A Conceptual Metaphysical Object.

I May Not Look It, But I Can Be A Very Patient Guy. And Killing Time Is One Of My Specialities.

Despite Your Best Efforts, People Are Going To Be Hurt When It's Time For Them To Be Hurt.

I’ve Never Once Thought About How I Was Going To Die,” She Said. “i Can’t Think About It. I Don’t Even Know How I’m Going To Live.

My Father Always Told Me: 'give Somebody A Hand And He'll Take An Arm.

When The Orbits Of These Two Satellites Of Ours Happened To Cross Paths, We Could Be Together. Maybe Even Open Our Hearts To Each Other. But That Was Only For The Briefest Moment. In The Next Instant We'd Be In Absolute Solitude. Until We Burned Up And Became Nothing.

It Doesn’t Matter How Old I Get, But As Long As I Continue To Live I’ll Always Discover Something New About Myself.

Hatsumi Had A Pretty Good Idea That Nagasawa Was Sleeping Around, But She Never Complained To Him. She Was Seriously In Love With Him, But She Never Made Demands. 'i Don't Deserve A Girl Like Hatsumi,' Nagasawa Once Said To Me. I Had To Agree With Him.

Some Things In Life Are Too Complicated To Explain In Any Language.

Loneliness Becomes An Acid That Eats Away At You.

Distance Might Not Solve Anything, No Matter How Far You Run.

Life Doesn't Require Ideals. It Requires Standards Of Action.

When There's Nothing To Do, You Do Nothing Slowly And Intently.

Is It Against The Law For Me To Know It?

You Could Be Anybody When You're Writing. That's The Reason That I'm Writing: To Be Anybody. You Can Put Your Feet In Various Shoes And Experience Anything.

Letters Are Just Pieces Of Paper," I Said. "burn Them, And What Stays In Your Heart Will Stay; Keep Them, And What Vanishes Will Vanish.

If You Really Want To Know Something, You Have To Be Willing To Pay The Price.

The Sky Grew Darker, Painted Blue On Blue, One Stroke At A Time, Into Deeper And Deeper Shades Of Night.

Kumiko And I Felt Something For Each Other From The Beginning. It Was Not One Of Those Strong, Impulsive Feelings That Can Hit Two People Like An Electric Shock When They First Meet, But Something Quieter And Gentler, Like Two Tiny Lights Traveling In Tandem Through A Vast Darkness And Drawing Imperceptibly Closer To Each Other As They Go. As Our Meetings Grew More Frequent, I Felt Not So Much That I Had Met Someone New As That I Had Chanced Upon A Dear Old Friend.

One Of These Days They'll Be Making A Film Where The Whole Human Race Gets Wiped Out In A Nuclear War, But Everything Works Out In The End.

There Are Lots Of Things We Never Understand, No Matter How Many Years We Put On, No Matter How Much Experience We Accumulate.

When I Was Fifteen, All I Wanted Was To Go Off To Some Other World, A Place Beyond Anybody’s Reach. A Place Beyond The Flow Of Time.” - But There’s No Place Like That In This World. - Exactly. Which Is Why I’m Living Here, In This World Where Things Are Continually Damaged, Where The Heart Is Fickle, Where Time Flows Past Without A Break.

But Even So, Every Now And Then I Would Feel A Violent Stab Of Loneliness. The Very Water I Drink, The Very Air I Breathe, Would Feel Like Long, Sharp Needles. The Pages Of A Book In My Hands Would Take On The Threatening Metallic Gleam Of Razor Blades. I Could Hear The Roots Of Loneliness Creeping Through Me When The World Was Hushed At Four O'clock In The Morning.

Time Weighs Down On You Like An Old, Ambiguous Dream. You Keep On Moving, Trying To Sleep Through It. But Even If You Go To The Ends Of The Earth, You Won't Be Able To Escape It. Still, You Have To Go There- To The Edge Of The World. There's Something You Can't Do Unless You Get There.

I Miss You Terribly Sometimes, But In General I Go On Living With All The Energy I Can Muster. Just As You Take Care Of The Birds And The Fields Every Morning, Every Morning I Wind My Own Spring. I Give It Some 36 Good Twists By The Time I've Got Up, Brushed My Teeth, Shaved, Eaten Breakfast, Changed My Clothes, Left The Dorm, And Arrived At The University. I Tell Myself, "ok, Let's Make This Day Another Good One." I Hadn't Noticed Before, But They Tell Me I Talk To Myself A Lot These Days. Probably Mumbling To Myself While I Wind My Spring.

I Have No Idea! I Have Been Writing For 35 Years And From The Beginning Up To Now The Situation's Almost The Same. I'm Kind Of An Ugly Duckling. Always The Duckling, Never The Swan.

As We Go Through Life We Gradually Discover Who We Are, But The More We Discover, The More We Lose Ourselves.

Time Flows In A Strange Way On Sundays.

The Best Way To Think About Reality, I Had Decided, Was To Get As Far Away From It As Possible.

Things May Look Different To You Than They Did Before. I've Had That Experience Myself. But Don't Let Appearances Fool You. There's Only One Reality.

I Was Dying. Like All The Other People Who Live In This World.

What Would Tomorrow Bring? I Wondered. Both Hands On The Wheel, I Closed My Eyes. I Didn’t Feel Like I Was In My Own Body; My Body Was Just A Lonely, Temporary Container I Happened To Be Borrowing. What Would Become Of Me Tomorrow I Did Not Know.

Whatever Can't Be Expressed Might As Well Not Exist.

It's Just Like Sex; When [a Book Is] Finished, It's Finished.

All You Have To Do Is Wait,” I Explained. “sit Tight And Wait For The Right Moment. Not Try To Change Anything By Force, Just Watch The Drift Of Things. Make An Effort To Cast A Fair Eye On Everything. If You Do That, You Just Naturally Know What To Do. But Everyone’s Always Too Busy. They’re Too Talented, Their Schedules Are Too Full. They’re Too Interested In Themselves To Think About What’s Fair.

You Can Hide As Cleverly As You Like, But In The Final Analysis Mimicry Is Deception, Pure And Simple. It Doesn't Solve A Thing.

Knowledge And Ability Were Tools, Not Things To Show Off.

A Life Without Pain: It Was The Very Thing I Had Dreamed Of For Years, But Now That I Had It, I Couldn’t Find A Place For Myself Within It. A Clear Gap Separated Me From It, And This Caused Me Great Confusion. I Felt As If I Were Not Anchored To This World - This World That I Had Hated So Passionately Until Then; This World That I Had Continued To Revile For Its Unfairness And Injustice; This World Where At Least I Knew Who I Was. Now The World Ceased To Be The World, And I Had Ceased To Be Me.

Pointless Thinking Is Worse Than No Thinking At All.

If You Remember Me, Then I Don't Care If Everyone Else Forgets.

I Spent Thirty-three Years In Another Man's Shadow. I Went Everywhere He Went, I Helped Him With Everything He Did. I Was In A Sense A Part Of Him. When You Live Like That For A Long Time, You Gradually Lose Track Of What It Is You Yourself Really Want Out Of Life

Better To Be A First-class Matchbox Than A Second-class Match.

A Strange, Terrific Force Unlike Anything I've Ever Experienced Is Sprouting In My Heart, Taking Root There, Growing. Shut Up Behind My Rib Cage, My Warm Heart Expands And Contracts Independent Of My Will--over And Over.

One Last Word Of Advice, Though, Mr. Okada, Though You May Not Want To Hear This. There Are Things In This World It Is Better Not To Know About. Of Course, Those Are The Very Things That People Most Want To Know About. It's Strange.

You Know What I Should Do?" Hoshino Asked Excited. "of Course," The Cat Said. "what'd I Tell You? Cats Know Everything. Not Like Dogs.

Have Your Dream...what You Need Now More Than Anything Is Discipline. Cast Off Mere Words. Words Turn Into Stone. (from Thailand)

Have You Ever Had That Feeling—that You’d Like To Go To A Whole Different Place And Become A Whole Different Self?

Love Can Rebuild The World, They Say, So Everything's Possible When It Comes To Love.

I'm All Alone, But I'm Not Lonely.

This Is What It Means To Live On. When Granted Hope, A Person Uses It As Fuel, As A Guidepost To Life. It Is Impossible To Live Without Hope.

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