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I'll Follow Him To The Ends Of The Earth,' She Sobbed. Yes, Darling. But The Earth Doesn't Have Any Ends. Columbus Fixed That.
-Tom Robbins
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I'll Follow Him To

Tom Robbins
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I'll Follow Him To The Ends Of The Earth,' She Sobbed. Yes, Darling. But The Earth Doesn't Have Any Ends. Columbus Fixed That.

Understanding the Quote: "i'll follow him to the ends of the earth,' she sobbed. yes,..."

This quote by Tom Robbins reflects deeply on the theme of earth. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Earth, Woodpeckers, Columbus, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Tom Robbins interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Tom Robbins

Tom Robbins is celebrated for insightful thoughts on earth and woodpeckers. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Earth
Woodpeckers
Columbus
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The Trickster's Function Is To Break Taboos, Create Mischief, Stir Things Up. In The End, The Trickster Gives People What They Really Want, Some Sort Of Freedom.
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The Enemy Of The Black Is Not The White. The Enemy Of Capitalist Is Not Communist, The Enemy Of Homosexual Is Not Heterosexual, The Enemy Of Jew Is Not Arab, The Enemy Of Youth Is Not The Old, The Enemy Of Hip Is Not Redneck, The Enemy Of Chicano Is Not Gringo And The Enemy Of Women Is Not Men. We All Have The Same Enemy. The Enemy Is The Tyranny Of The Dull Mind. The Enemy Is Every Expert Who Practices Technocratic Manipulation, The Enemy Is Every Proponent Of Standardization And The Enemy Is Every Victim Who Is So Dull And Lazy And Weak As To Allow Himself To Be Manipulated And Standardized.
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True Stability Results When Presumed Order And Presumed Disorder Are Balanced. A Truly Stable System Expects The Unexpected, Is Prepared To Be Disrupted, Waits To Be Transformed.
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I Want To Travel On A Train That Smells Like Snowflakes. I Want To Sip In Cafes That Smell Like Comets. Under The Pressure Of My Step, I Want The Streets To Emit The Precise Odor Of A Diamond Necklace. I Want The Newspapers I Read To Smell Like The Violins Left In Pawnshops By Weeping Hobos On Christmas Eve. I Want To Carry Luggage That Reeks Of The Neurons In Einstein's Brain. I Want A City's Gases To Smell Like The Golden Belly Hairs Of The Gods. And When I Gaze At A Televised Picture Of The Moon, I Want To Detect, From A Distance Of 239,000 Miles, The Aroma Of Fresh Mozzarella.
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There's Birth, There's Death, And In Between There's Maintenance.
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When They Tell You To Grow Up, They Mean Stop Growing.
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The Loony Legacy Of Money Was That The Arithmetic By Which Things Were Measured Had Become More Valuable Than The Things Themselves.
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If We're Ever Going To Get The World Back On A Natural Footing, Back In Tune With Natural Rhythyms, If We're Going To Nurture The Earth And Protect It And Have Fun With It And Learn From It - Which Is What Mothers Do With Their Children - Then We've Got To Put Technology (an Aggressive Masculine System) In Its Proper Place, Which Is That Of A Tool To Be Used Sparingly, Joyfully, Gently And Only In The Fullest Cooperation With Nature. Nature Must Govern Technology, Not The Other Way Around.
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Don't Talk About It - You'll Talk It Away. Let The Ideas Flow From Your Mind To The Page Without Exposing Them To Air. Especially Hot Air.
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Birth And Death Were Easy. It Was Life That Was Hard.
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Some Marriages Are Made In Heaven, Mine Was Made In Hong Kong, By The Same People Who Make Those Little Rubber Pork Chops They Sell In The Pet Department At Kmart.
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Modern Romans Insisted That There Was Only One God, A Notion That Struck Alobar As Comically Simplistic. Worse, This Semitic Deity Was Reputed To Be Jealous (what Was There To Be Jealous Of If There Were No Other Gods?), Vindictive, And Altogether Foul-tempered. If You Didn't Serve The Nasty Fellow, The Romans Would Burn Your House Down. If You Did Serve Him, You Were Called A Christian And Got To Burn Other People's Houses Down.
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She Continued Weeping Until The Heat Of Her Tear Water, The Sheer Velocity Of Its Flow, Finally Obscured The Already Vague Circumstances Of Its Origins.
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Those Same Forces That Drive A Genius To Create The Things Or Ideas That Entertain Or Enlighten Us Often Gobble So Much Of His Personality That He Has None Left For The Social Graces.
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The Winter Passed As Slowly And Peacefully As A Boa Constrictor Digesting A Valium Addict.
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Today
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There Are Two Lost Continents.... We Are One: The Lovers.
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Science
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Halloween
Giving
Scary
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Cop
Crime
Danger Is To Adventure What Garlic Is To Spaghetti Sauce. Without It, You Just End Up With Stewed Tomatoes.
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Tomatoes
Sauce
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Kissing
Men
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The First Time That She Spread Her Legs For Him It Had Been Like Opening Her Jaws For The Dentist.
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You Know What The Game Of Golf Is, Don't You? It's Basketball For People Who Can't Jump And Chess For People Who Can't Think.
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Golf
Thinking
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Artist
People
The Middle Ages Hangs Over History's Belt Like A Beer Belly. It Is Too Late Now For Aerobic Dancing Or Cottage Cheese Lunches To Reduce The Middle Ages. History Will Have To Wear Size 48 Shorts Forever.
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Lunch
Dancing
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Swings
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Thinking
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Movement
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Smell
Poop
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Rhythm
Ifs
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Advertising
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Food
Passion
Dip A Slice Of Bread In Batter. That's September: Yellow, Gold, Soft And Sticky. Fry The Bread. Now You Have October: Chewier, Drier, Streaked With Browns. The Day In Question Fell Somewhere In The Middle Of The French Toast Process.
French Toast
Yellow
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Typewriters
Who You Are
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Mean
Happens
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Dancing
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Hero
Garden
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Two
Finding Yourself
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Heaven
Batteries
Toys
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Hero
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Ecstasy
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Genius
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Neurosis
Normality
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Silent
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Successful
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Phones
Machines
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Rawness
Disorder
Plasma
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Compassion
Generosity
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People
Sick
Sometimes, Though, I Feel That Pushing Books Is A Whole Lot Like Pushing Medicine. Think Of Books As Pills. I Have Pills That Cure Ignorance And Pills That Cure Boredom. I Have Pills To Elevate Moods And Pills To Open People's Eyes To The Awful Truth: Uppers And Downers As They Were. I Sell Pills To Help People Find Themselves And Pills To Help Them Lose Themselves When They Require Escape From The Pressures And Anxieties Of Life In A Complex Society.
Book
Ignorance
Eye
The Japanese Have Become So Smitten With The Western Condiment - Its Texture As Silky As A Kimono, Its Tang As Understated As The Tang Of Zen - That Today They Have A Word For Mayonnaise Junkie: Mayora.
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Humorous
Japan
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Dream
True Dreams
Early Religions Were Like Muddy Ponds With Lots Of Foliage. Concealed There, The Fish Of The Soul Could Splash And Feed. Eventually, However, Religions Became Aquariums. Then Hatcheries. From Farm Fingerling To Frozen Fish Stick Is A Short Swim.
Aquariums
Swim
Soul
Employing Women As My Primary Protagonists Has Allowed Me To Step Outside Of Myself, To Distance Myself From My Own Personality, Far More Easily Than Were I To Look At Events From A Masculine Perspective.
Distance
Perspective
Personality
Just Because You're Naked Doesn't Mean You're Sexy. Just Because You're Cynical Doesn't Mean You're Cool.
Sexy
Mean
Cynical
Logic Only Gives Man What He Needs... Magic Gives Him What He Wants.
Men
Giving
Magic
It Is Better To Be Small, Colorful, Sexy, Careless, And Peaceful, Like The Flowers, Than Large, Conservative, Repressed, Fearful, And Aggressive, Like The Thunder Lizards; A Lesson, By The Way, That The Earth Has Yet To Learn.
Sexy
Peace
Flower
Let Us, Rather, Gather Facts, All The Facts, Regardless Of Aesthetic Appeal Or Theoretical Social Worth, And Spread Those Facts Before Us Not As The Soothsayer Spreads The Innards Of A Turkey But As A Newspaper Spreads Its Columns. Let Us Be Journalists, Then. And Like All Good Journalists, We Shall Present Our Facts In An Order That Will Satisfy The Famous Five W's: Wow, Whoopee, Wahoo, Why-not And Whew.
Order
Turkeys
Why Not
If You Were Jesus With Missing Years To Kill Where Would You Go?
Jesus
Years
Missing
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Reading
Opportunity
Desire
…not A Fighter… An Adventurer. He Doesn’t Attack, He Engages; He Doesn’t Defend, He Expands; He Doesn’t Destroy, He Transforms; He Doesn’t Reject, He Explores; ….
Fighter
Adventurer
Rejects
Almost Any Object, Including This Book You Hold, Can Turn Up As Exhibit A In A Murder Trial.
Book
Trials
Murder
If Complexity Doesn't Beat You, Paradox Will.
Paradox
Beats
Complexity
Love Is Very Powerful, But It Has Limits And It's A Costly Mistake To Spread It Too Thin.
Powerful
Mistake
Love Is
Some Folks Hide And Some Folks Seek, And Seeking When Its Mindless, Neurotic, Desperate, Or Pusillanimous, Can Be A Form Of Hiding.
Desperate
Hiding
Still Life With Woodpecker
Love Is The Ultimate Outlaw.
Love Is
Outlaw
Ultimate
If You Want To Make A Name For Yourself, The Oldest Trick In The Book Is To Attack What Everybody Else Reveres.
Book
Names
Want
All Dreams Continue In The Beyond.
Dream
A Sense Of Humor...is Superior To Any Religion So Far Devised.
Sense Of Humor
Still Life With Woodpecker
Perfume
If The Novelist Isn't Surprised By Where His Book Ends Up, He Or She Probably Hasn't Written Anything Worth Remembering.
Book
Novelists
Remember
Me? I Stand For Uncertainty, Insecurity, Bad Taste, Fun, And Things That Go Boom In The Night.
Fun
Night
Insecurity
The Theme Of Corporate Stories (and Millions Drink Them In Every Day) Seldom Varies: To Be Happy You Must Consume, To Be Special You Must Conform. Absurd, Obviously, Yet Our Identities Have Become So Fragile, So Elusive, That We Seem Content To Let Advertisers Provide Us With Their Version Of Who We Are, To Let Them Recreate Us In Their Image: A Cookie-cutter Image Based On Market Research, Shallow Sociology, And Insidious Lies.
Lying
Special You
Identity
I Went To A Large Consolidated School In Appalachia. And I Wrote The Story When I Was In The Second Grade And I Took It Up To The Third Floor To The School Newspaper Office That Was Written And Edited By Juniors And Seniors.
Senior
School
Office
The Gods Have Chosen To Entertain Me With Chronic Eyestrain Headaches. Very Poisonous Episodes. So I Don't Do A Lot Of Reading Anymore Except On Tape.
Reading
Tape
Headache
Rivers Are The Primal Highways Of Life. From The Crack Of Time, They Had Borne Men's Dreams, And In Their Lovely Rush To Elsewhere, Fed Our Wanderlust, Mimicked Our Arteries, And Charmed Our Imaginations In A Way The Static Pond Or Vast And Savage Ocean Never Could.
Dream
Ocean
Men
...to Emphasize The Afterlife Is To Deny Life. To Concentrate On Heaven Is To Create Hell. In Their Desperate Longing To Transcend The Disorderliness, Friction, And Unpredictability That Pesters Life; In Their Desire For A Fresh Start In A Tidy Habitat, Germ-free And Secured By Angels, Religious Multitudes Are Gambling The Only Life They May Ever Have On A Dark Horse In A Race That Has No Finish Line.
Life
Religious
Horse
Success Can Eliminate As Many Options As Failure.
Success
Success Failure
I Sweet Potato What I Sweet Potato.
Sweet
Potatoes
Sweet Potatoes
Often, Moreover, It Is...that Aspect Of Our Being That Society Finds Eccentric, Ridiculous, Or Disagreeable, That Holds Our Sweet Waters, Our Secret Well Of Happiness, The Key To Our Equanimity In Malevolent Climes.
Sweet
Keys
Water
There Were No Mail-order Catalogues In 1492. Marco Polo's Journal Was The Wish Book Of Renaissance Europe. Then, Columbus Sailed The Ocean Blue And Landed In Sears' Basement. Despite All The Indians On The Escalator, Columbus' Visit Came To Be Known As A "discovery.
Ocean
Book
Blue
Every Day Is Judgement Day. Always Has Been. Always Will Be.
Judgement
Judgement Day
Has Beens
How We Shape Our Understanding Of Others' Lives Is Determined By What We Find Memorable In Them, And That In Turn Is Determined Not By Any Potentially Accurate Overview Of Another's Personality But Rather By The Tension And Balance That Exist In Our Daily Relationships.
Memorable
Personality
Understanding
Switters Was Actually Quite Fond Of Seattle's Weather, And Not Merely Because Of It's Ambivalence. He Liked It's Subtle, Muted Qualities And The Landscape That Those Qualities Encouraged If Not Engendered: Vistas That Seemed To Have Been Sketched With A Sumi Brush Dipped In Quicksilver And Green Tea. It Was Fresh, It Was Clean, It Was Gently Primal, And Mystically Suggestive.
Weather
Tea
Quality
To Be Or Not To Be Isn't The Question. The Question Is How To Prolong Being.
Health
Exercise
Diets
Every Individual Has To Assume Responsibility For His Or Her Own Actions, Even The Poor And The Young. A Social System That Decrees Otherwise Is Inviting Intellectual Atrophy And Spiritual Stagnation.
Spiritual
Responsibility
Intellectual
Live The Beauty Or Your Own Reality.
Reality
I Go Into A Gallery Or Museum, And I Realize That I Don't Have To Formulate Any Opinions If I Don't Want To. I Don't Have To Think This Thing Through And Write About It At Any Great Length. I Can Think About It If I Want To; If Not, I Can Just Walk Out. So I Can Enjoy Painting Really A Lot More Than I Could When I Had That Sort Of Pressure.
Writing
Thinking
Museums
Never Be Afraid To Make A Fool Of Yourself. The Furthest Out You Can Go Is The Best Place To Be.
Writing
Fool
Best Place
Be Your Own Flying Saucer! Rescue Yourself!
Flying
Flying Saucers
Rescue
I Have Always Been A Romantic, One Of Those People Who Believes That A Woman In Pink Circus Tights Contains All The Secrets Of The Universe.
Believe
People
Secret
Death Is Simple. Life Is Messy. Give Me Life, The More Complicated The Better.
Simple
Giving
Life Is
Something Has Got To Hold It Together. I'm Saying My Prayers To Elmer, The Greek God Of Glue.
Life
God
Prayer
Perhaps The Most Terrible (or Wonderful) Thing That Can Happen To An Imaginative Youth, Aside From The Curse (or Blessing) Of Imagination Itself, Is To Be Exposed Without Preparation To The Life Outside His Or Her Own Sphere - The Sudden Revelation That There Is A There Out There.
Blessing
Imagination
Preparation
Individualism Is Bad For Business - Though Absolutely Necessary For Freedom, Progressive Knowledge, And Any Possible Interface With The Transcendent.
Individualism
Progressive
Interfaces
You're Better Equipped For This World Than I Am," She Said. "i'm Always Trying To Change The World. You Know How To Live In It.
Always Trying
World
Said
Most Novelists Write About Twisted Lives.
Writing
Novelists
Twisted
The Universe Does Not Have Laws. It Has Habits. And Habits Can Be Broken.
Law
Broken
Doe
A Hamburger Is An Icon Of Layered Circles, The Circle Being At Once The Most Spiritual And The Most Sensual Of Shapes.
Spiritual
Food
Circles
Would You Complain Because A Beautiful Sunset Doesn't Have A Future Or A Shooting Star A Payoff? And Why Should Romance 'lead Anywhere'? Passion Isn't A Path Through The Woods. Passion Is The Woods.
Beautiful
Stars
Passion
In Times Of Widespread Chaos And Confusion, It Has Been The Duty Of More Advanced Human Beings--artists, Scientists, Clowns And Philosophers--to Create Order. In Times Such As Ours, However, When There Is Too Much Order, Too Much Management, Too Much Programming And Control, It Becomes The Duty Of Superior Men And Women To Fling Their Favorite Monkey Wrenches Into The Machinery. To Relive The Repression Of The Human Spirit, They Must Sow Doubt And Disruption.
Men
Artist
Order
Society In General Maintains Such A Vested Interested In Its Cozy Habits And Solidified Belief Systems That It Had Rather Die - Or Kill - Than Entertain Change. Consider How Threatened Religious Fundamentalists Of All Faiths Remain To This Day By Science In General And Darwin In Particular.
Religious
Cozy
Belief
Our World Isn't Made Of Earth, Air And Water Or Even Molecules And Atoms; Our World Is Made Of Language.
Our World
Air
Water
Of The Seven Dwarfs, The Only One Who Shaved Was Dopey. That Should Tell Us Something About The Wisdom Of Shaving.
Shaving
Seven
Should
Plato Did Claim That The Unexamined Life Was Not Worth Living. Oedipus Rex Was Not So Sure.
Plato
Oedipus
Claims
If It Is Committed In The Name Of God Or Country, There Is No Crime So Heinous That The Public Will Not Forgive It.
Inspirational
Country
Names
Very Few People Can Write In A Crowd. This Is A Very Solitary Occupation. I Have Known People More Talented Than Me Who Never Made It. And The Primary Reason Was Always That They Couldn't Stand To Be Alone For Several Hours A Day. Any Writer Worth Anything Has Mastered The Art. The Art Of Solitude.
Art
Writing
People
It Is Better To Be Small, Colorful, Sexy, Careless, And Peaceful.
Sexy
Peaceful
Lizards
Reality Whistles A Different Tune Underwater.
Reality
Tunes
Underwater
Reality Is Contradictory. And It's Paradoxical.
Reality
Contradictory
Paradoxical
When A Culture Is Being Dumbed Down As Effectively As Ours Is, Its Narrative Arts (literature, Film, Theatre) Seem To Vacillate Between The Brutal And The Bland, Sometimes In The Same Work.
Art
Theatre
Culture
That's The Way The Mind Works: The Brain Is Genetically Disposed Towards Organization, Yet If Not Controlled, Will Link Even The Most Imagerial Fragment To Another On The Flimsiest Pretense And In The Most Freewheeling Manner, As If It Takes A Kind Of Organic Pleasure In Creative Association, Without Regards To Logic Or Chronological Sequence.
Organization
Creative
Brain
There Is A Sense In Which A Painted Stick Is A Stick In Bloom. This Stick Points To The Hidden Face Of God. Sometimes It Points To You.
Faces
Sticks
Sometimes
Purpose! Purposes Are For Animals With A Hell Of A Lot More Dignity Than The Human Race! Just Hop On That Strange Torpedo And Ride It To Wherever It's Going.
Animal
Race
Purpose
Usually, Autobiography Is Such An Indulgence Of The Ego.
Ego
Autobiography
Indulgence
Anyone Who Maintains Absolute Standards Of Good And Evil Is Dangerous. As Dangerous As A Maniac With A Loaded Revolver.
Evil
Revolver
Standards
As Any Car Freak Will Tell You, The Old Models Are The Most Beautiful, Even If They Aren't The Most Efficient. People Who Sacrifice Beauty For Efficiency Get What They Deserve.
Beautiful
Sacrifice
People
The Ultimate End Of Any Ideology Is Totalitarianism.
Ends
Ideology
Ultimate
Much Scientific Truth Proved To Be As Hypothetical As Poetic Allegory. The Relationshiip Of Those Rod-connected Blue And Red Balls To An Actual Atomic Structure Was About The Same As The Relationship Of Christianity To The Fish Or The Lamb.
Truth
Blue
Balls
Our Individuality Is All, All, That We Have. There Are Those Who Barter It For Security, Those Who Repress It For What They Believe Is The Betterment Of The Whole Society, But Blessed In The Twinkle Of The Morning Star Is The One Who Nurtures It And Rides It In, In Grace And Love And Wit, From Peculiar Station To Peculiar Station Along Life's Bittersweet Route.
Love
Morning
Stars
Should You Fail To Pilot Your Own Ship, Don't Be Surprised At What Inappropriate Port You Find Yourself Docked.
Finding Yourself
Pilots
Ships
We All Dream Profusely Every Night, Yet By Morning We've Forgotten Ninety Percent Of What Went On. That's Why Poets Are Such Important Members Of Society. Poets Remember Our Dreams For Us.
Dream
Morning
Night
'neotenty' Is 'remaining Young,' And It May Be Ironic That It Is So Little Known, Because Human Evolution Has Been Dominated By It.
Philosophy
Educational
Ironic
Politics Is For People Who Have A Passion For Changing Life But Lack A Passion For Living It.
Life Changing
Passion
People
The Enemy Is The Tyranny Of The Dull Mind.
Mind
Enemy
Dull
When We Accept Bad Art Because It's Good Politics, We're Killing The Swan To Feed The Chickens.
Art
Swans
Killing
The Only Bubble In The Flat Champagne Of February Is Valentine’s Day. It Was No Accident That Our Ancestors Pinned Valentine’s Day On February’s Shirt: He Or She Lucky Enough To Have A Lover In Frigid, Antsy February Has Cause For Celebration, Indeed.
Valentine
Lucky
Causes
Our Purpose Is To Consciously, Deliberately Evolve Towards A Wiser, More Liberated And Luminous State Of Being.
Purpose
States
Evolve
I Am Looking For The Novelists Whose Writing Is An Extension Of Their Intellect Rather Than An Extension Of Their Neurosis.
Writing
Novelists
Neurosis
Above All, Have A Good Time. If You Aren’t Enjoying Writing It, You Can Hardly Expect Someone Else To Enjoy Reading It.
Reading
Writing
Good Times
My Faith Is Whatever Makes Me Feel Good About Being Alive. If Your Religion Doesn't Make You Feel Good To Be Alive, What The Hell Is The Point Of It?
Feel Good
Alive
Hell
Eating A Raw Oyster Is Like French Kissing A Mermaid.
Kissing
Oysters
Mermaid
Life Is Too Small A Container For Certain Individuals. Some Of Them, Such As Alobar, Huff And Puff And Try To Expand The Container. Others, Such As Kudra, Seek To Pry The Lid Off And Hop Out.
Trying
Puff
Life Is
You Should Never Hesitate To Trade Your Cow For A Handful Of Magic Beans.
Inspiration
Anxiety
Magic
You Are An Ignorant Schoolgirl. You Think Civilization Is A Good Thing.
Thinking
Civilization
Ignorant
Hardly A Pure Science, History Is Closer To Animal Husbandry Than It Is To Mathematics In That It Involves Selective Breeding. The Principal Difference Between The Husbandryman And The Historian Is That The Former Breeds Sheep Or Cows Or Such And The Latter Breeds (assumed) Facts. The Husbandryman Uses His Skills To Enrich The Future, The Historian Uses His To Enrich The Past. Both Are Usually Up To Their Ankles In Bullshit.
Science
Animal
Past
I Like To Think Of Myself As A Fiction Writer Who Liked Art Enough To Write About It For A While, And Then Went On To His Fiction.
Art
Writing
Thinking
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