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I've Been Lonely For So Long. And I've Been Hurt So Deeply. If Only I Could Have Met You Again A Long Time Ago, Then I Wouldn't Have Had To Take All These Detours To Get Here.' Tengo Shook His Head. 'i Don't Think So. This Way Is Just Fine. This Is Exactly The Right Time. For Both Of Us. [...] We Needed That Much Time.... To Understand How Lonely We Really Were.

-Haruki Murakami

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I've Been Lonely For

Haruki Murakami

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I've Been Lonely For So Long. And I've Been Hurt So Deeply. If Only I Could Have Met You Again A Long Time Ago, Then I Wouldn't Have Had To Take All These Detours To Get Here.' Tengo Shook His Head. 'i Don't Think So. This Way Is Just Fine. This Is Exactly The Right Time. For Both Of Us. [...] We Needed That Much Time.... To Understand How Lonely We Really Were.

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There's No War That Will End All Wars.

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Among The Many Values In Life, I Appreciate Freedom Most.

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After All This, I Won't Start To Hate You.

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Will You Wait For Me Forever?

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Physical Things

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Something Inside Me Had Dropped Away, And Nothing Came In To Fill The Cavern.

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The Better You Were Able To Imagine What You Wanted To Imagine, The Farther You Could Flee From Reality.

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I Move, Therefore I Am.

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Losing A Loved One

All Imperfections Are Forced Upon The Imperfect, So The 'perfect' Can Live Content And Oblivious.

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I Didn't Feel Like I Was In My Own Body; My Body Was Just A Lonely, Temporary Container I Happened To Be Borrowing.

When You Come Out Of The Storm, You Won’t Be The Same Person Who Walked In. That’s What This Storm’s All About.

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Every Writer Has His Writing Technique - What He Can And Can't Do To Describe Something Like War Or History. I'm Not Good At Writing About Those Things, But I Try Because I Feel It Is Necessary To Write That Kind Of Thing.

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

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

Ordinary Imperfect People, Always Choose Similarly Imperfect People As Friends.

Let Me Just Tell You This, Watanabe," Said Midori, Pressing Her Cheek Against My Neck. "i'm A Real, Live Girl, With Real, Live Blood Gushing Through My Veins. You're Holding Me In Your Arms And I'm Telling You That I Love You. I'm Ready To Do Anything You Tell Me To Do. I May Be A Little Bit Mad, But I'm A Good Girl, And Honest, And I Work Hard, I'm Kind Of Cute, I Have Nice Boobs, I'm A Good Cook, And My Father Left Me A Trust Fund. I Mean, I'm A Real Bargain, Don't You Think? If You Don't Take Me, I'll End Up Going Somewhere Else.

No Matter How Much Suffering You Went Through, You Never Wanted To Let Go Of Those Memories.

So What’s Wrong If There Happens To Be One Guy In The World Who Enjoys Trying To Understand You?

The Pillow Smells Like The Sunlight, A Precious Smell.

What Matters Is Deciding In Your Heart To Accept Another Person Completely. When You Do That, It Is Always The First Time And The Last.

It's Basically Impossible For Everybody's Justice To Prevail Or Everybody's Happiness To Triumph, So Chaos Takes Over.

What I'd Like To Be Is A Unique Writer Who's Different From Everybody Else. I Want To Be A Writer Who Tells Stories Unlike Other Writers'.

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Human Beings Are Ultimately Nothing But Carriers-passageways- For Genes. They Ride Us Into The Ground Like Racehorses From Generation To Generation. Genes Don't Think About What Constitutes Good Or Evil. They Don't Care Whether We Are Happy Or Unhappy. We're Just Means To An End For Them. The Only Thing They Think About Is What Is Most Efficient For Them.

Memories Warm You Up From The Inside. But They Also Tear You Apart.

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If There's Any Guy Crazy Enough To Attack Me, I'm Going To Show Him The End Of The World -- Close Up. I'm Going To Let Him See The Kingdom Come With His Own Eyes. I'm Going To Send Him Straight To The Southern Hemisphere And Let The Ashes Of Death Rain All Over Him And The Kangaroos And The Wallabies.

Everybody Feels Safe Belonging Not To The Excluded Minority But To The Excluding Majority. You Think, Oh, I’m Glad That’s Not Me. It’s Basically The Same In All Periods In All Societies. If You Belong To The Majority, You Can Avoid Thinking About Lots Of Troubling Things.

I Contented Myself With Whiskey, For Medicinal Purposes. It Helped Numb My Various Aches And Pains. Not That The Alcohol Actually Reduced The Pain; It Just Gave The Pain A Life Of Its Own, Apart From Mine.

A Girl Doesn't Always Want To Go Out, You Know, Mr. Wind-up Bird. Sometimes She Feels Like Being Nasty--like, If The Guy's Gonna Wait, Let Him Really Wait.

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.

I Have Been Told I've Got A Darkish Personality. A Few Times." Takahashi Swings His Trombone Case From His Right Shoulder To His Left. Then He Says, "it's Not As If Our Lives Are Divided Simply Into Light And Dark. There's Shadowy Middle Ground. Recognizing And Understanding The Shadows Is What A Healthy Intelligence Does. And To Acquire A Healthy Intelligence Takes A Certain Amount Of Time And Effort. I Don't Think You Have A Particularly Dark Character.

Curiosity Can Bring Guts Out Of Hiding At Times, Maybe Even Get Them Going. But Curiosity Usually Evaporates. Gust Have To Go For The Long Haul. Curiosity's Like A Fun Friend You Can't Really Trust. It Turns You On And Then It Leaves You To Make It On Your Own - With Whatever Guts You Can Muster

Everyone Just Keeps On Disappearing. Some Things Vanish, Like They Were Cut Away. Others Fade Slowly Into The Mist. And All That Remains Is A Desert.

If You Think God’s There, He Is. If You Don’t, He Isn’t. And If That’s What God’s Like, I Wouldn’t Worry About It.

What's Nurtured Slowly Grows Well.

Pointless Thinking Is Worse Than No Thinking At All.

Life's No Piece Of Cake, Mind You, But The Recipe's My Own To Fool With.

I Was Always Hungry For Love. Just Once, I Wanted To Know What It Was Like To Get My Fill Of It -- To Be Fed So Much Love I Couldn't Take Any More. Just Once.

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.

Of Course You Keep Telling Yourself There's Something To Be Learned From Everything, And Growing Old Shouldn't Be That Hard. That's The General Drift.

I'm Always Tripped Up By The Eternal Who Am I?

I Never Made Any Plan Before Writing, However I Succeeded. I Enjoyed Writing With Excitement ,"what Happen On The Next Page?"

Confidence; As A Teenager? Because I Knew What I Loved. I Loved To Read; I Loved To Listen To Music; And I Love Cats. Those Three Things. So, Even Though I Was An Only Kid, I Could Be Happy Because I Knew What I Loved.

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

The Unwaking World Was As Hushed As A Deep Forest.

There’s Nothing Wrong With Not Looking Like Something. It Just Means You Don’t Fit The Stereotype Yet.

There's No Sense Forcing Yourself If You Don't Feel Like It. Tell You The Truth, I've Had Sex With Lots Of Guys, But I Think I Did It Mostly Out Of Fear. I Was Scared Not To Have Somebody Putting His Arms Around Me, So I Could Never Say No. That's All. Nothing Good Ever Came Of Sex Like That. All It Does Is Grind Down The Meaning Of Life A Piece At A Time.

Like You're Riding A Train At Night Across Some Vast Plain, And You Catch A Glimpse Of A Tiny Light In A Window Of A Farmhouse. In An Instant It's Sucked Back Into The Darkness Behind And Vanishes. But If You Close Your Eyes, That Point Of Light Stays With You, Just Barely For A Few Moments.

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.

Time Moves In It Special Way In The Middle Of The Night.

I'm Not A Fast Reader. I Like To Linger Over Each Sentence, Enjoying The Style. If I Don't Enjoy The Writing, I Stop.

Shakespeare Said It Best,' Tamaru Said Quietly As He Gazed At That Lumpish, Misshapen Head. 'something Along These Lines: If We Die Today, We Do Not Have To Die Tomorrow, So Let Us Look To The Best In Each Other

Ice Contains No Future , Just The Past, Sealed Away. As If They're Alive, Everything In The World Is Sealed Up Inside, Clear And Distinct. Ice Can Preserve All Kinds Of Things That Way- Cleanly, Clearly. That's The Essence Of Ice, The Role It Plays.

She Gave Me This Look – She Might Have Been Watching From A Lifeboat As The Ship Went Down. Or Maybe It Was The Other Way Around.

The Most Dangerous Creature Here Would Have To Be Me. So Maybe I'm Just Scared Of My Own Shadow.

You Know, Eating's Much More Important Than Most People Think. There Comes A Time In Your Life When You've Just Got To Have Something Super-delicious. And When You're Standing At That Crossroads Your Whole Life Can Change, Depending On Which One You Go Into - The Good Restaurant Or The Awful One.

A Man Is Like A Two-story House. The First Floor Is Equipped With An Entrance And A Living Room. On The Second Floor Is Every Family Member's Room. They Enjoy Listening To Music And Reading Books. On The First Underground Floor Is The Ruin Of People's Memories. The Room Filled With Darkness Is The Second Underground Floor.

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.

I Don’t Know, I Don’t Feel Right Unless I’ve Got The Sea And Mountains Nearby. People Are Mostly A Product Of Where They Were Born And Raised. How You Think And Feel’s Always Linked To The Lay Of The Land, The Temperature. The Prevailing Winds, Even.

Whether You Take The Doughnut Hole As A Blank Space Or As An Entity Unto Itself Is A Purely Metaphysical Question And Does Not Affect The Taste Of The Doughnut One Bit.

When You Fall In Love, The Natural Thing To Do Is Give Yourself To It.

Falling In Love

Falling For You

Crying Is Personal. On The Other Hand, Laughing Is More General . Laughing Makes Our Hearts Wider.

The Grounds Of The Place Were Dominated By Several Large, Old Willow Trees That Towered Over The Surrounding Stone Wall And Swayed Soundlessly In The Wind Like Lost Souls.

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