In a crowded subway car, I hear a male voice, close to my ear. We’re on an express train somewhere between Grand Central and Union Square, and I worry that I have a situation on my hands. But he isn’t talking to me. He’s reading out loud from “Only You Can Save Mankind,” by Terry Pratchett. His head is a mass of dark, wayward curls, and a young woman leans into him, listening and idly tugging on his Harry Potter-esque scarf. She’s wearing purple leg warmers with oversized yellow buttons down the sides. Between her boots, laced tight with rainbow laces, is an orange bag stuffed with smaller white plastic bags—it looks like a creamsicle. A single, surprised “Oh!” escapes her chapped lips at something he’s read. They aren’t on the subway; they’re in the story, saving mankind. He holds her head against his chest with his gloved hand, and she turns the page for him.

--
In The New Yorker

Reactions, please (errr... to the x number of people who actually read this stuff; where x < 3):
Obama's chief of staff.

Zionist corrupt fatcat
OR
Inspired choice.

Myth, Lies and creation.

"But, said Lewis, myths are lies, even though lies breathed through silver.
No, said Tolkien, they are not.
You call a tree, he said, and you tink more of the word. But it was not a 'tree' until someone gave it that name. You call a star a star, and say it just a ball of matter moving on mathematical course. But that is merely how you see it. By so naming things and describing them you are only inventing your own terms about them. And just as speech is invention about objects and ideas, so myth is invention about truth.
We have come from God (continued Tolkien), and inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, will also reflect a splintered fragment of the true light, the eternal truth that is with God. Indeed only by myth-making, only by becoming a 'sub-creator' and inventing stories, can Man aspire to that state of perfection that he knew... Our myths may be misguided, but they steer however shakily towards the true harbour, while materialistic 'progress' leads only to a yawning abyss and the Iron Crown of the power of evil."


--
A conversation between J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, recounted in
Humphrey Carpenter,
J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography

Will not apologise for the pain.

Everything around here makes me sad.

Everything around here's part of the dreams that we had. That will never be the way we wanted them to be... We dreamed of the future...
All the beautiful dreams..
I can see... this is only a dream.
Come on and wake up with me. Hey come on, and wake up with me. Hey come on and wake up with me.
Everything around is so beautiful.
Everything is a part of the dreams we will paint. That will never look the way we thought that they would look when we began to step into the future... It don't look too good right now, but I know, you're a wonderful painter, you're a master with your colours, as mine get fainter... there will always be an afterglow of a beautiful dream that will never be the way that we dreamed it to be, but hey, c'mon and wake up with me, hey come on and wake up with me, hey come on and wake up with me... for more beautiful dreams.

Jolie Holland. The Future.

Ich bin ein Berliner

A wonderful speech! In better words than I could ever muster, here IS the pattern that connects. The only important one - Ich bin ein Berliner!

retrospectively, i can write an ad...

From the other side of singledom:

Wanted:
One man.
Essentials:
Strong, beautiful hands. Cheekbones. The kissing kind. Loves parks, sunsets, cats and books. Must have insatiable curiosity and lust for life.
Must be dizzyingly, madly, hopelessly beautiful to me even in the middle of a fight. (This will be tested many, many times. Final contract subject to success in these tests.)
Must play the mandolin. Must invent a language or show marked potential for such invention.

Quiet, polite, gentle, sexy as can be.

Only men with above-mentioned qualities need apply.

Back Home.

The minute I heard my first love story
I started looking for you,
not knowing
how blind that I was

Lovers don't finally meet somewhere
They're in each other all along.

-- Rumi

Citius, Altius, Fortius