QUOTATIONS FROM THE UNKNOWN

... a muumuu speech -- covering everything and touching nothing.

A pessimist is one who feels bad when he feels good for fear he'll feel worse when he feels better.

Architects cover their mistakes with ivy, doctors with sod, and brides with mayonnaise.

... as obvious as a bear in a bathtub.

... harder than nailing jello to a tree.

If you have a bunch of clowns, you're going to have a circus.

If your outgo is greater than your income, then your upkeep will be your downfall.

"In media res, tutissimus ibis."

You will go most safely by the middle way.

It's not enough to have the right aim in life.
You've got to pull the trigger.

Life is like a tea bag.

You don't know your strength

(or weakness for that matter)

Until you're in hot water.

Life is simple ... if you meet triumph and disaster and treat these two imposters just the same.

LIKE A PATCHWORK QUILT

Life isn't given us all of a piece,
It's more like a patchwork quilt.
Each hour and minute a patch to fit in
To the pattern that's being built.

---

With some patches gay and some patches dark
And some that seem even dull,
But if we were given to set some apart,
We'd hardly know which to cull.

---

For it takes the dark patches to set off the light,
And the dull to show up the gay,
And somehow the pattern just wouldn't seem right
If we took any part away.

---

No, life isn't given us all of a piece,
But in patches of hours of use.
That each might work out his own pattern of life
To whatever design he choose.

May you have just enough clouds in your life to make a beautiful sunset.

Much more painful than acting the fool is the realization that you haven't been acting.

No individual raindrop ever considers itself responsible for the flood.

Now I lay me down to sleep,
The speaker's dull -- the subject deep;
If he should stop before I wake,
Give me a nudge for goodness sake.

Of all the things I've lost ...
I miss my mind the most.

T-Shirt Message, November 1988

SADLY HOLLOW
IMMORTALITY

Do not stand by my grave and weep.
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am a diamond glint on snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle Autumn rain.
When you awake in the morning hush
I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft star shine at night.
Do not stand by my grave and cry.
I am not there .. I did not die

(Prayer of the Makah Indians)

Smooth seas do not make good sailors.

Success is getting up one more time than you are knocked down.

"Indifference"

The cat is in the parlor,
The dog is in the lake;
The cow is in the hammock --
What difference does it make?

The human mind is like a parachute -- it functions best when it is open.

The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war.

Military Aphorism

The nature of God is a circle of which the centre is everywhere and the circumference is nowhere.

The sooner you fall behind, the more time you have to catch up.

"The Tired Woman's Epitaph"

Don't mourn for me now,
Don't mourn for me never;
I'm going to do nothing
For ever and ever.

The Uninhabited Island

An only survivor of a shipwreck came to an uninhabited island. He built a crude hut in which he placed the "little all" he had saved from the sinking ship. One day, returning from a hunt for food, he was horrified to find his hut in flames, All he had was gone. It was the worse thing that could happen to him. But the next day a ship arrived and the captain said, "We saw your smoke signal ."

"There Is No Death"

There is a plan far greater than the plan you know;
There is a landscape broader than the one you see.
There is a haven where storm-tossed souls may go --
You call it death -- we, immortality.

There is so much good in the worst of us,
And so much bad in the best of us,
That it hardly becomes any of us
To talk about the rest of us.

They thought they had discovered the legendary rose without a thorn.

"Rose Without a Thorn"

Within this vale ... of toil and sin ...
Your head grows bald ...
But not your chin.

an old Burma Shave road sign

Yesterday is a canceled check.
Tomorrow is a promissory note.
Today is the only cash you have.
Spend it wisely.

You must turn your stumbling blocks into stepping stones.