It depends on me, whether life is good or not. On me. Not on life. On me.

~ Alice Herz-Sommers
the worlds oldest Holocaust survivor (died yesterday)
(NPR) Alice Herz-Sommer, Pianist And Holocaust Survivor, Dies At 110

May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you’re wonderful, and don’t forget to make some art – write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself.

~ Neil Gaiman

My aim is to put down on paper what I see and what I feel in the best and simplest way.

~ Ernest Hemingway

The sexiest thing in the entire world is being really smart, and being thoughtful, and being generous. Everything else is crap. I promise you. It’s just crap that people try to sell to you to make you feel like less. So don’t buy it! Be smart, be thoughtful and be generous.

~ Ashton Kutcher
2013 Teen Choice Awards

You know what’s really, powerfully sexy? A sense of humor. A taste for adventure. A healthy glow. Hips to grab on to. Openness. Confidence. Humility. Appetite. Intuition. … Smart-ass comebacks. Presence. A quick wit. dirty jokes told by an innocent-looking lady. .. A woman who realizes how beautiful she is.

~ Courtney E. Martin

People think focus means saying yes to the thing you’ve got to focus on. But that’s not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully. I’m actually as proud of the things we haven’t done as the things I have done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things.

~ Steve Jobs
Apple Developer Conference, 1997

The best people possess a feeling for beauty, the courage to take risks, the discipline to tell the truth, the capacity for sacrifice. Ironically, their virtues make them vulnerable; they are often wounded, sometimes destroyed.

~ Ernest Hemingway

Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.

~ William Morris

Of all the days and all the places this wayward “I Love You” red balloon lands in an oak tree on my little piece of heaven – on my birthday.

That’s the kind of thing my dad would do… Leave a red “I Love You” balloon lurking in a distant tree. Reminds me of 30 years ago when he left a red convertible Mustang lurking in a parking lot for me to find on my 16th birthday. Love you Dad!

Miss you more than anything here on earth.

August 29th, a day for red balloons and red Mustangs. Love you Dad!

Have you had a kindness shown?
Pass it on;
‘Twas not given for thee alone,
Pass it on;
Let it travel down the years,
Let it wipe another’s tears,
‘Til in Heaven the deed appears –
Pass it on.

~ Henry Burton 

Greed’s worst point is its ingratitude.

~ Seneca

Ingratitude is a nail which, driven into the tree of courtesy, causes it to wither; it is a broken channel, by which the foundations of the affections are undermined; and a lump of soot, which, failing into the dish of friendship, destroys its scent and flavor.

~ Giambattitsta Basile

The first one you’ll see in Jesus.

~  Colton Burpo
Heaven is for Real

I don’t take pictures, pictures take me. One can only trust one’s sensitivity, the bounty of the world, and the chemistry of Kodak.

~ Charles Aarbuh

I hate cameras.  They are so much more sure than I am about everything.

~ John Steinbeck

It says that when you cross the valley of tears, and you arrive to the oasis, the reward of God is not success, it’s not money, it’s not admiration or fame, it’s not power. His reward is rest. So that’s what I want for me now.

~ Ingrid Betancourt
Even Silence Has An End
NPR’s Ingrid Betancourt’s Six Years In The Jungle (Sept. 2010)

There is a sacredness in tears. They are not a mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition and of unspeakable love.

~ Washington Irving