I have been collecting quotations since before most of you were born or thought of I was in college. There is just something about words in certain combinations that fascinates me, tantalizes me, makes me laugh out loud, reduces me to heartbroken tears, infuriates me, sweeps me off my feet, reminds me of experiences actually experienced and/or on my to-be-experienced list, causes my heart to beat faster in love, hate, outrage, and shock. Good quotations are not necessarily thoughts that I believe in. Sometimes, a horrendous thought or belief, expressed well, is worth remembering, too.

Words have power. When we know a lot of words, we have power. When we can string the words we know together, and weave a thought into a coherent sentence – and what is a coherent sentence but a thought given bodily substance – we join those in whose hands a pen is a wand capable of moving mountains.

I keep my quotes on file cards, one quote to a card. I used to file the cards in alphabetical order, according to theme, but as I use my quote cards in my classes so much, any logical order they may once have been in has long since disintegrated. I like it better this way, actually; thoughts coming at me randomly force me to use brain cells that may never have been used before. Whether this delays or speeds up the inevitable day when I’ll be able to hide my own Easter eggs, I know not. But I do know that I loves me some wisdom, some wit, some whimsy, some rancor, some love, some heartbreak, some hatred, some sarcasm, some disgust, some clever whining, some intellectual “wow’s,” and some evil incarnate, as long as it’s all put together in some mighty and majestic turn-of-phrase.

“Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must be first overcome.” –Samuel Johnson

“Do not think of knocking out another person’s brains because he differs in opinion from you. It would be as rational to knock yourself on the head because you differ from yourself ten years ago.” –Horace Mann

“Those who never retract their opinions love themselves more than they love truth.” — Joseph Joubert

“To force opinion is like pushing the magnetized needle round by brute strength until it points to where we wish the North Star stood, rather than to where it really is.” – Dorothy Canfield Fisher

“Consistancy requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago.” –Bernard Berenson

“The people who are always hankering loudest for some golden yesteryear usually drive new cars.” – Russell Baker

“Adversity is the trial of principle. Without it, a man hardly knows whether he is honest or not.” –Henry Fielding

“If you are losing a tug-of-war with a tiger, give him the rope before he gets to your arm. You can always buy a new rope.” –Max Gunther

“Every job is a self-portrait of the person who does it. Autograph your work with excellence.” –Unknown

“You have to pay dearly for being an imaginative person. You see a great deal and feel a great deal, but there is ugliness to see and feel as well as beauty, and in yourself as well as in others.” –Sherwood Anderson

“We are all here and it is now. Further than that, all human knowledge is moonshine.” –H.L. Mencken

“Many a man who would not dream of putting too much pressure in his automobile tires, lays a constant overstrain on his heart and arteries.” –Bruce Barton

“A dining room table with children’s eager, hungry faces around it, ceases to be a mere dining room table, and becomes an altar.” –Simeon Strunsky

“I think we’re all heroes if you catch us at the right time.” –Andy Garcia

“How many fancy they have experience simply because they have grown old.” – Stanislas I

“He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really co-operating with it.” – ML King, Jr.

“If you’re going through hell, keep going.” – Winston Churchill

“Remember, remember always, that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.” –FDR

“Dreaming permits each and every one of us to be quietly and safely insane every night of our lives.” –Charles William Dement

“If boys and girls do not learn discipline in their school days, money and time spent on their education is so much national loss.” –Ghandi

“It is not the facts which guide the conduct of men, but their opinions about facts, which may be entirely wrong. We can only make them right by discussion.” –Sir Normal Angele

“The character that needs law to mend it, is hardly worth the tinkering.” –Unknown

“Logical consequences are the scarecrows of fools and the beacons of wise men.” -T.H. Huxley

“He that is not open to conviction, is not qualified for discussion.” –Richard Whately

“Democracy is based upon the conviction that there are extraordinary possibilities in ordinary people.” –Harry Emerson Fosdick

“Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen, and thinking what nobody has thought.” – Albert Szent-Gyorgi

. . . to be continued, here and there, now and then, as the mood overtakes me, and it will.

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly

Bill Clinton was supposed to speak in one of our middle schools’ gymnasiums at 12:30 today. (The mid-town one, naturally; nobody ever presents anything at either of the two rural middle schools) I was supposed to pick up my sweet MIL from the newspaper office (she is a reporter) at 11:10, and take her to a doctor’s appointment. As I was trying to get there, around 11:00, many of the streets in the middle of town were already blocked and guarded by police cars and fire trucks, and the crowds were thick.

I managed to get to her office and pick her up, and with just a little maneuvering and a few detours we made it to the doctor’s office in time.

After her appointment, we stopped for a quick lunch and then I took her back to work. Bill still hadn’t shown up, but the streets were still blocked and the crowds were even bigger.

I had no desire to see Bill Clinton or anyone he might be still married to as I type, so I came back home. I was interested in his visit from a historical standpoint, however, so every once in a while I checked them pesky internets to see what he was speaking about, but at 2:00 he still hadn’t shown up. I started to wonder what the middle school was going to do about getting all those kids on their respective buses pretty soon. The streets were completely congested and I was betting to myself that there would be no way the guards would allow all those school buses in there.

I finally got an email from my Cousin C; she’d been standing up for over four hours but felt it was worthwhile because when Bill finally did show up, he put on a good show.

Of course, he’s always been good at putting on a good show. (insert unkind smirk here)

I had a brief fantasy about being there and having him come up to me, shake my hand, and ask me if I was planning to vote for Hilary. He would use that smooth tone of voice – the one he always used when he told lies – and his charismatic wink, and I, still holding his hand, would smile at him and say sweetly, into the camera, “Oh HELL to the no. “

What, you have other kinds of fantasies? These days, mine are usually scenarios of some kind.

Maybe that kind, maybe. But mostly, this kind. Sigh.

Bill was supposed to speak at Assembly Hall at IU at 2:00. He was late for that gig, too. I have a feeling it won’t matter as much up there, though, because Bill’s visit was maybe just a tiny tad shown up by the Hoosiers hiring a new basketball coach.

Down here, people think basketball is important. More important than academics, more important than culture, more important than integrity, more important than good behavior, and definitely more important than politics.

Welcome to Indiana, Clintons.

Mamacita, Scheiss Weekly