when the rain taps at the window

"My gripe is not with the lovers of the truth but with the truth herself. What succor, what consolation is there in truth, compared to a story? What good is truth, at midnight, in the dark, when the wind is roaring like a bear in the chimney? When the lightning strikes shadows on the bedroom wall and the rain taps at the window with its long fingernails? No. When fear and cold make a statue of you in your bed, don't expect hard-boned and fleshless truth to come running to your aid. What you need are the plump comforts of a story. The soothing, rocking safety of a lie." -Diane Setterfield, The Thirteenth Tale


Here in Seattle, we heard quite a bit of rain tapping at the window... With flood warnings in effect I was able to take a half day off of work and spend the morning with my mom and dad.

Perfection

In anything at all, perfection is finally attained not when there is no longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away, when a body is stripped down to its nakedness. -Antione de St. Exupery, Wind, Sand and Stars

"Soccer Moms"

"Soccer moms," Freddy said "spending all day driving around in shapeless vehicles that look like Flash Gordon's bread truck, and their children watch television in the back and ape superficial characters therein. This is the cause of deep unhappiness, because what they want is so different from what they have, even though they don't realize that this is so. They don't want their children to dress like circus clowns, speak like zombie chipmunks, and behave like programed machines. They want sons and daughters they can talk to; they want a struggle they can win but that they are not assured of winning; they want to know physical exhaustion; they want to be sunburned; they want to smell eucalyptus; they want to weep; they want to dance naked for their husbands; they want to feel wind, see the stars, swim in a river, slam the back door, and laugh uncontrollably with their children. That's what they want. They don't want the crap they have, the crap self promises, or the crap you would promise if you could figure out what to promise. They want to be free, to have dignity, to know honor and sacrifice. What else does anyone want?"
-Moofoomooach (or Freddy Finney from the book Freddy and Fredricka by Mark Helprin)