Jodi Picoult

"After a certain point, a heart with so many stress fractures can never be anything but broken."

Jodi Picoult (Salem Falls)

Louise Erdrich

"Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could."

Louise Erdrich (The Painted Drum)

Valentine's Day

Because it's February 14th.
My take on love - all year round.

Lisa Genova

"She liked being reminded of butterflies. She remembered being six or seven and crying over the fates of the butterflies in her yard after learning that they lived for only a few days. Her mother had comforted her and told her not to be sad for the butterflies, that just because their lives were short didn't mean they were tragic. Watching them flying in the warm sun among the daisies in their garden, her mother had said to her, see, they have a beautiful life. Alice liked remembering that."

Lisa Genova (Still Alice)

Kevin Brooks

"I remember it all: every word, every breath, every tick of the clock . . . everything that happened is with me forever. I can never forget it. But that doesn't mean I can live it again. You can't live what's gone, you can only remember it, and memories have no life. They're just pale reminders of a time that's gone - like faded photographs, or a dried-up daisy chain at the back of a drawer. They have no substance. They can't take you back. Nothing can take you back. Nothing can be the same as it was. Nothing is."

Kevin Brooks

Kirsten Dewar

Madiba Magic
In celebration of 20 years of freedom ...

Nelson Rolihlahla Dalibhunga Mandela.
Warrior, statesman, freedom fighter, Nobel Prize winner, Africa’s most celebrated, yet most humble son. How much do we via to wear, be associated, claim your“ 46664”.

How little did your captors realise, all those years ago, that the prison number they gave you, to rob you of your identity, to hurt, belittle and humble you, would one day be synonymous - across the world - with liberty, justice, and freedom, the catalyst for a nation so unique, so diverse, so blessed, that no rainbow, no matter how majestic, would ever even attempt to rival it.

You, who have transcended age, colour, gender, race and nationality – have taught us, through your example, to choose reconciliation; flatten our spears into plough shares; share one another's burdens, and cherish and value humanity - in all its shapes and sizes and colours. You inspire us like no other. Indeed, just as you once said that talking to a man in a language he understands, goes to his head, but talking to him in his language, goes to his heart - Tata mkulu, Madiba, father, we love you, respect you, and have heard you - you have indeed, gone to our hearts.

(c) 2008 all rights reserved.

Judy Garland

"Somewhere over the rainbow - skies are blue - and the dreams that you dare to dream - really do come true"

Judy Garland

James Joyce

"Secrets, silent, stony sit in the dark palaces of both our hearts: secrets weary of their tyranny: tyrants willing to be dethroned."

James Joyce

Nicholas Sparks

"If conversation was the lyrics, laughter was the music, making time spent together a melody that could be replayed over and over without getting stale."

Nicholas Sparks

Mahatma Gandhi

"Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."

Mahatma Gandhi