Michael Reisig > Quotes

“You can’t train a monkey to show character in times of peril, to be selfless, to be kind when there’s no percentage in it, or to exercise pride without haughtiness.”
― Michael Reisig, Somewhere On The Road To Key West

“Seems to me it sailed out of Cartagena in one of the early 1700 fleets, but it was recorded as lost to piracy. Absolutely one of the significant lost treasures of that era.”
― Michael Reisig, Back On The Road To Key West

“Fear is a strange thing. There are several kinds, from mild trepidation and sweaty armpits, to shaky hands and stuttering, but the worst is the cold fear of uncertainty, the specter in the darkness — the one you can’t exactly see, the one that drives your imagination wild, crawls into your intestines, and digs at you with tiny, mean claws.”
― Michael Reisig, Back On The Road To Key West

“I’ll leave with a quote by English footballer Steve Bull – “Nerves and butterflies are fine – they’re a physical sign that you’re mentally ready and eager. You have to get the butterflies to fly in formation, that’s the trick.”
― Michael Reisig, Michael Reisig's Great Little Bathroom and Bedtime Book

“Next to no money, ill health is life’s greatest plague, I think.” He took another draw from his cigarillo. “I’ve been without finances once or twice in my life—I know what it feels like, but that’s not one of my problems now. Health, however, cannot be bought and paid for like a burrito at a roadside stand. Good health can be more elusive than money.” As”
― Michael Reisig, The Road to Key West

“but I ended up in the Florida Keys in August of 1971. The Keys—haven of scoundrels, smugglers, and pirates for over 300 years—a bastion for independent thinkers, benign crazies, adventurers, and visionaries.”
― Michael Reisig, The Road to Key West

“Just about the time you’re strolling down the street of life, hands in your pockets, not a care in the world, somebody pushes a piano out of a sixth-story window….”
― Michael Reisig, The Road to Key West

“And so it was that in this remarkable circle of life, another union was formed, and two lives joined — to experience the world together, to teach each other, and to love each other as best they could, given what they were.”
― Michael Reisig, A Far Road To Key West

“Adventure doesn’t come to you. You have to chase it down. Are you placing enough interesting, freakish bets? Taking enough chances? Playing the long shots? — Tom Peters and Kansas Stamps    ”
― Michael Reisig, Back On The Road To Key West

“I had forgotten. After all these years without the company of a friend like him, I had forgotten. I had cast aside the memory of what it was like to feel the honest affection of a creature who had nothing to gain from your company but the pleasure of the experience, and wanted nothing tangible back but the love he or she traded for yours. There were tears in my eyes as I knelt and held my dog, and he made that little whine in his throat while that heavy, wet tongue found my face and neck. I was suddenly reminded of the expression by the great writer and humorist, Will Rogers: “If there are no dogs in”
― Michael Reisig, The Wild Road to Key West

“I discovered that owning a cat should be mandatory for every male at age sixteen. It’s the supreme field study on the opposite sex. If you pay attention at all, you come away with volumes of knowledge on care, nurturing, artful communication, and proper approaches to sex (with the girl, not the cat). They don’t like being chased too much. They want to be left alone sometimes, and they want love at their pace and time. Their feelings are easily hurt, but if you don’t speak the language of subtlety you’ll rarely know when that is. Never hold them so tightly that they feel the need to free themselves—always gently, sometimes firmly, and always part with a caress. And if they move away, let them. It’s the only way to assure they’ll be back. Cats like things they can’t always have. That’s why they chase butterflies—because they only get about half of them. For cats, and women, you want to represent a more difficult than average butterfly.”
― Michael Reisig, The Road to Key West

“That Harrison dude’s got nothin’ on us. Dude’s never dug a real piece of bright and shiny out of the dirt in his life, or crashed an airplane, or fought his way out of a bar when there wasn’t a camera rolling.” Eddie slapped his hand on the table. “We are the Harrison Fords! The ones our friends will remember when they’re hammering down a beer in a”
― Michael Reisig, A Far Road To Key West

“Love is a lot like contracting rabies. Sometime after you’ve been bitten you know you’re getting crazy, but there’s nothing you can do about it.”
― Michael Reisig, Back On The Road To Key West

“integrity”
― Michael Reisig, A Pirate's Road to Key West

“the”
― Michael Reisig, Down The Road To Key West

“becomes the barroom story.”
― Michael Reisig, A Far Road To Key West

“had discovered long ago that the expression, “It’s just a dog,” is most commonly used by people who just barely qualify as humans. Intelligent animals are hardly any different than their human counterparts in their curiosity, trust, and love, and they often eclipse their counterparts when it comes to loyalty and courage. It’s the latitude you give an animal to “be more” that makes them what they are.”
― Michael Reisig, The Wild Road to Key West

“Ultimately, faith isn’t much more than something like a child’s old blanket or the distinct smell of home — the fact that we know it’s there is all that’s necessary. In the end, it’s perfectly okay to find your own peace”
― Michael Reisig, The Lost Road To Key West

“There are those in life who allow their ego to supersede their intelligence.”
― Michael Reisig, Caribbean Gold - The Treasure Of Tortuga

“Life is not simply about physical or mental progression. It’s about the evolution of the heart as well, and the growth of emotion. It is love that binds almost all intelligent creatures, and allows us to develop into more than what we are.”
― Michael Reisig, A Far Road To Key West

“Just about the time you’re strolling down the street of life, hands in your pockets, not a care in the world, somebody pushes a piano out of a sixth-story window…. We”
― Michael Reisig, The Road to Key West

“Through it all, the one thing they had come to realize was that family is God’s gift to fools and failures. It was the precious sanctuary to which we could return, to mend our wounds and heal our minds, and find safety at the end of the”
― Michael Reisig, A Far Road To Key West

“After a good deal of thought, we all came to the conclusion that some things are better off left undiscovered. Man is a confused enough creature as it is — no point in discouraging or confounding him further regarding his faith and his origins. In these troubled times, our belief in a greater power is like a secret, wonderful weapon that protects and guides us — from our mores and codes, to our tolerance and benevolence. It works for me and my companions, I know that.”
― Michael Reisig, The Wild Road to Key West

“Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.”
― Michael Reisig, Michael Reisig's Great Little Bathroom and Bedtime Book

“Whether it happened in one day or a million years, I came to realize that the ocean is the creator’s finest work—the detail, hues, and sheer artistry. It is the effort of an infinite imagination and the continual process of a power beyond the manipulation of man.   It”
― Michael Reisig, The Road to Key West

“The real treasure is in the tale. Gold? Hell, I got gold already, but you can never have enough barroom stories.”
― Michael Reisig, The Wild Road to Key West

“Marathon was a strange town, never quite recapturing the sleepy Keys essence it had in the sixties. It ended up more like a series of strip malls and restaurants interspaced with resorts trying way too hard to compete with their southern brethren. It could never quite capture the genuine allure or the delightful decadence of the big island at the end of the chain. But for now it was a good place for us to hide out and lay some plans. “What”
― Michael Reisig, Back On The Road To Key West

“Sundance just laughed. “C’mon, where’s your adventurous spirit?” “I think it got sucked up my little puckered asshole when you started shooting holes in the ceiling of a bank and demanding their money,” I said. Sundance shook his head and smiled. “No cojones, no colones, man. That’s how it is in the bank-robbing business.” Will”
― Michael Reisig, The Road to Key West

“A few of these folks act contented, but most are just fearful of vision and chance. Some of us are searchers, and we need more. We want to find that place that warms the heart — that strikes such a note at the core of our being we simply stand there enthralled, soothed, and a voice inside says, I’m home. We want to choose the points for our joys and sorrows before we experience them.   Relaxed”
― Michael Reisig, Back On The Road To Key West

“The byproduct of the whole adventure thing is knowledge (and, of course, wonderful barroom stories). Great experiences are borne not from what happens to you, but from how you respond when they’re happening. If you’re paying attention, encapsulated in the event is learning, which enables you to limit your next battery of mistakes to something new. While”
― Michael Reisig, Back On The Road To Key West