Flo > Flo's Quotes

“Everything in the universe has a rhythm, everything dances. ”
― Maya Angelou

“I guess there are never enough books.”
― John Steinbeck, A John Steinbeck Encyclopedia

“just because you fail once, it doesn't mean you're going to fail at everything. keep trying, hold on, and always, always, always believe in yourself because if you don't, then who will? so keep your head high, keep your chin up, and most importantly, keep smiling because life's a beautiful thing and there's so much to smile about.”
― Marilyn Monroe

“When you learn, teach, when you get, give.”
― Maya Angelou

“Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent and original manner possible.”
― Richard Feynmann

“Have enough courage to trust love one more time and always one more time.”
― Maya Angelou

“I'm very definitely a woman and I enjoy it. ”
― Marilyn Monroe

“We need much less than we think we need.”
― Maya Angelou

“You should date a girl who reads.
Date a girl who reads. Date a girl who spends her money on books instead of clothes, who has problems with closet space because she has too many books. Date a girl who has a list of books she wants to read, who has had a library card since she was twelve.

Find a girl who reads. You’ll know that she does because she will always have an unread book in her bag. She’s the one lovingly looking over the shelves in the bookstore, the one who quietly cries out when she has found the book she wants. You see that weird chick sniffing the pages of an old book in a secondhand book shop? That’s the reader. They can never resist smelling the pages, especially when they are yellow and worn.

She’s the girl reading while waiting in that coffee shop down the street. If you take a peek at her mug, the non-dairy creamer is floating on top because she’s kind of engrossed already. Lost in a world of the author’s making. Sit down. She might give you a glare, as most girls who read do not like to be interrupted. Ask her if she likes the book.

Buy her another cup of coffee.

Let her know what you really think of Murakami. See if she got through the first chapter of Fellowship. Understand that if she says she understood James Joyce’s Ulysses she’s just saying that to sound intelligent. Ask her if she loves Alice or she would like to be Alice.

It’s easy to date a girl who reads. Give her books for her birthday, for Christmas, for anniversaries. Give her the gift of words, in poetry and in song. Give her Neruda, Pound, Sexton, Cummings. Let her know that you understand that words are love. Understand that she knows the difference between books and reality but by god, she’s going to try to make her life a little like her favorite book. It will never be your fault if she does.

She has to give it a shot somehow.

Lie to her. If she understands syntax, she will understand your need to lie. Behind words are other things: motivation, value, nuance, dialogue. It will not be the end of the world.

Fail her. Because a girl who reads knows that failure always leads up to the climax. Because girls who read understand that all things must come to end, but that you can always write a sequel. That you can begin again and again and still be the hero. That life is meant to have a villain or two.

Why be frightened of everything that you are not? Girls who read understand that people, like characters, develop. Except in the Twilight series.

If you find a girl who reads, keep her close. When you find her up at 2 AM clutching a book to her chest and weeping, make her a cup of tea and hold her. You may lose her for a couple of hours but she will always come back to you. She’ll talk as if the characters in the book are real, because for a while, they always are.

You will propose on a hot air balloon. Or during a rock concert. Or very casually next time she’s sick. Over Skype.

You will smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn’t burst and bled out all over your chest yet. You will write the story of your lives, have kids with strange names and even stranger tastes. She will introduce your children to the Cat in the Hat and Aslan, maybe in the same day. You will walk the winters of your old age together and she will recite Keats under her breath while you shake the snow off your boots.

Date a girl who reads because you deserve it. You deserve a girl who can give you the most colorful life imaginable. If you can only give her monotony, and stale hours and half-baked proposals, then you’re better off alone. If you want the world and the worlds beyond it, date a girl who reads.

Or better yet, date a girl who writes.”
― Rosemarie Urquico

“I don't trust anyone who doesn't laugh.”
― Maya Angelou

“Calvin: I used to hate writing assignments, but now I enjoy them. I realized that the purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity. With a little practice, writing can be an intimidating and impenetrable fog! Want to see my book report?
Hobbes: (Reading Calvin's paper) "The Dynamics of Interbeing and Monological Imperatives in Dick and Jane: A Study in Psychic Transrelational Gender modes."
Calvin: Academia, here I come!”
― Bill Watterson, Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat

“Nothing can dim the light which shines from within.”
― Maya Angelou

“Read, read, read. Read everything -- trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You'll absorb it.
Then write. If it's good, you'll find out. If it's not, throw it out of the window.”
― William Faulkner

“I've learned that regardless of your relationship with your parents, you'll miss them when they're gone from your life.”
― Maya Angelou

“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”
― Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote

“Be present in all things and thankful for all things.”
― Maya Angelou

“Study without desire spoils the memory, and it retains nothing that it takes in.”
― Leonardo da Vinci

“When we find someone who is brave, fun, intelligent, and loving, we have to thank the universe.”
― Maya Angelou

“Studies show that intelligent girls are more depressed because they know the world.”
― Emilie Autumn

“I've learned that whenever I decide something with an open heart, I usually make the right decision.”
― Maya Angelou

“I believe that the most important single thing, beyond discipline and creativity is daring to dare.”
― Maya Angelou

“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.”
― Albert Einstein

“Too much sanity may be madness — and maddest of all: to see life as it is, and not as it should be!”
― Dale Wasserman, Man of La Mancha: A Musical Play

“Nothing will work unless you do.”
― Maya Angelou

“I am selfish, private and easily bored. Will this be a problem?”
― Neil Gaiman, A Study in Emerald

“I am a Woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal Woman,
that's me.”
― Maya Angelou

“Think before you speak. Read before you think.”
― Fran Lebowitz, The Fran Lebowitz Reader

“Success is loving life and daring to live it.”
― Maya Angelou

“All great achievements require time.”
― Maya Angelou

“What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love.”
― Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov