Bobbie

“There was no one clear point of loss. It happened over and over again in a thousand small ways and the only truth there was to learn was that there was no getting used to it.”
― Ann Patchett, State of Wonder

“Nathan ran a palm over his forehead. He was on a mission with Taliban terrorists. His old sarge would be puking in his grave. He’d always maintained that the enemy of your enemy was still your fucking enemy.”
― Barry Kirwan, When the children come

“Amazing. Chamberlain let his eyes close down to the slits, retreating within himself. He had learned that you could sleep on your feet on the long marches. You set your feet to going and after a while they went by themselves and you sort of turned your attention away and your feet went on walking painlessly, almost without feeling, and gradually you closed down your eyes so that all you could see were the heels of the man in front of you, one heel, other heel, one heel, other heel, and so you moved on dreamily in the heat and the dust, closing your eyes against the sweat, head down and gradually darkening, so you actually slept with the sight of the heels in front of you, one heel, other heel, and often when the man in front of you stopped you bumped into him. There were no heels today, but there was the horse he led by the reins. He did not know the name of this horse.
He did not bother any more; the horses were all dead too soon. Yet you learn to love it.
Isn’t that amazing? Long marches and no rest, up very early in the morning and asleep late in the rain, and there’s a marvelous excitement to it, a joy to wake in the morning and feel the army all around you and see the campfires in the morning and smell the coffee…
… awake all night in front of Fredericksburg. We attacked in the afternoon, just at dusk, and the stone wall was aflame from one end to the other, too much smoke, couldn’t see, the attack failed, couldn’t withdraw, lay there all night in the dark, in the cold among the wounded and dying. Piled-up bodies in front of you to catch the bullets, using the dead for a shield; remember the sound? Of bullets in dead bodies? Like a shot into a rotten leg, a wet thick leg.
All a man is: wet leg of blood. Remember the flap of a torn curtain in a blasted window, fragment-whispering in that awful breeze: never, forever, never, forever.
You have a professor’s mind. But that is the way it sounded.
Never. Forever.
Love that too?
Not love it. Not quite. And yet, I was never so alive.”
― Michael Shaara, The Killer Angels

“You can wander around these outlet shops for hours, accumulating clothing and accessories until your credit cards melt down. But you will not find one single shop that sells anything for the mind or the soul. There are no books. There is no music. There is no art. There is no poetry. The outlets are a spiritual wasteland.”
― Lou Marinoff, The Power of Tao: A Timeless Guide to Happiness and Harmony