Jason Oliver

“The kind of hope that I often think about...I understand above all as a state of mind, not a state of the world. Either we have hope within us or we don't; it is a dimension of the soul, and it's not essentially dependent on some particular observation of the world or estimate of the situation...[Hope] is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.

Vaclav Havel”
― fritjof capra, The Systems View of Life: A Unifying Vision

“How is it, Theo wondered, that a piece of paper - a letter, a photo, a ticket stub, a sketch, a painting - is suddenly transformed by placing it in four bits of wood beneath a pane of glass? What does it mean that we place permanent boundaries around transient moments? What does it say of humankind that we take such trouble to freeze specific memories, that we devote such energy to capturing and preserving the "minute particulars" of our lives?”
― Allen Levi, Theo of Golden

“It’s hard enough to define what art is, much less ‘good art.’ I wonder if there is such a thing. Maybe there are just good responses. But I guess if a work of art makes us see something familiar in a new way or makes us feel something we ought to have felt all along or shows us our place in the world more clearly, maybe then it qualifies as ‘good.’ If it makes us better somehow, maybe that’s what gives it value.”
― Allen Levi, Theo of Golden

“Well intentioned? Entirely.
Affectionate? Unquestionably.
Heartwarming? Perhaps.
Upsetting? Possibly.
Wise? Maybe not.
"Should I send it?" Theo removed the feather and tore up the card. Maybe next year.”
― Allen Levi, Theo of Golden