#mm

Shortly before school started, I moved into a studio apartment on a quiet street near the bustle of the downtown in one of the most self-conscious bends of the world. The “Gold Coast” was a neighborhood that stretched five blocks along the lake in a sliver of land just south of Lincoln Park and north of River North. The streets were like fine necklaces and strung together were the brownstone houses and tall condominiums and tiny mansions like pearls, and when the day broke and the sun faded away, their lights burned like jewels shining gaudily in the night. The world’s most elegant bazaar, Michigan Avenue, jutted out from its eastern tip near The Drake Hotel and the timeless blue-green waters of Lake Michigan pressed its shores. The fractious make-up of the people that inhabited it, the flat squareness of its parks and the hint of the lake at the ends of its tree-lined streets squeezed together a domesticated cesspool of age and wealth and standing. It was a place one could readily dress up for an expensive dinner at one of the fashionable restaurants or have a drink miles high in the lounge of the looming John Hancock Building and five minutes later be out walking on the beach with pants cuffed and feet in the cool water at the lake’s edge. ↗

— Daniel Amory

#city #contemporary-fiction #contemporary-literature #downtown #lake

In a city that is barely getting by with its small budget, something like illegal immigration can be the difference from being able to provide the level of public service that people expect. ↗

— Lou Barletta

#barely #being #budget #city #difference

Think then what it is to live on here eternally and yet be human; to age in soul and see our beloved die and pass to lands whither we may not hope to follow; to wait while drop by drop the curse of the long centuries falls upon our imperishable being, like water slow dripping on a diamond that it cannot wear, till they be born anew forgetful of us, and again sink from our helpless arms into the void unknowable. ↗

— H. Rider Haggard

#age

The immense cities lie basking on the beaches of the continent like whales that have taken to the land. ↗

— Arnold J. Toynbee

#cities #continent #immense #land #lie

Only love heals. Anger, guilt, and fear can only destroy and separate you from your true capabilities. ↗

— Alyson Noel

#love #the-immortals #anger

If I say you're a goatherd's son, you say, 'Yes, Lord Ralon.'" Alanna gasped with fury. "I'd as soon kiss a pig! Is that what you've been doing-kissing pigs? Or being kissed? ↗

— Tamora Pierce

#anger #humor #insult #pigs #anger

These past two days, I’ve seen a fire in your eyes that I never have before. Granted, it’s mostly anger and frustration, but it’s still emotion. ↗

— Rebecca Donovan

#emma-thomas #emotion #reason-to-breathe #rebecca-donovan #sara-mckinley

I like it too," Angelo said. "I love this country. Much you and anybody, and you know it." "I know it," Prew said. "But I still hate this country. You love the Army. But I dont love the Army. This country's Army is why I hate this country. What did this country ever do for me? Gimme a right to vote for men I cant elect? You can have it. Gimme a right to work at a job I hate? You can have that too. Then tell I'm a Citizen of the greatest richest country on earth, if I dont believe it look at Park Avenue. Carnival prizes. All carnival prizes. [..] They shouldnt teach their immigrants' kids all about democracy unless they mean to let them have a little bit of it, it ony makes for trouble. Me and the United States is dissociating our alliance as of right now, until the United States can find time to read its own textbooks a little." Prew thought, a little sickly, of the little book, The Man Without A Country that his mother used to read to him so often, and how the stern patriotic judge condemned the man to live on a warship where no one could ever mention home to him the rest of his whole life, and how he had always felt that pinpoint of pleased righteous anger at seeing the traitor get what he deserved. ↗

— James Jones

#democracy #immigrants #patriotism #propaganda #the-american-dream

I had to sever my emotional cord to escape the anger and shame that silently slithered through my head, disconnecting myself from the stares and whispers that followed me down the hall. ↗

— Rebecca Donovan

#disconnecting #emma #emotional #escape #feelings

Jimmy: One day, when I'm no longer spending my days running a sweet-stall, I may write a book about us all. It's all here. (slapping his forehead) Written in flames a mile high. And it won't be recollected in tranquillity either, picking daffodils with Auntie Wordsworth. It'll be recollected in fire, and blood. My blood. ↗

— John Osborne

#blood #fire #jimmy-porter #anger