“ Only take someone's hand in a certain way, even look into their eyes in a certain way, and the world is changed forever. Iris Murdoch
“ Because once you had been through certain things, their presence inside you never really disappeared. Julian Barnes
“ I thought—at some level of my being, I actually thought—that I could go back to the beginning and change things. That I could make the blood flow backwards. I had the vanity to imagine—even if I didn'… Julian Barnes
“ I replayed the words that would forever haunt me. As would Adrian's unfinished sentence: 'So, for instance, if Tony . . .' I knew I couldn't change, or mend, anything now. Julian Barnes
“ You're still in it. You'll always be in it. No, not literally. But in your heart. Nothing ever ends, not if it's gone that deep. You'll always be walking wounded. That's the only choice, after a while… Julian Barnes
“ I keep having this fantasy about some wide river or channel I'm on the bank of. I can look up, and on the far side is another, better self, holding hands with Mercer—that's his name, my ex—and both of… Garth Risk Hallberg
“ In the past, nothing is irretrievably lost, but rather, on the contrary, everything is irrevocably stored and treasured. To be sure, people tend to see only the stubble fields of transitoriness but ov… Viktor E. Frankl
“ ...true love is an irrevocable act - you can only give your heart away once - after that, you give as much as you have left ... John Geddes
