Memoirs Quotes

“Our conversation flowed soft and easy, like a breeze on a summer’s day—such a pleasure.”
― Charles Dyson, A Decade of Desire: Erotic Memoirs from The Office Diaries

“Should you feel sufficiently emboldened, then let’s plan a coffee sometime soon. And see what the universe makes of the occasion.”
― Charles Dyson, A Decade of Desire: Erotic Memoirs from The Office Diaries

“Where, where all the summer dogs leaping like dolphins in the wind-braided and unbraided tides of what? Where lightning smell of Green Machine or trolley? Did the wine remember? It did not? Or seemed not, anyway.
Somewhere, a book said once, all the talk ever talked, all the songs ever sung, still lived, had vibrated way out in space and if you could travel to Far Centauri you could hear George Washington talking in his sleep or Caesar surprised at the knife in his back. So much for sounds. What about light then? All things, once seen, they didn't just die, that couldn't be. It must be then that somewhere, searching the world, perhaps in the dripping multiboxed honeycombs where light was an amber sap stored by pollen-fired bees, or in the thirty thousand lenses of the noon dragonfly's hemmed skull you might find all the colors and sights of the world in any one year. Or pour one single drop of this dandelion wine beneath a microscope and perhaps the entire world of July Fourth would firework out in Vesuvius showers. This he would have to believe.
And yet... looking here at this bottle which by its number signalized the day when Colonel Freeleigh had stumbled and fallen six feet into the earth, Douglas could not find so much as a gram of dark sediment, not a speck of the great flouring buffalo dust, not a flake of sulphur from the guns at Shiloh...”
― Ray Bradbury, Dandelion Wine

“We got to the casino and ordered some drinks. We then walked around, drinking and losing. We had some drinks at the craps table and lost money there. We had some drinks at the slot machines and lost a little more over there. Our drinking and money lasted longer at the blackjack tables, but even there our drinks and winning streak dried up. The more we drank, the flirtier we became. Although I was hemorrhaging money like crazy, I was the luckiest guy in the casino.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Fishermen don’t play to fold. They will always play the bluff no matter how hard things get. We throw the dice no matter how broke or how leveraged we may be. Like any true gambler, we know the dice will eventually get hot again if we throw them hard enough. It’s just a matter of surviving long enough to throw them enough times to find a winning streak”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“I followed all the advice my mind could compute and digested it to the best of my ability. I’d run, work out, eat healthy, and then swallow a fifth of whiskey. The man cave below my home began to look like a recycling center for Crown Royal and Jack Daniels distilleries. I discovered that empty whiskey bottles made an eerily satisfying thud when stacked up like cordwood. The sturdy glass was much thicker and stronger than my own skin, and I admired their resilience to outside forces.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“I had a lot of losing in my life lately, but this would be a loss that I just couldn’t bear. The world is full of women—I had a chance to survive that. But a fish of this caliber was truly something special. I have seen a lot of women in my life, and none of them have ever had me yelling at the top of my lungs in excitement at first glance. Wonder women are rare, wonder fish are twice as rare. This fact was not lost on me.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“The sea may be your lover, but she is not your friend. You cannot safely turn your back to her. Her loyalty is that of an ex- wife, her characteristics more of a new mistress; she will bring you to your highest peaks, but beware for on the other side of the high ground lie valleys of unspeakable misery. Her mind games are second to none. She will lead you down darker alleys of your mind than you ever knew existed within. She will make you question all that you are.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Mother Nature had blessed her with the customary rear-end one expects of a Brazilian smokeshow. However, her chest was ornamented by a beautiful set of
bolt-ons, arguably the only thing man has crafted better than the hand of God.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Paint thinner is the boatyard’s morning dew. The stringent smell awakens the mind of a sailor as spring flowers awaken the mind of a poet.
The boatyard, a reflection of your life, reminds us that the least desirable jobs often prove to be the most important and fulfilling. The harder the task, the more one feels rewarded when accomplishing it. Paint erratically splatters on skin in the same fashion that the stars come to fill up the night sky, the constellations on your forearms telling of the most recent project.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Unbelievably, the whales continued to circle me. Eventually, I was even able to run my hands down Mama’s back several times. Her black skin felt much tougher and tired. Remnants of barnacles made her skin rough in patches. She seemed more hesitant of this human. Perhaps she had firsthand evidence of man’s horrible actions and treachery. I didn’t blame her for her concerns. I had come to trust fewer and fewer humans myself. Her giant eyes possessed wisdom only found in the passage of time and miles traveled on long journeys.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“At night, fishermen are paid for their hard work with one of the Pacific’s greatest views—the gates to the heavens above. Hawaii’s remoteness to the rest of the world leaves the skies unpolluted by man’s industrial byproducts and artificial light known on the mainland. A man can actually look back in time when he gets far enough away from the shores of Hawaii and leaves modern society behind. He will find a sky above him before the hustle and bustle of mankind, a place where a stunning display of rhythmically twinkling stars are the norm and planets lay boldly pronounced. Shooting stars are commonplace and so is the humbling feeling a man gets when looking at this masterpiece before him. The boat churns up neon-green phosphoresce that glows in the water below like fireflies. When the ocean is calm enough and the moon dark enough, it is completely impossible to tell where the earth ends and where the heavens begin.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Loved ones will beg you to stay home but in the same breath refuse to stop mentioning how much money they need. They want you around more but want the all-mighty dollar just as much. So, though you may long for your warm bed at home, you know it will be freezing cold if you don’t come home with money independent of how many blankets you pile upon yourself. Just because fish were worthless this month doesn’t mean the mortgage or price of groceries was adjusted to reflect how terrible the auction was.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“I lay in the rain as it made intricate rivers that flowed off my nose and along the peaks and valleys of my face. I could almost feel memories encapsulated in the different streams. Water pooled in the leeward side of my mouth after cascading across the rapids of my front teeth. In the previous hours, my jaw and mouth went limp from their newfound home on the ground. They now served for little more than a shitty birdbath. I wished the water would drown me.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“I was cursed with the inability to ever sleep in late, a habit inherited from years of working on fishing boats. Being drunk and/or being hungover has never been nor ever will be an acceptable reason for not being at work and doing your job on time. In some sick way, there’s even a sense of pride from being able to party all night and work all day. Throughout my entire career, I and others alike in the industry were praised for this attribute. A talent that I often secretly wore like a scarlet letter of shame, I was blessed with an extremely high tolerance for alcohol, particularly whiskey. The problem with this is that it got me into a lot of shitty situations. I often found myself in questionable locations, with even more questionable company, doing even more questionable activities. It was a direct portal to a darkness that had haunted me since my teenage years.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“At sea, I was the captain. I was important, and I had a role. I ran the show. At home, I was the swab. I did the shit work, almost always unappreciated. I loved my family, but man did I hate being on land all the time. I tried my best, I honestly did. I really stepped up my game around the house to be the best dad and partner I could be. It just was never good enough. With no offshore fishing and encouragement at home, part of me was dead inside, the part that made me who I am. I missed my boat daily. Flashbacks were a constant. I daydreamed of foaming schools of tuna while washing bubbly dishes. I saw mahi mahi boldly charging baits as I folded brightly colored laundry. When I went jogging and my heart started pumping, I saw huge marlin going wild on the gaffs. Everything reminded me of the boat. I most likely honestly had post-traumatic stress from the whole ordeal”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“When a man’s dreams live past the horizon of the sea, his soul dies a little each day he spends upon land and each mile he moves farther inland until ultimately one day he is nothing but a shell, empty and dead inside. Like a shell, you can hear the sound of the ocean if you hold it close enough to your ear and truly listen. In the sound of the ocean, you can find a man’s purpose and in his purpose you will find the meaning of his life. If you love this man, you’ll bring him back to the sea and set him free. If you greedily wish to showcase this man like a trophy on your windowsill, he may shine for you at times. Perhaps even your friends will comment how wonderful he is, but trust that a storm is brewing within. Each one of his stares into the distance is foretelling of a voyage of freedom to come. When this storm ultimately hits, it will take all that you have to survive and more likely than not, you’ll be separated in its gales.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“When I had been at sea, she felt so close, yet now living full time on land in our bed she couldn’t have been any more distant than the summit of Mauna Kea from the sea mountain. I longed for this woman beside me, like a first-time marathoner desires the finish line. I could envision the big picture; I saw us as old people holding hands and watching our children graduate from college. I was mentally prepared for the hardest of miles. In my mind, none of our problems were more than a mere hang-up in a lifetime commitment to something bigger than ourselves. Schooled by the sea, I feared not hard work, less than perfect conditions, or the hands of time. Accepting the temperamental nature of the sea and women, I expected this storm to pass as the others had before. She would toss and turn, relentlessly complaining about summer heat in our room, yet no number of blankets could warm me from her wintery chill. I had been over a thousand miles out to sea before, but after the accident, my side of the bed became the loneliest place I ever visited on the planet.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Sometimes, when we lose something major in life, we squeeze too hard on what remains. Afraid we will lose that last part of ourselves with which we are still familiar, we end up strangling the very thing we wish to preserve. I smothered my ex in all the wrong ways. I was weak and needy. I was uncertain and lacked confidence. I’d lost my focus, and for lack of a better term, I was scared. I knew and wanted no other life than working the sea. What I found to be mundane everyday life on shore was painful to me at best.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“I’m not going to sit here and tell you I was totally innocent of all wrong doings. I most certainly was not. I was a total asshole during this time. I was absolutely losing my fucking mind. I swam in a sea of anger whose waters were far wider than I could have ever imagined, and I sank to depths I didn’t know I was capable of reaching. I said the most terrible things. I hated her, and I hated myself even more for hating the one I loved. My whole life became just pissing in the wind. Everything I did backfired on me. My life was at a giant standstill, and I was standing in purgatory. Fuck, even lying in a bush during a rainstorm didn’t feel strange. The crazy part was that it was more comfortable than facing the guy in the mirror at home. I came to hate my ex, but I hated myself the most. I was disgusted at who I had become. Who was this fucking broken down drunk”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“I went to the bathroom and put each hand forcefully down on opposite sides of the sink. I looked straight into the mirror before me and stared at the person I’d been ignoring for some time now. I didn’t have to say much. I already knew all this person’s demons. I shook my head in disapproval. The alcohol and hate were killing me. What they missed, the depression whittled at unrelentingly. My whole life I had been told that I didn’t look like a fisherman. All the while the only thing I wished to be was a fisherman. I screamed at the mirror in pure rage.
“Do I look like a fisherman now?”
“Dooooo IIIIIIIIII looook like a fucking fisherman now!!!” “Do I?”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“I hadn’t flown half around the world to shack up with a Cairns five. I was here for one reason: to find myself. In the first twelve hours, I had only found the guy I hated, the drunk who fucked anything that walked. The woman was adamant that I take her phone number and email. She scribbled down both on notebook paper. I grasped the sheet of paper, assuring her I’d be in touch. I gave her a final nudge toward the door and a final kiss goodbye, carefully avoiding her snaggle tooth.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Funny enough, I received a phone call and an ultimatum from my wife just moments before we untied the dock lines. The offer was to come home now to save this marriage or don’t come home at all.
Morning dew artificially rained from the outriggers as I pulled down on the halyards, deep in thought. I got off the boat and paced up and down the dock. I looked back and forth between my phone and the light-blue hull of the vessel before me shining in the morning light. I sighed deeply. In my heart, I knew the truth was that the other ship back at home had already set sail. Heavyhearted, I looked one last time at the phone and jumped on board.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Chase muttered the likes of “Come on, you big bitch.” However, Billy stood on the bridge like a sentry, quiet and focused. His body was at the helm, but I could tell his mind was swimming beside this great fish. I could picture these two physically imposing creatures staring each other down, neither one willing to blink, both animals stubborn and hardened by decades of being on the reef.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Above her lateral line she was blacker than night; below she was a metallic silver. Her physically perfect body represented both the heaven and hell she possessed. She had the lustrous lines of a young mistress and brought all the trouble that accompanies one in her devious black eyes. She teased us by exposing herself from the depths but refused to surrender to our desires. Dreams and nightmares live in close proximity when marlin fishing.”
― Kenton Geer, Vicious Cycle: Whiskey, Women, and Water

“Not realizing that in an instant my privileged self brutally equated her entire identity to that of a street dog ~ (Pagli, Memoirs-The Imperfections of My Life)”
― Kanika Sharma

“فيما توجد لحظات في السياسة كما في الحياة , بكةن فيها فعل التجنب, ان لم يكن التراجع, الجانب الأفضل للشجاعة, هناك أوقات أخرى يكون فيها الاختبار الوحيد أن يحصن المرء نفسه و يخاطر”
― باراك أوباما, ‫الأرض الموعودة‬

“1) “How did I end up down this rabbit hole of being obsessed with men on the DL (down-low)? Why did I prefer playing more in the straight arena with the closet cases (as they were called in my day) and the bisexual men over the gay ones?”

2) “We didn’t identify in my day; you were either gay, bisexual, or straight. People will always label others or pigeonhole them without even knowing for sure who they really are. They presumably stereotype and judge just by your outward appearance.”

3) “It wasn't until the seventh grade that Sister Gloria would be my social studies teacher, and I began leaning more towards being an extrovert than the anxious introvert that I was. All the accolades go to her. She lit the flame under my ass that would be the catalyst for my advocacy. Her podium, located front and center of the classroom, became ground zero for me and where I found my voice.”

4) “Their taunting was my kryptonite. My peers hated me for no other reason than the fact that they thought I was gay. I was only thirteen and often wondered how they knew who I was before I did.”

5) “Evangelical Christian Anita Bryant (First Lady of Religious Bigotry), along with her minions, led a crusade against the LGBTQ community back in 1977 and said we were trying to recruit children and that ‘Homosexuals are human garbage.’ My first thoughts were, how unchristian and deplorable of her to even say something like that, not to mention, to make it her life’s mission promoting hate.”

6) “Are there any more Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. kind of Christians in this country today? Dr. King knew about his friend’s homosexuality and arrest. Being a religious man and a pastor, Dr. King could have cast judgment and shunned Bayard Rustin like so many other religious leaders did at the time. But he didn’t. That, to me, is the true meaning of being a Christian. He loved Bayard unconditionally and was unbiased towards his sexual orientation. Dr. King was not a counterfeit Christian and practiced what he preached—and that, along with remembering what Jesus had said, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’ is the bottom line to Christianity and all faiths.”

7) “We are all God’s children! That is what I was taught in Catholic school. God doesn’t make mistakes—it’s as simple as that. Love is love—period! I don’t need anyone’s validation or approval, I define myself.”

8) “You will bake our cakes, you will provide us our due healthcare, you will do our joint tax returns, and yes, you will bless our unions, too. Otherwise, you cannot call yourselves Christians or even Americans, for that matter.”

9) “The torch has been passed. But we must never forget the LGBT pioneers that have come before and how they fought in the streets for our lives. Never forget the Stonewall riots of 1969 nor the social stigma put upon us during the HIV/AIDS epidemic from its onset in the early 1980s. Remember how many died alone because nobody cared. Finally, keep in mind how we were all pathologized and labeled in the medical books until 1973.”
― MICHAEL CAPUTO

“Each time life threw me a curveball, I learned to pitch it on my own...and hit home runs for survival”
― Selin Senol-Akin, Set Free Your Flow: A Centered View

“You can take a little bit of the East and a little bit of the West, and create a formulaic soup in life that works best for you: no one else has to drink it if they don’t like”
― Selin Senol-Akin, Set Free Your Flow: A Centered View