Quotes with paces

Her hand holding his for a dozen paces. His, resting on the small of her back for a moment. Touches that had no real purpose but to say I’m here and We are together still.

Though there had been moments of beauty in it Mariam knew that life for most part had been unkind to her.But as she walked the final twenty paces,she could not help but wish for more of it.She wished she could see Laila again , wished to hear the clangor of her laugh , to sit with her once more for a pot of chai and leftover halwa under a starlit sky. She mourned that she would never see Aziza grow up , would not see the beautiful young woman that she would oneday become ,would not get to paint her hands with henna and toss noqul candy at her wedding . She would never play with Aziza's children. She would have liked that very much , to be old and play with Aziza's children.Mariam wished for so much in those final moments. Yet as she closed her eyes , it was not regret any longer but a sensation of abundant peace that wshed over her. She thought of her entry into this world , the harami child of a lowly villager , an unintended thing , a pitiable , regrettable accident. A weed , And yet she was leaving the wolrd as a woman who had loved and been loved back.She was leaving it as a friend , a companion , a guardian.A mother. A person of consequence at last. No. It was no so bad , Mariam thought , that she should die this way. Not so bad.This was a legitimate end to a life of illegitimate beginnings. pg. 360

Though there had been moments of beauty in it, Mariam knew that life for the most part had been unkind to her. But as she walked the final twenty paces, she could not help but wish for more of it. She wished she could see Laila again, wished to hear the clamour of her laugh, to sit with her once more for a pot of chai and left over halwa under a starlit sky. She mourned that she would never see Aziza grow up, would not see the beautiful young woman that she would one day become, would not get to paint her hands with henna and toss noqul candy at her wedding. She would never play with Aziza's children. She would have liked that very much, to be old and play with Aziza's children.Near the goalpost, the man behind her asked her to stop. Mariam did. Through the crisscrossing grid of the burqa, she saw his shadow arms lift his shadow Kalashnikov. Mariam wished for so much in those final moments. Yet as she closed her eyes, it was not regret any longer but a sensation of abundant peace that washed over her. She thought of her entry into this world, the harami child of a lowly villager, an unintended thing, a pitiable, regrettable accident. A weed. And yet she was leaving the world as a woman who had loved and been loved back. She was leaving it as a friend, a companion, a guardian. A mother. A person of consequence at last. No. It was not so bad,Mariam thought, that she should die this way. Not so bad. This was a legitimate end to a life of illegitimate beginnings. Mariam's final thoughts were a few words from the Koran, which she muttered under her breath.He has created the heavens and the earth with the truth; He makes the night cover the day and makes the day overtake the night, and He has made the sun and the moon subservient; each one runs on to an assigned term; now surely He is the Mighty, the Great Forgiver."Kneel," the Talib saidO my Lord! Forgive and have mercy, for you are the best of the merciful ones."Kneel here, hamshira and look down."One last time, Mariam did as she was told.

In the presence of the storm, thunderbolts, hurricane, rain, darkness, and the lions, which might be concealed but a few paces away, he felt disarmed and helpless.

Before she'd gone five paces, she heard Benedict speak softly behind her. "You matter, Heloise," he said. She didn't stop. She didn't turn. "Whether or not you believe it. Whether or not you rescue your sister tonight," he said, his voice reaching out to her as the distance grew between them. "You matter. You matter...to me." Another step. Then another. The Great Hall was so terribly long! But she kept walking, and she would climb those dais steps. "You reminded me what it means to live. I thought I was dead and done, but you taught me otherwise. " I... I'll never..."She could hear what he was going to say. I'll never forget you. It caught in his throat, but she heard it as clearly as though he'd spoken the words.

From time to time, too, and for the space of two or three paces, an image or an echo would rise up from the recesses of time: in the little streets of the beaters of silver and gold, for instance, there was a clear, unhurried tinkling, as if a djinn with a thousand arms was absent-mindedly practising on a xylophone.

And one cold Tuesday in December, when Marie-Laure has been blind for over a year, her father walks her up rue Cuvier to the edge of the Jardin des Plantes."Here, ma chérie, is the path we take every morning. Through the cedars up ahead is the Grand Gallery.""I know, Papa."He picks her up and spins her around three times. "Now," he says, "you're going to take us home."Her mouth drops open."I want you to think of the model, Marie.""But I can't possibly!""I'm one step behind you. I won't let anything happen. You have your cane. You know where you are.""I do not!""You do."Exasperation. She cannot even say if the gardens are ahead or behind."Calm yourself, Marie. One centimeter at a time.""I'm far, Papa. Six blocks, at least.""Six blocks is exactly right. Use logic. Which way should we go first?"The world pivots and rumbles. Crows shout, brakes hiss, someone to her left bangs something metal with what might be a hammer. She shuffles forward until the tip of her cane floats in space. The edge of a curb? A pond, a staircase, a cliff? She turns ninety degrees. Three steps forward. Now her cane finds the base of a wall. "Papa?""I'm here."Six paces seven paces eight. A roar of noise - an exterminator just leaving a house, pump bellowing - overtakes them. Twelve paces farther on, the bell tied around the handle of a shop door rings, and two women came out, jostling her as they pass.Marie-Laure drops her cane; she begins to cry. Her father lifts her, holds her to his narrow chest."It's so big," she whispers."You can do this, Marie."She cannot.

In the cage is the lion. She paces with her memories. Her body is a record of her past. As she moves back and forth, one may see it all: the lean frame, the muscular legs, the paw enclosing long sharp claws, the astonishing speed of her response. She was born in this garden. She has never in her life stretched those legs. Never darted farther than twenty yards at a time. Only once did she use her claws. Only once did she feel them sink into flesh. And it was her keeper's flesh. Her keeper whom she loves, who feeds her, who would never dream of harming her, who protects her. Who in his mercy forgave her mad attack, saying this was in her nature, to be cruel at a whim, to try to kill what she loves. He had come into her cage as he usually did early in the morning to change her water, always at the same time of day, in the same manner, speaking softly to her, careful to make no sudden movement, keeping his distance, when suddenly she sank down, deep down into herself, the way wild animals do before they spring, and then she had risen on all her strong legs, and swiped him in one long, powerful, graceful movement across the arm. How lucky for her he survived the blow. The keeper and his friends shot her with a gun to make her sleep. Through her half-open lids she knew they made movements around her. They fed her with tubes. They observed her. They wrote comments in notebooks. And finally they rendered a judgment. She was normal. She was a normal wild beast, whose power is dangerous, whose anger can kill, they had said. Be more careful of her, they advised. Allow her less excitement. Perhaps let her exercise more. She understood none of this. She understood only the look of fear in her keeper's eyes. And now she paces. Paces as if she were angry, as if she were on the edge of frenzy. The spectators imagine she is going through the movements of the hunt, or that she is readying her body for survival. But she knows no life outside the garden. She has no notion of anger over what she could have been, or might be. No idea of rebellion.It is only her body that knows of these things, moving her, daily, hourly, back and forth, back and forth, before the bars of her cage.

If you are one of those people who can’t hold a lot in mind at once—you lose focus and start daydreaming in lectures, and have to get to someplace quiet to focus so you can use your working memory to its maximum—well, welcome to the clan of the creative. Having a somewhat smaller working memory means you can more easily generalize your learning into new, more creative combinations. Because your learning new, more creative combinations. Having a somewhat smaller working memory, which grows from the focusing abilities of the prefrontal cortex, doesn’t lock everything up so tightly, you can more easily get input from other parts of your brain. These other areas, which include the sensory cortex, not only are more in tune with what’s going on in the environment, but also are the source of dreams, not to mention creative ideas. You may have to work harder sometimes (or even much of the time) to understand what’s going on, but once you’ve got something chunked, you can take that chunk and turn it outside in and inside round—putting it through creative paces even you didn’t think you were capable of! Here’s another point to put into your mental chunker: Chess, that bastion of intellectuals, has some elite players with roughly average IQs. These seemingly middling intellects are able to do better than some more intelligent players because they practice more. That’s the key idea. Every chess player, whether average or elite, grows talent by practicing. It is the practice—particularly deliberate practice on the toughest aspects of the material—that can help lift average brains into the realm of those with more “natural” gifts. Just as you can practice lifting weights and get bigger muscles over time, you can also practice certain mental patterns that deepen and enlarge in your mind.

Physicists have yet to find anything capable of exceeding our known speed of light. The Tao cannot be named, and so I say there is one thing that out-paces all things: we call it “thought.” I can fill a room a with light before I’m anywhere near the switch.

We put our children through their paces in school not so that they will learn something, or master something, or meet any standards. No. We give them tools so that they can experience the joy, the passion, of creating. All we are doing is saying, “Here, if you know this, there is more you can make; there is another path you can map; there is another song you can compose.” School—from pre-K to postdoc programs—exists so that we can all build more from within ourselves and with our colleagues.

Grief was like a terrible burden, but at least you could lay it down by the side of the road and walk away from it. Antonia had come only a few paces, but already she could turn and look back and not weep. It wasn't anything to do with forgetting. It was just accepting. Nothing was ever so bad once you had accepted it.

The finished clock is resplendent. At first glance it is simply a clock, a rather large black clock with a white face and a silver pendulum. Well crafted, obviously, with intricately carved woodwork edges and a perfectly painted face, but just a clock.But that is before it is wound. Before it begins to tick, the pendulum swinging steadily and evenly. Then, then it becomes something else.The changes are slow. First, the color changes in the face, shifts from white to grey, and then there are clouds that float across it, disappearing when they reach the opposite side. Meanwhile, bits of the body of the clock expand and contract, like pieces of a puzzle. As though the clock is falling apart, slowly and gracefully.All of this takes hours.The face of the clock becomes a darker grey, and then black, with twinkling stars where numbers had been previously. The body of the clock, which has been methodically turning itself inside out and expanding, is now entirely subtle shades of white and grey. And it is not just pieces, it is figures and objects, perfectly carved flowers and planets and tiny books with actual paper pages that turn. There is a silver dragon that curls around part of the now visible clockwork, a tiny princess in a carved tower who paces in distress, awaiting an absent prince. Teapots that pour into teacups and minuscule curls of steam that rise from them as the seconds tick. Wrapped presents open. Small cats chase small dogs. An entire game of chess is played.At the center, where a cuckoo bird would live in a more traditional timepiece, is the juggler. Dress in harlequin style with a grey mask, he juggles shiny silver balls that correspond to each hour. As the clock chimes, another ball joins the rest until at midnight he juggles twelve balls in a complex pattern.After midnight, the clock begins once more to fold in upon itself. The face lightens and the cloud returns. The number of juggled balls decreases until the juggler himself vanishes.By noon it is a clock again, and no longer a dream.