Allow me a few observations:
W r i t i n g
Have no fear; I’m fairly certain anyone with a fifth-grade education can get a book published.
People who cannot write annoy me when they try.
“A good style should show no signs of effort. What is written should seem a happy accident.”
—W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965)
G e n i u s
I don’t borrow other people’s work. If it’s not good enough to be my own, why bother?
L e a r n i n g
The only thing worse than ignorance is taking pride therein.
C i v i l i t y
Ever been to the Friday night football game? It’s pretty rough.
There is no excuse for being rude, no exception for being crass, no explanation for being uncivilized. We didn’t waste a thousand years just so you can yell, snort, and laugh like an idiot.
S u c c e s s
Greatness is achieved not by national prominence, but by personal satisfaction.
There is a great difference between having failed and being a failure. Everyone fails; few let their failures define them.
S e l f
The tragedy is not in being who you are. The tragedy is in being the person others think you ought to be.
The greatest damage we can do to our convictions is to compromise them.
L o s s
“I cannot get used to the idea that George is not coming back. It seems to me that he must, and that all I am doing is preparatory to his arrival. Lila dear, we were so happy and I miss him so dreadfully.”
(Edith Stuyvesant Vanderbilt, widow of George W. Vanderbilt (1862-6 March 1914), to Lila Vanderbilt Webb, 28 May 1914)
