Youth

Flipping through The Telegraph the other day, I stumbled across the following quote by Richard Halliburton from The Royal Road to Romance, first published in 1925. Well worth thinking about:

Youth — nothing else worth having in the world... And I had youth, the transitory, the fugitive, now, completely and abundantly. Yet what was I going to do with it? Certainly not squander its gold on the commonplace quest for riches and respectability, and then secretly lament the price that had to be paid for these futile ideals. Let those who wish have their respectability — I wanted freedom, freedom to indulge in whatever caprice struck my fancy, freedom to search in the farthermost corners of the Earth for the beautiful, the joyous and the romantic.

English way

Caressing that marvelous body of hers, breathing in her adolescence, her insecurity, her vulgar mindlessness. Stroking her hair, kissing her. Wondering how much of those feelings is reality and how much just a projection of my own imagination and sentiment.

Rationale: that's what's driving me in most cases but this. Drowning in as there's no solution other than cut it short or wait. Perhaps in vain, perhaps forever. No equation, no fundamental law to make things right — there's no equations and no laws.

Caressing that marvelous body of hers meaning to caress my brain to calm.

Hanging on in quiet desperation
is the English way

This is not my way. It's only a cold turkey of Sunday afternoon.

Linger

Walking around the city helped to ease the moment. There she was, in my bed, her youthful body inches from mine.

She could; she knew she could; and I felt I could, too. Yet we didn't.

Paraphrasing His Steveness: I’m as proud of what I don’t do as I am of what I do.