♡

To stand at the edge of the sea, to sense the ebb and flow of the tides, to feel the breath of a mist moving over a great salt marsh, to watch the flight of shore birds that have swept up and down the surf lines of the continents for untold thousands of years, to see the running of the old eels and the young shad to the sea, is to have knowledge of things that are as nearly eternal as any earthly life can be.

Ah, to be able to live a thousand different lives in a thousand different ways, but in the end, to live only this one.

I can never be all the people I want and live all the lives I want. I can never train myself in all the skills I want. And why do I want so many things? I want to live and feel all the shades, tones, and variations of mental and physical experience possible in life. And I am horribly limited.

I exist, that is all, and I find it nauseating.

I'll shut myself off from everyone to the point of insensibility. Make an enemy of everyone, speak to no one.

Sometimes, I feel the past and the future pressing so hard on either side that there's no room for the present at all.

What would it take for me to wake and walk through the world as who I am?

—how wonderful to be who I am,

If by romantic they mean someone who dreams, I am a romantic, but I shall keep my crown of dreams a secret.