Quotes About Youth

I was actually doing in my life. I was like a young Walter Mitty; a Don Quixote with no Sancho Panza.

If I were to travel back in time, I might urge the young man I was to set the books aside for a minute, open the windows, and let in some fresh air (my smoking habit was then in full bloom). I'd tell him to relax, go meet some people, and enjoy the pleasures that life reserves for those in their twenties.

I wanted to think that she did look back, that she'd reveled in the memory of a long ago lover, or a perfect sun lit day in her youth when she'd experienced a bit of good fortune and the world had revealed itself to be big and full of promise.

The fruit vendor's anguish set off weeks of nationwide demonstrations against the Tunisian government, and on January 14, 2011, Ben Ali and his family fled to Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, similar protests, made up mostly of young people, were beginning to happen in Algeria, Yemen, Jordan, and Oman, the first flickers of what became known as the Arab Spring.

I'd had a chance to meet many Dreamers, both before and after I entered the White House. They were smart, poised, and resilient—as full of potential as my own daughters. If anything, I found the Dreamers to be less cynical about America than many of their native-born contemporaries—precisely because their circumstances had taught them not to take life in this country for granted.

African American boys or white boys. They don't have rituals, road maps, and initiation rites into a clear sense of a male strength and energy that is positive as opposed to just dominating.

My anger when a young Kerry staffer informed us that I had to cut one of my favorite lines because the nominee intended to poach it for his own speech.

The students and their parents had cheered, many of them waving American flags of their own. I thought about the country I'd just described to them—a hopeful, generous, courageous America, an America that was open to everyone. At about the same age as the graduates were now, I'd seized on that idea and clung to it for dear life. For their sake more than mine, I badly wanted it to be true.

Katie printed out a wire photo and left it on my desk; it showed a group of young protesters in the Egyptian square hoisting a sign that read, YES WE CAN.

I don't see kids smiling around here no more. You look at 'em listen to 'em… they seem worried all the time, mad about something. They got nothing they trust. Not their parents. Not God. Not themselves. And that's not right. That just ain't the way things supposed to be… kids not smiling

At ten, she learned that no address was permanent, at twelve, that no promise was sacred, and at sixteen, that there was no such thing as safe.

Parents could see what was happening to their own children, who were being drawn to electronic devices—cell phones, computers, and iPads—as if to opium-infused cupcakes.

As a teenager, I aspired to be a scientist, but too many things happened to distract me from that goal, so I became instead a science appreciator.

Yeah, Erik. You're about as sensitive as a toilet seat, Horatio said. Angie giggled. That's not original. I got it from Holden Caulfield. Who's he? Angie asked. A character in a book. [i]The Catcher In The Rye[/i]. (pg. 69)

Jenny froze...cut by an unexpected pang of a hot jealousy she had thought that she had long outgrown—the bitter jealousy of her youth toward those who had greater skills than she. All her life she had worked to rid herself of it, knowing it crippled her from learning from those more powerful.

For if there is any single thing that everyone hopes for most dearly, it must be this: that the youngest outlive the oldest.

Most of the girls my age, or even younger, have babies. They appear way too young to be married, till you look in their eyes. Then you'll see it. Their eyes look happy and sad at the same time, but unexcited by anything, shifting easily off to the side as if they've already seen most of what there is. Married eyes.

But time passed and eventually my mind had only one thought in it as regards childhood. For any kid that gets that as an option: take that sweet thing and run with it. Hide. Love it so hard. Because it's going to fucking leave you and not come back.

Perhaps growing up meant we put our knives away and feigned ignorance of the damage.

It is harrowing for me to try to teach 20-year-old students, who earnestly want to improve their writing. The best I can think to tell them is: Quit smoking, and observe posted speed limits. This will improve your odds of getting old enough to be wise

Keeping secrets from young ears only plants seeds in between them

Our childhood had passed over into history overnight. The transition was unnoticed by anyone but ourselves.

For six years, from age nineteen until I turned twenty-five, I did not sleep uninterrupted through a single night. . . . I felt lucky to get my shoes on the right feet. . . . I moved forward only, thinking each morning anew that we were leaving the worst behind.

Zeke embodied the contradiction of his generation: jaded about the fate of the world, idealistic about personal prospects.