Quotes About Youth

They don't smile like that anymore. They were good kids, well-adjusted and all, but there was still an inescapable, underlying sadness. When you looked closely, the smiles were more cautious now, a wince in the eye, a fear of what else might be taken from them.

In short, Millie explained in long, they would decorate the middle school gymnasium to look like various comic-book places.

There was a swirl of giggles, of "Hello, Ms. Lawson," wet hair, the gentle perfume of both YMCA chlorine and bubble gum, the sound of backpacks being shucked off, of seat belts fastening.

He was no longer a child, barely an adolescent, really, moving too hard and too fast into adulthood.

The lake was hold-your-breath still, but I swore I could still hear Dad's howl of delight as he cannonballed off the dock, his knees pressed tightly against his chest, his smile just south of sane, the upcoming splash a virtual tidal wave in the eyes of his only son.

Esperanza's sexual preference flip-flopped like a politician in a nonelection year. Currently she seemed to be on a man kick, but Myron guessed that was one of the advantages of bisexuality: love everyone. Myron had no problem with it. In high school he had dated almost exclusively bisexual girls—he'd mention sex, the girls would say "bye." Okay, old joke, but the point remained.

They were sprawled on the den furniture as only teenage boys can, as though they'd removed their skeletons, hung them in a nearby closet, and slid to a collapse against whatever upholstery was nearby.

Let her go? What kind of crap is that? She's eighteen, Myron. That makes her an adult. She asked you for a ride. You gallantly—and stupidly, I might add—gave her one. That's it." "That's not it.

Four-year-olds don't belong in dark suits. Four-year-olds belong in goalie uniforms next to their dads.       MARIO

So when did you know for sure?" she asked. "I mean, about his, uh, talents. Do you remember?" He did. Too well. "Freshman year, maybe a month into the school year, a bunch of football players decided to shave Win's head. You know how it is. They thought his hair looked too perfect, what with the straight part and the yellow blond and all that." "Right.

There was such a feeling of innocence here, of make-believe, of youth, of startling passion. But that was the beauty of such a university: students debating over life-and-death issues in an environment as insulated as Disney World. Reality had nothing to do with the equation. And that was okay. In fact, that was how it should be.

His eyes still had the ice blue of youth, and he aimed them my way.

A classmate had told Kimberly about the site. You didn't really have to do anything with the guys, she'd been told. They just wanted young girls for the company. Heidi almost laughed out loud at that one. Men, as Heidi knew all too well and Kimberly quickly learned, never really just wanted company. That was merely the loss leader to get you in the store. Heidi

The girl at the door was young. Eighteen, twenty, something like that. Nope, not a Jehovah's Witness. Didn't have that scooped-out-brain smile.

Drew Van Dyne gave him the cocky grin. Van Dyne was probably thirty-five, ten years younger than Davis. He'd come in as a music teacher eight years ago. He looked the part, the former rock 'n' roller who woulda-shoulda made it to the top except the stupid record companies could never understand his true genius. So now he gave guitar lessons and worked in a music store where he scoffed at your pedestrian taste in CDs. Recent

It had, of course, embarrassed him. And then—equally, of course—it pleased him to no end. When you're young you don't get how great it is to be loved unconditionally. Now

Too many of our insanities are tolerated because they are harmless on an individual level—but multiply them by a millionfold and you have a nation that is culturally sick. These things stem from each individual's conception of himself—which he arbitrarily assumes to be the nature of the world as well. These conceptions are haphazardly picked up during youth—along with all of the other opinions, neuroses, hangups and etceteras common to the human animal.

That's what happens, friends. It gets so damned depressing, coming up against the cultural hari-kiri we keep committing, that cynicism becomes the only supportable attitude. And then the kids prove they've got it. Even I, anxious to give them every possible point, begin to suspect the rot goes from top to bottom, young and old alike. And then the kids do me in. They come up with solid gold, and make me feel like the idiot I certainly am, on occasion.

It was the woman his finest instincts had needed to make them valid; the woman who not only gave to him, but to whom he could give; the woman of memory, of desire, of youth, of restlessness, of completion. A dream. And here, against the softspeaking bubbling water, a reality.

I can't bear these accounts I read in the Times and elsewhere of these poetry slams, in which various young men and women in various late-spots are declaiming rant and nonsense at each other. The whole thing is judged by an applause meter which is actually not there, but might as well be. This isn't even silly; it is the death of art.

There is many a boy here today who looks on war as all glory, but, boys, it is all hell. —WILLIAM TECUMSEH SHERMAN

We Were Soldiers Once…and Young

I'm little but I'm old.

Dill was off again. Beautiful things floated around in his dreamy head. He could read two books to my one, but he preferred the magic of his own inventions. He could add and subtract faster than lightning, but he preferred his own twilight world, a world where babies slept, waiting to be gathered like morning lilies.