“In the end, I think the relationships that survive in this world are the ones where two people can finish each other's sentences. Forget drama and torrid sex and the clash of opposites. Give me banter any day of the week. ”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Here's what I think: the five most
unattractive traits in people are cheapness, clinginess, neediness, unwillingness to change and
jealousy. Jealousy is the worst, and by far the hardest to conceal.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“So where do you start when you want to start your life again?”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“I am aware that there is a world out there that functions without regard to me. There are wars and budgets and bombings and vast dimensions of wealth and greed and ambition and corruption. And yet I don't feel a part of that world, and I wouldn't know how to join if I tried.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Jason once told me that eye contact is the most intimacy two people can have -- forget sex -- because the optic nerve is technically an extension of the brain, and when two people look into each other's eyes, it's brain-to-brain.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“As I'm never going to be old, I'm glad that I never lost my sense of wonder about the world, although I have a hunch it would have happened pretty soon. I loved the world, its beauty and bigness as well as its smallness.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“After my brush with the suicidal impulse, I listen with new ears to others when they
speak on the subject. I think there are people who were born with that little door open, and they
have to go through life knowing that they might jump through it at any moment.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Lists only spell out the things that can be taken away from us by moths and rust and thieves. If something is valuable, don't put it in a list. Don't even say the words.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“There are a number of things a woman can tell about a man who is roughly twenty-nine years old,
sitting in the cab of a pickup truck at 3:37 in the afternoon on a weekday, facing the Pacific,
writing furiously on the back of pink invoice slips. Such a man may or may not be employed, but
regardless, there is mystery there. If this man is with a dog, then that's good, because it means he's
capable of forming relationships. But if the dog is a male dog, that's probably a bad sign, because
it means the guy is likely a dog, too. A girl dog is much better, but if the guy is over thirty, any
kind of dog is a bad sign regardless, because it means he's stopped trusting humans altogether. In
general, if nothing else, guys my age with dogs are going to be work.
Then there's stubble: stubble indicates a possible drinker, but if he's driving a van or a pickup
truck, he hasn't hit bottom yet, so watch out, honey. A guy writing something on a clipboard
while facing the ocean at 3:37 P.M. may be writing poetry, or he may be writing a letter begging
someone for forgiveness. But if he's writing real words, not just a job estimate or something
business-y, then more likely than not this guy has something emotional going on, which could
mean he has a soul.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“We're all born lost, aren't we? We're all born separated from God - over and over life makes sure to inform us of this - and yet we're all real: we have names, we have lives. We mean something. We must. ”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“At least when you're young you're also stupid.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Sometimes it feels as if everything in life is just
something we haul into the grave.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“I think God is how you deal with everything that's out of your own control.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“And in his heart, I think, he's now learned what I came to believe, which is, as I've said all along, that the sun may burn brightly, and the faces of children may be plump and achingly sweet, but in the air we breathe, in the water we drink and in the food we share, there will always be darkness in this world.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“It is indeed a mistake to confuse children with angels”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“If I've learned anything in twenty-nine years, it's
that every human being you see in the course of a day has a problem that's sucking up at least 70
percent of his or her radar. My gift - bad choice of words - is that I can look at you, him, her,
them, whoever, and tell right away what is keeping them awake at night: money; feelings of
insignificance; overwhelming boredom; evil children; job troubles; or perhaps death, in one of its
many costumes, perched in the wings. What surprises me about humanity is that in the end such a
narrow range of plights defines our moral lives.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Sometimes I think God is like weather - you may not like
the weather, but it has nothing to do with you. You just happen to be there. Deal with it. Sadness
and grief are part of being human and always will be.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Jason said, "Yes. Gerard T. Giraffe."
What does the 'T' stand for?"
'The.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“What surprises me about humanity is that in the end such a narrow range of plights defines our moral lives.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“It's around midnight. After I left Dad, my choice was to either become very drunk or write this. I
chose to write this. It felt kind of now-or-never for me.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“With Jason I thought I'd finally played my cards right, and now I'm just one more of those
broken, sad people out there, figuring out a year in advance where they can have Easter and
Christmas dinner without feeling like a burden or duty to others, cursing the quality of modern
movies because it's so hard to fill weeknights with movies when they're all crap, and waiting, just
waiting, for those three drinks a night to turn into four - and then, well, then I'll be applying my
makeup in the morning, combing my hair, washing my clothes, but it's not really for anyone. I'm
alive, but so what.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Inasmuch as I am a spiritual man, I do believe in God - I think that He created an
order for the world; I believe that, in constantly bombarding Him with requests for miracles,
we're also asking that He unravel the fabric of the world. A world of continuous miracles
would be a cartoon, not a world.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“My brain feels like a cool, deep lake.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Sometimes I think God is like weather--you may not like the weather, but it has nothing to do wit you. You just happen to be there. Deal with it.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“I was sick of wanting money. I was sick of being without a goal.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“The world was so unbearably pretty, and it continued being so all the way down the mountain to school. I felt slightly high because of the beauty, and the inside of my head tickled. I wondered if this is how artists go through life, with all of its sensations tickling their craniums like a peacock feather..”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“Failure is authentic, and because it's authentic, it's real and genuine, and because of that, it's a pure state of being.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“And when you do find this letter, you know
what? Something extraordinary will happen. It will be like a reverse solar eclipse - the sun will
start shining down in the middle of night, imagine that!”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“The world is a glorious place, and filled with so many unexpected moments that I'd get lumps in my throat, as though I were watching a bride walk down the aisle - moments as eternal and full of love as the lifting of veils, the saying of vows and the moment of the first wedded kiss.”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
“And when you do find this letter, you know what? Something extraordinary will happen. It will be like a reverse solar eclipse - the sun will start shining down in the middle of the night, imagine that! - and when I see this sunlight it will be my signal to go running out into the streets, and I'll shout over and over, "Awake! Awake! The son of mine who once was lost has now been found!" I'll pound on every door in the city, and my cry will ring true: "Awake! Everyone listen, there has been a miracle - my son who once was dead is now alive. Rejoice! All of you! Rejoice! You must! My son is coming home!”
― Douglas Coupland, quote from Hey Nostradamus!
Douglas Coupland
Born place: in CFB Baden-Söllingen, Germany
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“In the healing ways of women that remained mysterious to [him] even as he watched them do their work, tears were followed by reminiscences that brought a smile and soothed, and hope was always found to be the flower that bloomed from every seed of hopelessness.”
― Dean Koontz, quote from From the Corner of His Eye
“Just as rapport-building has a good reputation, explicitness applied by women in this culture has a terrible reputation. A woman who is clear and precise is viewed as cold, or a bitch, or both. A woman is expected, first and foremost, to respond to every communication from a man. And the response is expected to be one of willingness and attentiveness. It is considered attractive if she is a bit uncertain (the opposite of explicit). Women are expected to be warm and open, and in the context of approaches from male strangers, warmth lengthens the encounter, raises his expectations, increases his investment, and, at best, wastes time. At worst, it serves the man who has sinister intent by providing much of the information he will need to evaluate and then control his prospective victim.”
― Gavin de Becker, quote from The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us from Violence
“She's thinking I betrayed her, and she's thinking it now! I can't live with that.”
― Frederik Pohl, quote from Gateway
“Joey, it's high time, dear child. What will people say? If you don't want to be a doctor, at least be a womanizer, or a fancier of horses, be something... be something definite...”
― Witold Gombrowicz, quote from Ferdydurke
“People don't want reasons to do what they'd like to. They want excuses.”
― W. Somerset Maugham, quote from Theatre
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