Orts #683

"I love you more than anyone else in the world," he told her. "I love the children, but I love you more."

 "And I love you," she replied. "But I love the children more because they need me. They need me more than you do."

       —   JJ Lee, in The Measure of a Man

"Slavery begins when the heart loses hope," Papa had said. "Hope is the first step toward freedom."

And Mama had said, "I hope in that case you will learn one day to wash the dishes."

      —  Marina Lewycka, in Strawberry Fields

I think we never become really and genuinely our entire and honest selves until we are dead — and not then until we have been dead years and years. People ought to start dead, and then they would be honest so much earlier.                                                        
     —  Mark Twain, in Eruption (1940)
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For those of you who just can't get enough of this stuff, all previous Orts are available, bundled as follows:

Orts Compendium: the First Four Centuries is a PDF file, 181 pages, 1.2 MB, containing Orts #1 (May 28, 2001) through #400 (March 22, 2009)

Orts: the Fifth Century is a PDF file, 51 pages, 336 KB, containing Orts #401 (March 29, 2009) through #500 (March 13, 2011)

Orts: the Sixth Century is a PDF file, 56 pages, 430 KB, containing Orts #501 (March 20, 2011) through #600 (February 10, 2013)

If you'd like any of these, let me know and I will send. When the Seventh Century comes to an end, it too will be compiled.