Thread: Worthwhile Quotes

"Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people." -- Eleanor Roosevelt

"I love life and nothing intimidates me anymore."
Olivia Newton-John

...No matter where you go, there you are.

Buckaroo Banzai

A refuge suitable to my bitterness proves impossible to find on a wind-swept airport in spring. So I stand for a long time slewing one foot across the tarmac, my vicious self-censure relieved only by watching a plane land or take off. Here, refreshed in the wind, I re-discover what I had previously held to be certain truths. I again become aware that no pilot alive can resist watching a plane take off or land. He may pass a motionless airplane without taking much notice, but the moment his ears detect the first burst of power from a plane, however distant, he will turn his head regardless of everything else around him and watch it.

He will rudely break off in the middle of a conversation to watch a plane landing, though there may be a constant stream of them. From observance of such activity he enjoys an abiding satisfaction, as basic and everlasting as that found by a deep-sea sailor on his obligatory pilgrimage to the nearest harbor. Is it not so, then, that if there fascination there must also be devotion and joy? Both ingredients are surely vital to men who would fully and join any enterprise of great expectation. Therefore it must follow that the power of accomplishment is found in dedication, whether it be in the man who runs a small grocery store or in the scientist who flies to the moon.

Standing on the airfield, sensing the planes still over the horizon and watching others become specks against the sky and eventually vanish, I know that however small my own part, I am a part of this and can never forsake it.

Ernest K. Gann - Fate Is The Hunter

"After midnight the moon set and I was alone with the stars. I have often said that the lure of flying is the lure of beauty, and I need no other flight to convince me that the reason flyers fly, whether they know it or not, is the esthetic appeal of flying. Anticipation, I suppose, sometimes exceeds realization.

Flying may not be all plain sailing, but the joy of it, is worth the price.

Not much more than a month ago I was on the other shore of the Pacific, looking westward. This evening, I looked eastward over the Pacific. In those fast-moving days which have intervened, the whole width of the world has passed behind us -except this broad ocean. I shall be glad when we have the hazards of its navigation behind us.

Decide...whether or not the goal is worth the risks involved. If it is, stop worrying. The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward.

I lay no claim to advancing scientific data other than advancing flying knowledge. I can only say that I do it because I want to. Worry retards reaction and makes clear-cut decisions impossible. Courage is the price that Life exacts for granting peace, The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things. Adventure is worthwhile in itself.

The stars seemed near enough to touch and never before have I seen so many. I always believed the lure of flying is the lure of beauty, but I was sure of it that night."

- Amelia Earhart - from her diary

: Proverbs 16:18
: Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. (King James Version)

Soapboxmom

"Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectful and to give the appearance of solidity to pure wind." - George Orwell