DON'T GET DISTRACTED

“And therefore I looked into the great pity of a person's life on this earth. I don't mean that we all end up dead, that's not the great pity. I mean that he couldn't tell me what he was dreaming, and I couldn't tell him what was real.”--Denis Johnson from Jesus' Son

He was running over the tiled floor of the operating room with a mop. “Jesus, there's a lot of blood in here,” he complained. “They were performing surgery, Georgie,” I told him. “There's so much goop inside of us, man,” he said, “and it all wants to get out.” He leaned his mop against a cabinet. “What are you crying for?” I didn't understand.--Denis Johnson from Jesus' Son

“Love and violence—not to conquer one with the other but to live with both, that's what I've learned. Each pulling me a different way. If I relax my struggles they don't tear me in two, but lift me up.”--Denis Johnson from Already Dead

“Of course we need solutions. But solutions like: We solve the problems? Or solutions like: We dissove the fuckers in acid?”--Denis Johnson, Tree of Smoke

“You have to see fate as a design, a pattern, and the will as the knife, the blade, the thing slicing through the fabric.” –Denis Johnson, from Already Dead

“I've been shot twice.”
“Twice?”
“Once by each wife, for a total of three bullets, making four holes, three ins and one out.”
“What did you say when she shot you?”
“I said, 'You shot me!'”
“Both times? Both wives?”
“The first time I didn't say anything, because she shot me in the mouth.” –Denis Johnson, from Jesus' Son