to me, words are one of the few things that possess some absolute quality of truth.  not spoken words, but written words.  that probably explains why i’m such a collector of words — i have notebooks upon notebooks full of quotes, thoughts, random words that i don’t want to forget.

when i communicate with others, i prefer to do it in two ways — face-to-face or in writing.  of those two, there’s something magical about a written exchange.  i love reading and re-reading the words of others.  i love the text itself, the letters, whether handwritten or in type.  i find beauty in the absoluteness of words — they exist independently, and are not qualified or limited by anything.  words are pure and unconditional.

think about it:  i can write you a lie, but the words will be true.

ask me to recall a conversation, and you get my truth, my impression, which has been filtered through my experience and my lenses of reality.  my version of the exchange might be nothing more than a pale and lifeless rendering of the teller’s original story, long since dissolved into the ether.  but with written words, there is a promise of permanence, that in two months, two years, two decades, the words will remain the same.  sure, the context in which they are read may change, but the words themselves are no different.  the words are safe and untouched — almost like the faces in a photograph.

and it’s there, in that promise, that i find both beauty and truth.

“with all its sham, drudgery & broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.” (max erhmann)

“one day, one night, i’ll dream a dream, perhaps like any other dream, except that i won’t know it is the last dream of my life.” (louise erdrich)

“i don’t want to pay the price for living too long with a single dream.” (unknown)

“all of them constructed at infinite cost to themselves these maginot lines against the enemy they thought they saw across the frontier, this enemy who never attacked that way — if he ever attacked at all; if he was indeed the enemy.” (john knowles)<– bonus points to anyone who knows what this is from

“in the real world as in dreams; nothing is quite what is seems” (unknown)

“and when he shall die, take him and cut him out in little stars, and he will make the face of heaven so fine that all the world will be in love with night and pay no worship to the garish sun.” (william shakespeare)

“it is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.” (f. scott fitzgerald)

“the past is but the beginning of a beginning, and all that is and has been is but the twilight of the dawn.” (h.g. wells)

“i have loved the stars too well to be frightened of the night.” (unknown)

“you and me, we’ve made a separate peace.” (ernest hemmingway)

“so plant your own garden and decorate your own soul instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.” (sherrie lovler)

“every day she shed tears, not from sadness, but because the world was a beautiful as life was short.” (unknown)

“even if we drink i don’t think we would kiss in the way that we did when the woman was only a girl.” (the cure)

“we scream in cathedrals why can’t it be beautiful?” (tori amos)

The phrase itself comes later than that though. The first printed reference comes from 1657 in John Harington’s lyric poem, The History of Polindor and Flostella. In that work, the character Ortheris withdraws with his beloved to a country lodge for ‘quiet, calm and ease’, but later venture further – ‘Both Dove-like roved forth beyond the pale to planted Myrtle-walk’. Such recklessness rarely meets with a good end in 17th century verse and before long they are attacked by armed men with ‘many a dire killing thrust’.

The message is clearly, ‘if there is a pale, you should stay inside it’, but, really, what fun is that??