a little culture

"Later the wind died and a cloudreef rimmed in pale rose hung low and still. I was on a dirt road now, spectacularly lost, and I stopped the car and got out and scanned the landscape, feeling pretty dumb, and I thought I saw some funk holes out among the yucca - old concrete bunkers from a mining operation or military test site. It would be dark in forty-five minutes. I had a quarter tank of gas, half a can of iced tea, nothing to eat, no warm clothes, a map that scanted the details.
I would drink my tea and die."

-Don Delillo. Underworld

"Happiness, now, that's something else again. Happiness is human, not divine, and the pursuit of happiness is what we might call love. This love, earthly love, is a truce between metamorphs, a temporary agreement not to shape-shift while kissing or holding hands. Love is a beach towel spread over shifting sands. Love is intimate democracy, a compact that insists on renewals, and you can be voted out overnight, however big your majority. It's fragile, precarious, and it's all we can have while remaining free... All treaties can be broken, all promises end up as lies. Sign nothing, make no promises. Make a provisional reconciliation, a fragile peace. If you're lucky it might last five days; or fifty years."

-Salman Rushdie. The Ground Beneath Her Feet.

"Twenty-five seconds to live and I'm falling down
There the darling goes, magnetics that are pulling her down
Twenty-five seconds to live and I'm waving high
All this white's a thrill
Turning just to give us the sign
And what I never had were pictures passing by
Forces that make your way down
And what I had between the things I never tried
Was you reaching out in hopes that you could grab
Forces that make your way down
I'd say that's better 'cause at least I know you tried
At least I know you tried
Twenty-five seconds to live and I'm falling down
There the darling goes, whipping out her funeral song
Twenty-five seconds to live and I'm waving high
Now he cuts to go, deciding just to trade it all in
And what I never had were pictures flashing by
Forces that make your way down
But what I had between the things I never tried
Was you reaching out in hopes to hold your hand
Forces that make your way down
I'd say I'm better 'cause I lived before I died
At least I know you tried."

-Mates of State. Parachutes (funeral song).

MUSIC: american football: but the regrets are killing me