Do you ever wait for the longest day of the year and then miss it? I always wait for the longest day of the year and then miss it!
Interpretation
This quote reflects the idea of anticipation and the disappointment of missed opportunities.
F. Scott Fitzgerald's quote captures the essence of human experiences surrounding expectation and regret. It speaks to the tendency we have to look forward to significant moments, such as the longest day of the year, only to find ourselves unprepared or distracted when they arrive. This repetition implies a cycle of hope and letdown, emphasizing the importance of being present and appreciating moments as they happen.
In practice
In a speech about living in the moment, one might say, 'Do you ever wait for the longest day of the year and then miss it?' to illustrate the importance of appreciating life as it unfolds.
Don't be so anxious about it,' she laughed. 'I'm not used to being loved. I wouldn't know what to do; I never got the trick of it.' She looked down at him, shy and fatigued. 'So here we are. I told you years ago that I had the makings of Cinderella.' He took her hand; she drew it back instinctively and then replaced it in his. 'Beg your pardon. Not even used to being touched. But I'm not afraid of you, if you stay quiet and don't move suddenly.
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.
It was about then [1920] that I wrote a line which certain people will not let me forget: "She was a faded but still lovely woman of twenty-seven."
The words seemed to bite physically into Gatsby.
But you can love more than just one person, can't you?
A sudden gust of rain blew over them and then another - as if small liquid clouds were bouncing along the land. Lightning entered the sea far off and the air blew full of crackling thunder. The table cloths blew around the pillars. They blew and blew and blew. The flags twisted around the red chairs like live things, the banners were ragged, the corners of the table tore off through the burbling billowing ends of the cloths.
Two bubbles found they had rainbows on their curves. They flickered out saying: "It was worth being a bubble, just to have held that rainbow thirty seconds.
It's a pleasure to share one's memories. Everything remembered is dear, endearing, touching, precious. At least the past is safe though we didn't know it at the time. We know it now. Because it's in the past; because we have survived.
One ship drives east and another drives west With the selfsame winds that blow. Tis the set of the sails And not the gales Which tells us the way to go. Like the winds of the seas are the ways of fate, As we voyage along through the life: Tis the set of a soul That decides its goal, And not the calm or the strife.
Like a French poem is life; being only perfect in structure when with the masculine rhymes mingled the feminine are.
Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.
Ah, but in time the heat of noontide passes, and to it there succeed nightfall and dusk, with a return to the quiet fold where for the weary an the heavy-laden there waits sleep, sweet sleep.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.