Haruki Murakami - Day Quotes

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A regular wind-up toy world this is, I think. Once a day the wind-up bird has to come and wind the springs of this world. Alone in this fun house, only I grow old, a pale softball of death swelling inside me. Yet even as I sleep somewhere between Saturn and Uranus, wind-up birds everywhere are busy at work fulfilling their appointed rounds.

Haruki Murakami
We knew exactly what we wanted in each other. And even so, it ended. One day it stopped, as if the film simply slipped off the reel.

Haruki Murakami
And, well, mine are kind of on the heavy side anyway. The first day or two, I don't want to do ANYTHING. Make sure you keep away from me then.' I'd like to, but how can I tell?' I asked. O.K., I'll wear a hat for a couple of days after my period starts. A red one. That should work,' she said with a laugh. 'If you see me on the street and I'm wearing a red hat, don't talk to me, just run away.

Haruki Murakami
You're walking through a field all by yourself one day in spring and this sweet little bear cub with velvet fur and shiny little eyes comes walking along. And he says to you, 'Hi, there, little lady. Want to tumble with me?' So you and the bear spend the whole day in each other's arms, tumbling down this clover-covered hill. Nice, huh?

Haruki Murakami
Mountains, according to the angle of view, the season, the time of day, the beholder's frame of mind, or any one thing, can effectively change their appearance. Thus, it is essential to recognize that we can never know more than one side, one small aspect of a mountain.

Haruki Murakami
Was it Aristotle who said the human soul is composed of reason, will, and desire? No, that was Plato. Aristotle and Plato were as different as Mel Tormé and Bing Crosby. In any case, things were a lot simpler in the old days, Komatsu said. Wouldn't it be fun to imagine reason, will, and desire engaged in a fierce debate around a table?

Haruki Murakami
Even if there were two of me, I still couldn't do all that has to be done. No matter what, though, I keep up my running. Running every day is a kind of lifeline for me, so I'm not going to lay off or quit just because I'm busy. If I used being busy as an excuse not to run, I'd never run again. I have only a few reasons to keep on running, and a truckload of them to quit. All I can do is keep those few reasons nicely polished.

Haruki Murakami
People lose fifty million skin cells every day. The cells get scraped off and turn into invisible dust, and disappear into the air. Maybe we are nothing but skin cells as far as the world is concerned.

Haruki Murakami
You don't get it, do you?" I said. It's not a question of 'what then'. Some people get a kick out of reading railroad timetables and that's all they do all day. Some people make huge model boats out of matchsticks. So what's wrong if there happens to be one guy in the world who enjoys trying to understand you?

Haruki Murakami
That's all I think about these days. Must be because I have so much time to kill every day. When you don't have anything to do, your thoughts get really, really far out-so far out you can't follow them all the way to the end.

Haruki Murakami
Those were strange days, now that I look back at them. In the midst of life, everything revolved around death.

Haruki Murakami
The morning air of the pasture turned steadily cooler. Day by day, the bright golden leaves of the birches turned more spotted as the first winds of winter slipped between the withered branches and across the highlands toward the southeast. Stopping in the center of the pasture, I could hear the winds clearly. No turning back, they pronounced. The brief autumn was gone.

Haruki Murakami
You can keep as quiet as you like, but one of these days somebody is going to find you.

Haruki Murakami
Things like that happen all the time in this great big world of ours. It's like taking a boat out on a beautiful lake on a beautiful day and thinking both the sky and the lake are beautiful. So stop eating yourself up alive. Things will go where they're supposed to go if you just let them take their natural course.

Haruki Murakami
When I'm running I don't have to talk to anybody and don't have to listen to anybody. This is a part of my day I can't do without.

Haruki Murakami
One of these days they'll be making a film where the whole human race gets wiped out in a nuclear war, but everything works out in the end.

Haruki Murakami
So I made up my mind I was going to find someone who would love me unconditionally three hundred and sixty-five days a year. Watanabe: Wow, and did your search pay off? M: That's the hard part. I guess I've been waiting so long I'm looking for perfection. That makes it tough.

Haruki Murakami
Reality's just the accumulation of ominous prophecies come to life. All you have to do is open a newspaper on any given day to weigh the good news versus the bad news, and you'll see what I mean.

Haruki Murakami
People sometimes sneer at those who run every day, claiming they'll go to any length to live longer. But don't think that's the reason most people run. Most runners run not because they want to live longer, but because they want to live life to the fullest.

Haruki Murakami
One impossible day, of an impossible month, of an impossible year.

Haruki Murakami
I'm scared," she said. "These days I feel like a snail without a shell." "I'm scared too," I said. "I feel like a frog without any webs." She looked up and smiled. Wordlessly we walked over to a shaded part of the building and held each other and kissed, a shell-less snail and a webless frog.

Haruki Murakami
What I want is for the two of us to meet somewhere by chance one day, like, passing on the street, or getting on the same bus.

Haruki Murakami
Each day the sun would rise and set, the flag would be raised and lowered. Each Sunday I would have a date with my dead friend's girl. I had no idea what I was doing or what I was going to do.

Haruki Murakami
One listless day followed another, with nothing to distinguish one from the next. You could have changed the order and no one would have noticed.

Haruki Murakami
Being active every day makes it easier to hear that inner voice.

Haruki Murakami