More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
black
white
ruddy
"ruddy" is nonsensical in this usage. The blue stone is reddish colored? Or is the blue stone bloody?
“It’s easy to become accustomed to something, anything really. Food, pleasure, drugs, sex, music… you name it. You do anything enough, and the sensation fades to a shadow of its former glory. It flatlines,” he added with a morbid chuckle at his own joke. The Gambler glanced at Dom again. “So, are you really surprised that we get used to being alive? We do it all the time, don’t we?”
The man raised a finger. “But you can fix that problem – you can make those sensations just as powerful as they were the first time. You just need to create contrast. You smell something else. Listen to something else. Eat something else. Fuck someone else?” the Gambler offered with a sly grin. He shook his head. “But with living… man, there’s only one choice. “You need to brush up against death.”
“How is this shit fair?” Dom asked, his brow creased again. “This was just the first island outside of town. And new players start here?” The Gambler just shot him a mocking grin. “Fair? Who said anything about fair?” He held Dom’s gaze, his expression sobering. “In your experience, is life ever fair? Does anyone have control over where they’re born? Their parents? The color of their skin? Of course not. They’re all just dice rolls. Chance and probability. The cards we’re dealt.”
I’ve watched many lives grace my modest establishment. And I’ve noticed something. They’re all oblivious. Content to gamble away their time and money – which are really just the same thing when you get down to it. Their lives quantified and measured and traded for coin.”
“As I said before, they’re all looking for something here. But the strangest part? They don’t seem to notice what it costs them. The opportunities they’re missing. That time they can’t get back. They never ask for the exchange rate – barely stop to consider it. “Because they’re asleep. They’ve forgotten they’re living.”
“Some of us have less time than others,” Dom murmured, his eyes on that screen. “Those with decades to spare can afford to be oblivious. And those with little time left may feel… may feel like none of it matters.” The Gambler snorted out a laugh, and Dom glanced at him in surprise. “Yeah, that’s a common falsehood we like to tell ourselves. A pretty little lie we use to hold back the fear. Except your life has always been and always will be a perishable good. It’s going to expire. “Minutes, hours, days, months, years. It doesn’t matter. Eventually, everyone dies. The house always
...more
“People always seem to fear death above all else. But that’s shortsighted, in my opinion. There are things far worse than dying,” the Gambler grumbled from nearby, his voice accompanied by the splash of water. “Pain. Torture. Watching your loved ones die. Facing failure – even repeated failure.”
I agree.
about easy
about how easy
He’d assumed the guy was just an asshole, but maybe that was because he told the unvarnished truth. That wasn’t always pleasant. But perhaps it was necessary.
“But fear is just like anything else. You can train yourself to withstand it – to ignore it.
I’ll have you know I’m instrumental to this group.”
Very punny!
elephant.
elephantine foe.
slinked
slunk
“You know why they have trouble defining it? Same reason I just gave you! You can’t define happiness by itself. It’s just the opposite of a bundle of different things – of pain, sorrow, fear, loss, depression, anxiety, discomfort. That clusterfuck of painful shit. “Like think about the times you were happiest. You succeed after failing over and over again at something? You get some presents on a birthday? You get married? Have a kid? Have a cheat day on your diet? In other words, the absence of failure, of want, of loneliness, of lack of purpose, and of hunger.”
Everyone was destined to die, after all. He could still remember that first conversation with the Gambler. The man was clearly a cynical asshole. But he wasn’t wrong either. The clock was running on everyone’s life – most just didn’t appreciate that until the hourglass was almost empty. There was a sort of willful blindness to the way they walked through life, as if by ignoring their fate, they could convince themselves that it wouldn’t happen to them.
ruddy gray.
"ruddy" seems misused in this context.
black
white
Black powder firearms produces white smoke with each shot. En mass this was the source of the proverbial "fog of war."
crude fort
crude fort
ground
grind
black
white
he
she
eyes
eye
his
her
a LFM
an LFM
damaged
destroyed
in trade
in the trade
robed
armored
rock s,
rock,
He did look… imposing. Like a posh serial killer. Or a really upscale clown.
There may not be much difference between the two.
floor arena,
floor of the arena,
blaze that and
blaze and
Is it worth it? he wondered. This shitshow we call life – in-game or out. All this pain and stress and fear and bullshit? Never knowing whether you’re doing the right thing. The wrong thing? Or whether any of it even really matters.
I once read, or heard, something describing all the things men do, which screws up our lives, as being the result of "fucked up men fucking up in a fucked up world." The phrase stuck with me because I think there's a heavy dose of truth in it.
