65
" Now that we've come up with all the obvious answers to our problem, it's time to come up with some truly ridiculous ones." " Ridiculous?" asked Brasque." Yes, ridiculous. Think of something impossible, improbable or downright ridiculous and go from there." " Like we all flap our arms and fly out of here," said Katherine." Exactly!" said Spider." How about we form a long line all the way to the mountains and pass the charges along it?" said Brasque." Excellent," said Spider. " Keep it coming." " What if we each carry one charge, run back, carry another, and so on?" said Tom, getting into the swing of things." Lovely!" laughed Spider. " Now we're cooking." The shower of sparks shot out of the top of the Amadragon. Joe shielded his eyes with his hand." Yeah, and we can all climb on the Amadragon and ride out of here," he said." What was that, Joe?" said Spider, suddenly dropping the jokey manner. " What's the Amadragon?" Katherine's eyes glittered. " He means that," she said, pointing at the excavator. Everyone except Spider turned and looked. " He's talking about the giant machine, the one that keeps shooting sparks in the air." Spider cocked his ear and listened to the rumble of the Amadragon's engine. " So Orlemann built the dragon, did he?" he said. " I'd been wondering what the noise was. If they built it to the original specifications, it should get us out of here within an hour. Let's pray that will give us enough time! "
68
" Only two weeks since he had left, and it was already happening. Time, blunting the edges of those sharp memories. Laila bore down mentally. What had he said? It seemed vital, suddenly, that she know.
Laila closed her eyes. Concentrated.
With the passing of time, she would slowly tire of this exercise. She would find it increasingly exhausting to conjure up, to dust off, to resuscitate once again what was long dead. There would come a day, in fact, years later, when Laila would no longer bewail his loss. Or not as relentlessly; not nearly. There would come a day when the details of his face would begin to slip from memory's grip, when overhearing a mother on the street call after her child by Tariq's name would no longer cut her adrift. She would not miss him as she did now, when the ache of his absence was her unremitting companion—like the phantom pain of an amputee.
Except every once in a long while, when Laila was a grown woman, ironing a shirt or pushing her children on a swing set, something trivial, maybe the warmth of a carpet beneath her feet on a hot day or the curve of a stranger's forehead, would set off a memory of that afternoon together. And it would come rushing back. The spontaneity of it. Their astonishing imprudence...
It would flood her, steal her breath.
But then it would pass. The moment would pass. Leave her feeling deflated, feeling noting but a vague restlessness. "
― Khaled Hosseini , A Thousand Splendid Suns
69
" Some energies are not as potent. The only way to develop a potent energy is to spend an existence on the earth. There, one can develop a compassionate nature so that when passing onto other dimensions, one can be of help. When one leaves one’s earth body one will need to fully understand compassion to be helpful, effective. On earth, you are encapsulated in flesh...No soul is forced into an assignment upon the earth. Instead they go to their ‘rightful space’. When you leave the earth you have a lot more power. It won’t be ego-based power. Rather it will be beyond ego, beyond good and evil. In fact, ‘evil’ is just a label as everything is intermixed. The pendulum just appears to swing back and forth.”..." Kuan Yin is showing me a person running with sandbags. She’s telling me that when the person finally lets-go of the sandbags, she or he is faster, stronger. Oh. I get it! That’s what the earth existence is like. In many ways living on earth is an ‘artificial’ burden. Once one is free of one’s body, they are not only lighter but also stronger, more powerful. I’m reminded of a time when I was a child. I felt so limited. I remember thinking, ‘Why can’t I just be wherever I want to be and physically not have to walk or use transportation? Why do I have to physically cross the street?’”-Lena Lees "
