July 18, 1999

Quotes

Even before modern man had language, I bet that our monkey ancestors still quoted their predecessors. Sure, it might have been some cackle or howl or hoot, but the meaning of those sounds gave the monkey man a reason for repeating them.

We fill our lives with quotations. We have personal maxims we chant to ourselves each day to drive us, to encourage us, to keep us from throwing pennies off the Empire State Building in a ludicrous act of mass murder. Our religions are purely composed of quotations from higher beings or prophets of those beings. The publishing industry makes quite a bonus off of the quote book trade.

Who does not have a favorite quote? Who does not enjoy a casual flipping through a quote book? Who has never repeated a funny joke? We all live in a world of quotations. We live in the past no matter how hard you try. And even if you say don't 'live in the past,' that casual phrase has been uttered before, you eternally condemned quoter.