Some people collect watches, some collect cars, and some were given the assignment of collecting leaves for grade school projects.

I collect quotes.

You know — things people say or write. Some that I've collected are the utterances of famous people; others, little more than words spoken in unguarded moments. To me, quotations are quintessential poetry. Summaries of things so much larger, triggers that remind me of the greater context through which they came.

The quote that got me started, of all things, was something JR Ewing said during an original Dallas episode airing.

For some, no doubt, come questions in an effort to impose logic on art. Who really "said" those words? The actor? the writer? An ad hoc collaboration on the set? Better yet: Can it have any meaning whatsoever without knowing the history that led up to the moment at which it was said?

See what I mean? Riveting!

Quotes best served me in a personal relationship (a dating situation, actually), just after the Millennium turned. Whenever the woman I was seeing would turn an engaging phrase, I'd take note of it in the Quote file on the Palm Vx upon which I then relied.

The following Valentine's Day, I printed them all out for her and presented them in a bound volume.

She was moved by proof that I had listened.

Don't look for indexing and formality here. This is one section of my website strictly dedicated to casual meandering  process without drive — toward goal....