A Quote by Paul Hawken

Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of course. The world would become religious overnight. We would be ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead, the stars come out every night, and we watch television.
If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city of God which had been shown! But every night come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their admonishing smile.
Each night, Liesel would step outside, wipe the door, and watch the sky. Usually it was like spillage - cold and heavy, slippery and gray - but once in a while some stars had the nerve to rise and float, if only for a few minutes. On those nights, she would stay a little longer and wait. Hello, stars.
If the stars should appear but one night every thousand years how man would marvel and stare.
By about age 12, I would prefer to stay up and watch the stars than go to sleep. I started learning. I started going to the library and reading. But it was initially just watching the stars from my bedroom that I really did. There was just nothing as interesting in my life as watching the stars every night.
I would like to see every gay doctor come out, every gay lawyer, every gay architect come out, stand up and let that world know. That would do more to end prejudice overnight than anybody would imagine. I urge them to do that, urge them to come out. Only that way will we start to achieve our rights.
Once when I was cooking I burned my arm with scalding water. I went to the Emergency Room of the Hospital. When the doctor came in he looked at me and looked at my chart, and looked at me and looked at my chart, then looked at me again and said, "I loved your show!" He told me that when he was doing his internship he would come home every night stressed out, but he would watch a late night rerun of the Andy Griffith Show and relax and fall asleep. He said, "I wouldn't be a doctor, if it wasn't for the Andy Griffith Show".
I didn't have cable television growing up; there were only six channels you could watch then. The only really good channel was channel 10, and they would play 'The Nanny Called Fran' every night for years. I've seen every episode 100 times. I would get my Grandma to make me leopard skin dresses on her sewing machine.
Ralph Waldo Emerson would definitely be my homeboy.
How quickly do we grow accustomed to wonders. I am reminded of the Isaac Asimov story Nightfall, about the planet where the stars were visible only once in a thousand years. So awesome was the sight that it drove men mad. We who can see the stars every night glance up casually at the cosmos and then quickly down again, searching for a Dairy Queen.
I was a huge David Letterman fan, even going back to when he was on NBC. My parents would only let me watch a half hour of television a day, so I would record Letterman the night before and then watch it when I came home from school. That's what made me want to do a T.V. show.
As the Little House settled down on her new foundation, she smiled happily. Once again she could watch the sun and moon and stars. Once again she could watch Spring and Summer and Fall and Winter come and go. Once again she was lived in and taken care of. Never again would she be curious about the city... Never again would she want to live there... The stars twinkled above her... A new moon was coming up... It was Spring... And all was quiet and peaceful in the country.
If you were the sky, I would unfurl myself in you, as a rainbow of colors yet unseen. I would become oceans of stars in your night.
I remember working with Ray Charles when I was quite young, and I would wonder, 'Why would he sing 'Georgia On My Mind' and 'I Can't Stop Loving You' every night?' I said, 'Oh my God if I have to sing these songs, if I have to sing 'I Can't Stop Loving You' one more night, I'm going to fall out.' Of course, I was young and I didn't understand.
I constantly write about my safety walking to and from school, and then I would come home at night, and I would cut on the TV, and I would watch a show like 'The Wonder Years,' or I would watch, you know, some other show like 'Family Ties.'
But, if a man would be alone, let him look at the stars. The rays that come from these heavenly worlds, will separate between him and what he touches. One might think the atmosphere was made transparent with this design, to give man, in the heavenly bodies, the perpetual presence of the sublime... But every night come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their admonishing smile.
In this universe the night was falling; the shadows were lengthening towards an east that would not know another dawn. But elsewhere the stars were still young and the light of morning lingered; and along the path he once had followed, Man would one day go again.
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