A Quote by Mary Lou Retton

I usually don't mind giving autographs, but when hundreds of folks with paper and pen start coming at you, it's time to seek shelter. — © Mary Lou Retton
I usually don't mind giving autographs, but when hundreds of folks with paper and pen start coming at you, it's time to seek shelter.
My pen.’ Funny, I wrote that without noticing. ‘The torch’, ‘the paper’, but ‘my pen’. That shows what writing means to me, I guess. My pen is a pipe from my heart to the paper. It’s about the most important thing I own.
Summer is a discouraging time to work - you don't feel death coming on the way it does in the fall when the boys really put pen to paper.
I love writing thank-you notes. There's something very nostalgic to me about the feel of a card and putting pen to paper. How many times in our lives are we required to put pen to paper anymore?
I revise like crazy. I start revising before the pen hits the paper.
I don't answer fan mail. I don't have time for that. It's like hundreds of thousands of people who think they're going to become millionaires getting autographs from movie actors. I don't have time for those idiots. I've got stuff to do.
I was ashamed to let anyone know that I was living in a shelter. I remember one time coming home and some kids saw me and were like, "What you doing here? This is a shelter!" But I was like, "My mom's working there." It was pretty embarrassing.
Christmas always rustled. It rustled every time, mysteriously, with silver and gold paper, tissue paper and a rich abundance of shiny paper, decorating and hiding everything and giving a feeling of reckless extravagance.
My main message to folks who love animals is that you can do something every day to help them. Even if you have no money or time, per se, you can find ways to contribute on any level: sharing shelter animals on social media, donating old blankets or towels to a local shelter, starting a petition online for an animal cause.
When you start putting pen to paper, you see a side of your personal truth that doesn't otherwise reveal itself in conversation or thought.
I've always known that the best part of writing occurs before you've picked up a pen. When a story exists only in your mind, its potential is infinite; it's only when you start pinning words to paper that it becomes less than perfect. You have to make your choices, set your limits. Start whittling away at the cosmos, and don't stop until you've narrowed it down to a single, ordinary speck of dirt. And in the end, what you've made is not nearly as glorious as what you've thrown away.
The world is like a sheet of paper on which something is typed. The reading and the meaning will vary with the reader, but the paper is the common factor, always present, rarely perceived. When the ribbon is removed, typing leaves no trace on the paper. So is my mind - the impressions keep on coming, but no trace is left.
I don't even own a computer. I write by hand then I type it up on an old manual typewriter. But I cross out a lot - I'm not writing in stone tablets, it's just ink on paper. I don't feel comfortable without a pen or a pencil in my hand. I can't think with my fingers on the keyboard. Words are generated for me by gripping the pen, and pressing the point on the paper.
I don't think it's ungracious to seek cosmetic help - it has crossed my mind from time to time, and I have been tempted. But it's too short-term. Once you start down that road, you have to keep going.
There is something very sensual about a letter. The physical contact of pen to paper, the time set aside to focus thoughts, the folding of the paper into the envelope, licking it closed, addressing it, a chosen stamp, and then the release of the letter to the mailbox - are all acts of tenderness.
At first, I was hesitant when it came to giving autographs, thinking that I am not even worth giving one. But slowly I got over that phase.
And people coming up asking for autographs, there's only one time when it kind of bothers me: when I'm eating.
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