Shirts and jeans litter the asphalt, the empty fabric limbs askew as if they're attempting to escape. Blood smears Sarah's lips as she struggles against the chest of a dirty looking man with a beard. Terror. Terror is the only word my mind can seize on and it forgets what it means. I forget how to think - to move.

I was crying for the little girl I had been, who had withstood terrifying nightmares of death and blood and war and maiming. And when I had tried to share those horrors, the shock on my friends' faces had told me I was not normal, and I should keep my dreams to myself.

Most of the laugh tracks on television were recorded in the early 1950__. These days, most of the people you hear laughing are dead.

When a Wanderess has been caged, or perched with her wings clipped, She lives like a Stoic, She lives most heroic, smiling with ruby, moistened lips once her cup of Death is welcome sipped.

Now give me some advice about how to take full advantage of this city. I__ always looking to improve my odds.___ust what I__ expect from a horny actuary._____ serious.__arlos reflected for a moment on the problem at hand. He actually had never needed or tried to take full advantage of the city in order to meet women, but he thought about all of his friends who regularly did. His face lit up as he thought of some helpful advice: __et into the arts.___he arts?___eah.___ut I__ not artistic.___t doesn__ matter. Many women are into the arts. Theater. Painting. Dance. They love that stuff.___ou want me to get into dance? Earthquakes have better rhythm than me_And can you really picture me in those tights?___ake an art history class. Learn photography. Get involved in a play or an independent film production. Get artsy, Sammy. I__ telling you, the senoritas dig that stuff.___eally?___eah. You need to sign up for a bunch of artistic activities. But you can__ let on that it__ all just a pretext to meet women. You have to take a real interest in the subject or they__l quickly sniff out your game.___ don__ know_It__ all so foreign to me_I don__ know the first thing about being artistic.___eeb, this is the time to expand your horizons. And you__e in the perfect city to do it. New York is all about reinventing yourself. Get out of your comfort zones. Become more of a Renaissance man. That__ much more interesting to women.

It's my petty fear of personal rejection that allows so many true evils to exist. My cowardice enables atrocities.