“When the waves close over me, I dive down to fish for pearls.”

“Sophia sat in meditation on the riverbank when a student bent down to place two enormous pearls at her feet as a gift. She opened her eyes to see the pearls. She picked one up, but dropped it. It rolled down the hill upon which she was sitting and into the river. The student chased after it and looked all afternoon, diving, coming up for air, diving back down. “Sophia,” he asked. “Could you show me where it went in? I can’t find it.” “Right there,” she said throwing the other pearl in the river.”

“There’s no winning arguments with your parents, so why get all pumped up over them? It is way better to dive down and get out of the way than it is to get clobbered by some parental tidal wave.”

“It's decorated with fig leaves and, for some reason, fish. I never look too closely when raiding it; the fish that makes up the handle always seem to be giving me the serious malocchio.”

“the flying fish and the diving bird had been netted.”

“Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?”