Most cynics are really crushed romantics: they've been hurt, they're sensitive, and their cynicism is a shell that's protecting this tiny, dear part in them that's still alive.
One of the great natural phenomena is the way in which a tube of toothpaste suddenly empties itself when it hears that you are planning a trip, so that when you come to pack it is just a twisted shell of its former self, with not even a cubic millimeter left to be squeezed out.
A man that simply loads himself down with possessions of which he has no actual need, when he dies slips out of them--as a little insect might slip out of some parasite shell into which it has ensconced itself--into the grave, and is forgotten.
The shell fishing industry represents a major part of Louisiana's economy.
Walnuts have a shell, and they have a kernel. Religions are the same. They have an essence, but then they have a protective coating. This is not the only way to put it. But it's my way. So the kernels are the same. However, the shells are different.
Those with the softest hearts build the hardest shells.
He recounted to me that when he first saw the pictures of the bombed-out shells of the building he was really horrified.
Denis Law could dance on eggshells.
For me, whatever age or size I've been, I have rather liked myself. The shell is not the thing at all.
There was something about Jace, though, that made her want to push him, crack that shell of cynicism and make him admit her believed something, felt something, cared about anythinng at all.