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It Was As Though I Had One Map Inside My Head And It Led To The Man Who Was Waiting For Me. Someone Who Was Alone - Maybe Even More Alone - Than I Was.

-Alice Hoffman

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It Was As Though

Alice Hoffman

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It Was As Though I Had One Map Inside My Head And It Led To The Man Who Was Waiting For Me. Someone Who Was Alone - Maybe Even More Alone - Than I Was.

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It Doesn't Matter What People Tell You. It Doesn't Matter What They Might Say. Sometimes You Have To Leave Home. Sometimes, Running Away Means You're Headed In The Exact Right Direction.

He Wanted Pain, I Saw That In Him, And What A Man Wants He Will Often Manage To Find.

A Red Map Isn't Easy To Follow. Any Document Made Of Blood And Bones Is Tricky. Wrong Turns Are Easily Made, And There Are Often Piles Of Stones In The Road. A Person Has To Disregard Time And Sorrow And All The Damage Done. If You Follow, If You Dare, The Thread Always Leads To Whomever Or Whatever You've Forgotten.

That's The Way Love Sounds, My Mother Told Me. You Think It Should Feel Like Honey, But Instead It Cuts Like A Knife.

I Wrote To Find Beauty And Purpose, To Know That Love Is Possible And Lasting And Real, To See Day Lilies And Swimming Pools, Loyalty And Devotion, Even Though My Eyes Were Closed, And All That Surrounded Me Was A Darkened Room. I Wrote Because That Was Who I Was At The Core, And If I Was Too Damaged To Walk Around The Block, I Was Lucky All The Same. Once I Got To My Desk, Once I Started Writing, I Still Believed Anything Was Possible.

Love Was Like Rain: It Turned Into Ice, Or It Disappeared. Now You Saw It, Now You Couldn't Find It No Matter How Hard You Might Search. Love Evaporated; Obsession Was Realer; It Hurt, Like A Pin In Your Bottom, A Stone In Your Shoe. It Didn't Go Away In The Blink Of An Eye. A Morning Phone Call Filled With Regret. A Letter That Said, Dear You, Good-bye From Me. Obsession Tasted Like Something Familiar. Something You'd Known Your Whole Life. It Settled And Lurked; It Stayed With You.

[fairy Tales] Are Like A Journey To The Woods And The Many Ways You Can Get Lost. Some People Say It's Not A Good Idea To Read Fairy Tales To Anyone Under The Age Of Eight Because They Are Brutal And Raw. When I Was A Kid I Often Felt That Kids's Books Were Speaking Down To Me, But I Never Felt That Way About Fairy Tales. They Are Bloody And Scary, But So Is Life.

Maybe Some Love Was Guaranteed. Maybe It Fit Inside You And Around You Like Skin And Bones.

Those You Love Will Not Drown Or Burn. They Will Fly Away.' ...'now We Both Have People We Love Who Are Like Birds. They Have Flown Far From Anything In This World That Can Hurt Them. They're Flying Away Still.

You Have To Choose The Voice You Are Going To Trust. You Can't Listen To Everyone.

Some Things, However, Are True No Matter How Hard You Might Try To Block Them Out, And A Lie Is Always A Lie, No Matter How Prettily Told. Some Doors, Once They're Opened, Can Never Be Closed Again, Just As Some Trust, Once It's Been Lost, Can Never Be Won Back.

People Hide Their Truest Nature. I Understood That; I Even Applauded It. What Sort Of World Would It Be If People Bled All Over The Sidewalks, If They Wept Under Trees, Smacked Whomever They Despised, Kissed Strangers, Revealed Themselves?

I Can Hurt Myself More Than Anyone Else Can, She Told Her Sister. I Can Do It With My Eyes Closed.

I Saw The End Of His Life Right There In That Single Moment. His Pride, His Decency, His Secrets, His Death.

My Theory Is That Everyone At One Time Or Another Has Been At The Fringe Of Society In Some Way: An Outcast In High School, A Stranger In A Foreign Country, The Best At Something, The Worst At Something, The One Who's Different. Being An Outsider Is The One Thing We All Have In Common.

I Think Love Is A Huge Factor In Fiction And In Real Life. Is There A Risk? Always. In Fiction And In Life

The Adults Don't Know What's Happening On The Kids' Universe And The Kids Don't Know What's Happening On The Adults' Universe

Trouble Is Just Like Love, After All; It Comes In Unannounced And Takes Over Before You've Had A Chance To Reconsider, Or Even To Think.

Still, I Couldn't Help But Wonder If It Was A Mistake For People Like Us To Be Tied To A Place. If We Weren't Meant To Be Ready And Willing To Wander. If Everything We Needed Was Contained In Who We Were. And What We Remember.

Outside, The September Air Was Enticingly Fragrant, Yellow With Pollen And Rich, Lemony Sunlight.

Jill Told Me That When You're Really In Love, You Know Right Away. I'm Not Exactly Sure How This Happens. Is It Like A Flash Of Lightning? Like An Angel Tapping You On The Shoulder? Or Is It Similar To Choosing A Puppy? You Think You're Picking The Cutest One, But Really You Wind Up Going Home With The One Who Keeps Insisting On Climbing Into Your Lap.

Sometimes Movies Really Are The Best Medicine.

That Is How You Know You've Left Childhood Behind-when You Wish For Time To Go Backward.

Being Human Means Losing Everything We Love Best In The World," She Murmured As She Released Me. "but Would You Ask To Be Anything Else?

Losing Everything

This Day Is Going To Be Awful. It's The Sort Of Day You Wouldn't Mind Losing Completely, Even If It Meant Your Life Would Be Twenty-four Hours Shorter.

Once You Know Some Things, You Can't Unknow Them. It's A Burden That Can Never Be Given Away.

Love Was Like That, Like A Dream You Didn't Quite Understand, One In Which You Didn't Necessarily Know What You Were Looking At Until It Was Right In Front Of You.

A Boy Who Is Trouble Is Something Entirely Different As A Man.

We Stood And Watched As God Abandoned Us, And Then We Did The Best We Could.

The Moon Is Always Jealous Of The Heat Of The Day, Just As The Sun Always Longs For Something Dark And Deep.

The Weak Are Cruel. The Strong Have No Need To Be.

He Stepped Off The Pavement Like A Man Jumping Off A Bridge, As Calm As A Swimmer With An Ocean Out Below. Lucy Had Known What He Was Going To Do The Instant Their Eyes Met. She'd Know What He Intended Because She Would Have Done The Very Same Thing If She'd Had His Courage. Nothing Was Going To Break His Fall.

She Knows Where She's Going, And What She Has To Do. She Could, After All, Find Her Way To Route 95 South Blindfolded. She Could Do It In The Dark, In Fair Weather Or Foul; She Can Do It Even When It Seems She Will Run Out Of Gas. It Doesn't Matter What People Tell You. It Doesn't Matter What They Might Say. Sometimes You Have To Leave Home. Sometimes, Running Away Means You're Headed In The Exact Right Direction.

He Was In Love, And People In That Condition Did Stupid, Unfathomable Things. They Were All Flawed, Every Single One.

Feel Lucky For What You Have When You Have It. Isn't That The Point? Happily Ever After Doesn't Mean Happy Forever. The Ever After, What Precisely Was That? Your Dreams, Your Life, Your Death, Your Everything. Was It The Blank Space That Went On Without Us? The Forever After We Were Gone?

Some Things You Cannot Wish Away Or Think Away. They Become Part Of You When You Remember Them.

I Know Who You Are In Your Heart,' Andres Said. 'that's All That Matters.' And That Was It. That Was The Moment. Now I Knew How I Would Feel If I Ever Lost Him. That Was How You Knew Love. My Mother Had Told Me That. All You Had To Do Was Imagine Your Life Without The Other Person, And If The Thought Alone Made You Shiver, Then You Knew.

I'm Much Faster Now. When You Only Have A Certain Amount Of Time To Write, After A While You Learn To Use Your Time Well Or You Stop Writing

This Kind Of Knowing You Can Never Tell To Anyone. If You Want Us To Survive, You Cannot Trust A Soul'... 'not For Any Reason On This Earth. You Can Never Tell.

Any Institution Becomes A Community - Whether It's A High School Or A Boarding School Or A Publishing Company Or A Small Town Where Everybody Knows Certain Things About People.

The Best Way To Die Is When Your Living

How Could I Tell The Doctor What Was Wrong With Me? I Didn't Understand It Myself. I Couldn't Articulate The Pain; It Was The Pain Of Nothingness. My Fear Was Of The Weather, The Atmosphere, The Very Air. What Good Did Safety Tips Do Me Now? 'avoid Water, Metal Objects, Rooftops; Stay Off The Telephone In A Storm, Don't Think Glass Can Protect You; Even If A Storm Was 8 Miles Away, You're Still Not Safe From A Strike. Avoid Life Perhaps That Was The Answer. The Number One Safety Tip, Stay Away From It All.

Some People Say, 'save Yourself And You Save Your Ways.' I Say, 'be Yourself And You Save Your Soul.

You Can Never Tell About A Person By Guessing...that's Why Language Was Invented. Otherwise, We'd All Be Like Dogs, Sniffing Each Other To Find Out Where We Stood.

Margaret Thought Of All She Knew For Certain, That Day Would Always Follow Night That Love Was Never Wasted Nor Was It Lost.

No One Knows You Like A Person With Whom You've Shared A Childhood. No One Will Ever Understand You In Quite The Same Way.

The Nature Of Love Had Totally Escaped Her Until Now. She Had Thought That If You Lost It, You Could Never Get It Back, Like A Stone Thrown Down A Well. But It Was Like The Water At The Bottom Of The Well, There When You Can't Even See It, Shifting In The Dark.

Every Problem Has A Solution, Although It May Not Be The Outcome That Was Originally Hoped For Or Expected.

Jill And I Have Known Each Other Our Whole Lives. One House Separates Our Houses But We Act As If It Doesn't Exist. We Met Before We Were Born And We'll Probably Still Know Each Other After We Die. At Least, That's The Way We're Planning It.

It Was A Great Escape For Me And It Was A Way To Take A Break From What Was Going On In My Own World, To Go Into Another World.

I Have Crossed Over To A Place Where I Never Thought I’d Be. I Am Someone I Would Have Never Imagined. A Secret. A Dream. I Am This, Body And Soul. Burn Me. Drown Me. Tell Me Lies. I Will Still Be Who I Am.

If We Had Paid Attention, We Would Have Understood There Are Some Things In This World You Cannot Outrun.

Perhaps It Is Possible To Discover More In Silence Than In Speech. Or Perhaps It Is Only That Those Who Are Silent Among Us Learn To Listen.

Feel Lucky For What You Have When You Have It. Isn't That The Point? Happily Ever After Doesn't Mean Happy Forever.

Any Weapon Touched By A Woman, Even By Accident, Must Be Cleansed With Both Water And Prayer So That Her Essence Would Not Linger, Diverting The Warrior Who Might Use It Next, For Even The Faintest Touch Could Bring Lust To That Man's Heart. Perhaps That Meant A Woman Who Was Well Trained In Arms Would Be The Superior Warrior, Her Attention Never Wavering From Her Task.

You Can Try To Take Sorrow And Make It Into Something Enduring, Meaningful And Beautiful. I Always Feel Guilty That This Is My Job, That I Get To Do This

I Think We Are Bound To, And By, Nature. We May Want To Deny This Connection And Try To Believe We Control The External World, But Every Time There's A Snowstorm Or Drought, We Know Our Fate Is Tied To The World Around Us

I Read "the Group" By Mary Mccarthy. It Had Tons Of Sex In It, Or So I Thought At The Time.

I Never See A Novel As A Film While I'm Writing It. Mostly Because Novels And Films Are So Different, And I'm Such An Internal Novelist

Here Is The Riddle Of Love: Everything It Gives To You, It Takes Away.

My Grandmother Was Overwhelmed By What Was Happening To Us. She Ahd Moved Back Into The Past Because The Here And The Now Was Too Terrible.

I Don't Think I Make Much Of A Distinction Between The 'real' And The 'fantastic.' They Both Seem To Be Threads In The Same Cloth As Far As I'm Concerned.

I Didn’t Want To Be Prideful Anymore. I Wanted To Be As Hard As And Brittle As The Stones I Carted Into The Woods. Stones That Could Not Feel Or Cry Or See. I Wished Not To Feel Anything At All. In No Time, What I Wished For, I Became.

Always Keep Mint On Your Windowsill In August, To Ensure That Buzzing Flies Will Stay Outside, Where They Belong. Don't Think The Summer Is Over, Even When Roses Droop And Turn Brown And The Stars Shift Position In The Sky. Never Presume August Is A Safe Or Reliable Time Of The Year.

Emily Brontë's "wuthering Heights" Was Extremely Important To Me.

If Every Life Is A River, Then It's Little Wonder That We Do Not Even Notice The Changes That Occur Until We Are Far Out In The Darkest Sea. One Day You Look Around And Nothing Is Familiar, Not Even Your Own Face. My Name Once Meant Daughter, Grandaughter, Friend, Sister, Beloved. Now Those Words Mean Only What Their Letters Spell Out; Star In The Night Sky. Truth In The Darkness. I Have Crossed Over To A Place Where I Never Thought I'd Be. I Am Someone I Would Have Never Imagined. A Secret. A Dream. I Am This, Body And Soul. Burn Me. Drown Me. Tell Me Lies. I Will Still Be Who I Am.

Sometimes Words Drew Blood, They Cut Your Tongue, They Made You Know Things You Couldn't Unknow.

The Sky Is Already Purple; The First Few Stars Have Appeared, Suddenly, As If Someone Had Thrown A Handful Of Silver Across The Edge Of The World.

When All Is Said And Done, The Weather And Love Are The Two Elements About Which One Can Never Be Sure.

The Grass He Walked Through Was New And A Sweet Smell Clung To His Clothes. There Was Blue Dye On His Hands From The Wild Irises... That The Color Of The Sky Was A Shade That Could Never Be Replicated In Any Photograph, Just As Heaven Could Never Be Seen From The Confines Of Earth.

Hawthorne Has Given Us A Tradition That Some People Refer To As Yankee Magic Realism, And I Do Think There Is A Certain Quality To The Landscape That Definitely Leads Into The Dark Woods.

You Cannot Dispute The Ridiculous. You Cannot Argue Reasonably With Evil.

It Was The Sort Of Beauty You Feel So Deeply It Becomes Contagious And Somehow Makes You Feel Beautiful Too.

Feeling Beautiful

Sometimes The Right Thing Feels All Wrong Until It Is Over And Done With.

He'd Thought He Was Lost, But Now He Recognized That Eternity Was Around Him, Like Salt From A Shaker Or Stars In The Sky.

I Never Even Believed In Happiness. I Didn't Think It Existed. Now Look At Me. I'm Ready To Believe In Just About Anything.

Every Time Someone Forgets, Someone Else Disappears,' My Brother Wrote.

What You Dream, You Can Grow. Someone Told Me That, But I Didn't Believe It. I Said I Had Nothing And That People With Nothing Are Unable To Dream. But I Was Wrong.

I Always Quit At Three When My Kids Come Home From School So I Feel Pretty Spoiled

He Believed In Dreams, In Endings That People Told You Could Never Happen, In Disappointments Reversed And Luck That Lasted.

I Read Everything Of Ray Bradbury When I Was 12 Or 13, And I Think That's The Most Effective Time To Read Bradbury. He Built Such A Moral World, Where You Have To Make Decisions And Grow Up.

It's Not Finding What's Lost, It's Understanding What You've Found.

What Men Yearn For They Often Destroy.

There Are Some Things, After All, That Sally Owens Knows For Certain: Always Throw Spilled Salt Over Your Left Shoulder. Keep Rosemary By Your Garden Gate. Add Pepper To Your Mashed Potatoes. Plant Roses And Lavender, For Luck. Fall In Love Whenever You Can.

Falling In Love

Unfinished Business Always Comes Back To Haunt You, And A Man Who Swears He'll Love You Forever Isn't Finished With You Until He's Done.

Unfinished Business

I Think Secrets Often Come Out. I Spoke To A Friend Who Is A Therapist And I Asked Her If There Were People Who Came To Her And Admitted To Doing Horrible Things And She Said, 'more Than You Know.'.

At Midnight The Wind In The Tress Can Sound Like The Ocean. The Moonlight Can Make A Road Appear As Endless As The Sea.

When I Looked At Her, She Appeared To Be A Different Person From The One I'd Known... She Had Rewritten Everything, Our History Together, Our Friendship. Now I Was The Girl Who'd Stolen Andres; The Girl Who'd Lied To Her About Who I Was. Therefore, She Owned Me Nothing.

The Sisters Were Glad To Be Together. They Had The Easy Sort Of Relationship Where They Didn't Have To Speak To Be Understood.

My Grief Was Cold. It Was Nothing To Share. It Was Nothing To Speak About, Nothing To Feel.

When I Read Jerome D. Salinger's "the Catcher In The Rye" That Was The First Time I Felt My Mind Blow Open. I Thought That Book Was Speaking To Me. I Was 12 Or 13 When I Read That. I Read Everything On My Mother's Bookshelves.

Just Because Something Is Unspoken Doesn't Mean That It Disappears.

That Was The Way Love Was, Invisible, There Whether Or Not You Wanted To See It Or Admit To It.

Some Fates Are Guaranteed, No Matter Who Tries To Intervene.

The Voice That Arises Out Of The Silence Is Something No One Can Imagine Until It Is Heard. It Roars When It Speaks, It Lies To You And Convinces You, It Steals From You And Leaves You Without A Single Word Of Comfort.

Love Is Worth The Sum Of Itself, And Nothing More.

Women Know Things That Men Will Never Know. We Keep The Best Secrets. We Tell The Best Stories.

I Have Nothing From My Childhood. I Think You Carry Those Books With You. It's Like In [ray] Bradbury's "fahrenheit 451." Books Are Outlawed In This Future Society So People Become The Book They Love By Memorizing It.

When I Write For Teens, I Feel I Can Cut Through Everything And Get To The Bare Bones. I Can Get Straight Into The Emotional World Of The Character.

Most People Know That Ray Bradbury Is One Of My Favorite Authors.

I Could Hardly Get A Boy To Look At Me. All Right, They'd Look, They'd Even Take Me Out, But No One Asked For A Second Date. I Was Too Nasty, A Real Wise Guy, And All The Boys Could Tell What My Rotten Disposition Was. Deep Down, I Wanted A Commitment With A Capital C. To Get Anywhere With Me, A Boy Would Have To Sign His Undying Loyalty With His Own Blood.

Sally...can No Longer Think Of Love As A Reality, Or Even As A Possibility, However Remote.

I Can't Really Work On More Than One Thing At A Time

One Thing At A Time

I Don't Really Read As Much As I Used To. A Lot Of What I Was Looking For As An Escape I Find In Writing. And The Other Thing Is That I Don't Want To Get Into Someone Else's Language When I'm Working

If I Hadn't Learned My Lesson, I Would Have Wished We Could Stay There Forever. But I Knew Better Now. We'd Seen What We'd Come To See. The Way To Trick Death. Breathe In. Breathe Out. Watch As It All Rises Upwards, Black And Blue Into The Even Bluer Sky.

She Was So Busy Forgetting, She Couldn't Take A Single Step Into The Future.

Good Fortune Can Take Forever To Get To You, But As It Turns Out, Sorrow Is As Quick As A Shot.

I Must Keep My Head And Not Give In To Desire, For Desire Is What Causes Women To Drown.

My Mother, Abra, Had Taught Me That All People Are Made From The Same Dust. When Our Days Here Are Gone, All Men And Women Enter The Same Garden.

I Think Growing Up Is Difficult And It's A Process That I'm Always Interested In, With Kids And Adults, They Are Often On Two Different Universes.

They Were Written On Cheap Blue Notebooks Bought By Poor Women. I'm Interested In Folk Tales In The Way That Medicine And Magic In Women's Stories Are All Kind Of Combined.

Even As A Small Child, I Understood That Woman Had Secrets, And That Some Of These Were Only To Be Told To Daughters. In This Way We Were Bound Together For Eternity.

Our House Was Littered With Books- In The Kitchen, Under The Beds, Stuck Between The Couch Pillows--far Too Many For Her The Ever Finish. I Suppose I Thought If My Grandmother Kept Up Her Interests, She Wouldn't Die; She'd Have To Stay Around To Finish The Books She Was So Fond Of. "i've Got To Get To The Bottom Of This One," She'd Say, As If A Book Were No Different From A Pond Or A Lake. I Thought She'd Go On Reading Forever But It Didn't Work Out That Way.

What People Read Revealed So Much About Them That She Considered Our Card Catalog A Treasure House Of Privileged Secrets; Each Card Contained The Map Of An Individual’s Soul.

The Frightened Walk Away When Love Is Difficult. I Know That Now. You Have To Be Willing To Give Everything Away. You Have To Be Willing To End Up With Nothing. Only Then Will Your Heart Be Whole.

I'm At The Point Where Going Forward Is Easier Than Going Back.

I Knew What It Was To Yearn For A Life So Distant It Seemed That It Had Never Been Anything More Than A Dream.

Young People Believe That Regret Is Something You Will Never Feel If You Simply Do As You Please, But Sometimes It Is A Matter Of Degree.

Certain Things Need Not Be Said, And There’s Nothing, Not A Whisper, Prayer, Not A Sacrifice, Not A Payment Of Any Price, That Would Change What’s About To Happen.

Among Men And Women, Those In Love Do Not Always Announce Themselves With Declarations And Vows. But They Are The Ones Who Weep When You're Gone. Who Miss You Every Single Night, Especially When The Sky Is So Deep And Beautiful, And The Ground So Very Cold.

It Wasn't Right To Have Someone Charge Into You Your World Without Even Asking, Acting As If You Were Nothing More Than An Egg To Be Flipped And Flopped, Sunny-side Up Or Scrambled, Depending On The Whims On Whoever Ran Your Life..._

Do People Choose The Art That Inspires Them — Do They Think It Over, Decide They Might Prefer The Fabulous To The Real? For Me, It Was Those Early Readings Of Fairy Tales That Made Me Who I Was As A Reader And, Later On, As A Storyteller.

Still, She Knows One Thing For Certain: Never Judge A Relationship Unless You Are The One Wrapped Up In Its Arms.

She Didn't Like Being Twelve. It Felt Like Someplace Between Who She'd Been And Who She Was About To Be. It Felt Like No Place At All.

Do You Ever Just Put Your Arms Out And Just Spin And Spin And Spin? Well, That's What Love Is Like; Everything Inside Of You Tells You To Stop Before You Fall, But For Some Reason You Just Keep Going.

Fairytales Were Maps Formed Of Blood And Hair And Bones; They Were The Knots Of The Sub-conscious Unwound. Every Word In Every Tale Was Real And As True As Apples And Stones. They All Led To The Story Inside The Story.

Every Fairy Tale Had A Bloody Lining. Every One Had Teeth And Claws.

I Thought You Were Supposed To Be The Champion Of Your People,' I Said. I Live Because I Need To Do That. For Anyone Who Is Left.' Don't You See? No One Will Be Left. Protect Them Now Or There Will Be No One To Protect!' This Is A Battle That Goes On And On. It Never Ends. You're Too Young To Understand. No! You're Too Much Of A Coward To Fight.' I Was Sick Of Lies And Secrets And Of Battles So Old We Had To Erase Who We Were To Fight Back. And Still We Lost. Still We Were Tied To Posts.

But Most Important Of All, She Explained That It Was All Right To Say 'no. I Disagree.' That Was A Gift. I Understood It Was Power. The Power To Think My Own Thoughts. The Power To Believe In Myself.

Here's The Thing About Luck...you Don't Know If It's Good Or Bad Until You Have Some Perspective.

I Wasn't Quite As Certain That I Knew Her Soul. When It Came Right Down To It, I Wasn't Sure She Knew Me Either.

Unrequited Love Is So Boring. Weeping Under A Blue-black Sky Is For Suckers Or Maniacs.

Unrequited Love

Even In Times When It's Difficult To Figure Out, How Do You Go Forward, Art - And Books - Always Help

Being An Outsider Is The One Thing We All Have In Common.

I Feel As If When You Love A Book It Becomes A Part Of You Whether You Have It On Your Shelves Or Not.

When The Cold Comes To New England It Arrives In Sheets Of Sleet And Ice. In December, The Wind Wraps Itself Around Bare Trees And Twists In Between Husbands And Wives Asleep In Their Beds. It Shakes The Shingles From The Roofs And Sifts Through Cracks In The Plaster. The Only Green Things Left Are The Holly Bushes And The Old Boxwood Hedges In The Village, And These Are Often Painted White With Snow. Chipmunks And Weasels Come To Nest In Basements And Barns; Owls Find Their Way Into Attics. At Night,the Dark Is Blue And Bluer Still, As Sapphire Of Night.

Some Stories Stayed With You Even When You Wanted To Forget Them.

What Else Is There To Write About Than Love And Loss?

I'm A Really Eclectic Reader.

Only Her Death Could Prove Her Innocence; A Circle Of Impossible, Deathly Judgement.

My Sorrow Is I Used To Read All The Time And Now, As A Writer, I Don't Have The Time To Read.

I Thought Of The Bowl Of Water My Mother Taught Me To Look Into. It Was True, Everything A Person Ever Needed To Know Was Right There In A Single Bowl Small Enough To Fit In The Palm Of One Hand.

People Want To Ignore What They Can't Understand. They're Looking For Logic At Any Cost.

No Barrier Was Strong Enough To Keep Out The Movement Of Time.

In The Darkest Hour Of Winter, When The Starlings Had All Flown Away, Gretel Samuelson Fell In Love. It Happened The Way Things Are Never Supposed To Happen In Real Life, Like A Sledgehammer, Like A Bolt From Out Of The Blue. One Minute She Was A Seventeen Year-old Senior In High School Waiting For A Sicilian Pizza To Go; The Next One She Was Someone Whose Whole World Had Exploded, Leaving Her Adrift In The Milky Way, So Far From Earth She Was Walking On Stars.

You Can Be Betrayed In Your Sleep. The Whole World Can Tilt While You're Dreaming Of Butterflies.

I Wrote To Find Beauty And Purpose, To Know That Love Is Possible And Lasting And Real.... Once I Got To My Desk, Once I Started Writing, I Still Believed Anything Was Possible.

It Was As Though I Had One Map Inside My Head And It Led To The Man Who Was Waiting For Me. Someone Who Was Alone - Maybe Even More Alone - Than I Was.

My Mother's Blood That Would Last Forever After. The Blood Of My Brother, My Grandfather, My Father.

My Grandmother Told Me Once That When You Lose Somebody You Think You've Lost The Whole World As Well, But That's Not The Way Things Turn Out In The End. Eventually, You Pick Yourself Up And Look Out The Window, And Once You Do You See Everything That Was There Before The World Ended Is Out There Still. There Are The Same Apple Trees And The Same Songbirds, And Over Our Heads, The Very Same Sky That Shines Like Heaven, So Far Above Us We Can Never Hope To Reach Such Heights.

I Feel More Influenced In My Own Work By Dreams Than I Do By Other Writers' Works In A Way. Or By Popular Culture, Movies - What Else Is There To Write About Than Love And Loss?

The Evening Had Turned Sweet And Blue.

I Also Like The Whole Idea Of Fairy Tales And Folk Tales Being A Woman's Domain, Considered A Lesser Domain At The Time They Were Told.

I Wept To Think That Life Went On Even When So Much Had Been Lost, That Rain Still Fell And Myrtle Grew Between The Rocks.

I Wasn't Good Company, That Was True, And People Avoided Me, But That Was All Right. I Was Too Busy Dreaming.

Cleaning Up After Themselves Was A Low Priority For Margo And My Mother. They Had Both Recovered From Cancer Scares, Failed Marriages, And Lost Hope; In Their Opinion, Dirt Could Wait.

Others Said May Was Best, That Sweet Green Time When Lilacs Bloomed And Gardens Along Main Street Were Filled With Sugary Pink Peonies And Dutch Tulips.

That's Why There Are Ten Gates To Pass Through Before You Reach The Garden. If Life Were Easy There Would Be One Gate. There Would Be No Gates At All.

Love Ambushed You, It Lay In Wait, Dormant For Days Or Years. It Was The Red Thread, The Peach Stone, The Kiss, The Forgiveness. It Came After You, It Escaped You, It Was Invisible, It Was Everything.

Some Things, When They Change, Never Do Return To The Way They Once Were. Butterflies For Instance, And Women Who've Been In Love With The Wrong Man Too Often.

We Are Only An Instant, That's True. But We Are Eternal.

Sometimes They Would Sit In The Parlor Together, Both Reading – In Entirely Separate Worlds, To Be Sure, But Joined Somehow. When This Happened, Other People In The Family Couldn't Bring Themselves To Disturb Them. All That Could Be Heard In The Parlor Was The Sound Of Pages, Turning.

When You Start Writing The Magic Comes When The Characters Seem To Take On A Life Of Their Own And Write The Words For Themselves.

Do What You Want, Do What You Will, Do What You Have To, Do What You Think You Cannot.

That Was The Way Illness Appeared In A House, In The Corners, In Between Floorboards, On The Hooks In The Closet, Along With The Sweaters And Coats.

All The Characters In My Books Are Imagined, But All Have A Bit Of Who I Am In Them - Much Like The Characters In Your Dreams Are All Formed By Who You Are

I Always Felt And Still Feel That Fairy Tales Have An Emotional Truth That Is So Deep That There Are Few Things That Really Rival Them

Every Time I Finish A Book, I Forget Everything I Learned Writing It - The Information Just Disappears Out Of My Head

Forget Everything

I Thought That Love Was A River, Endless And Deep. I Thought It Merely Happened, Washing Over You Like Water. It Was Nothing To Search For, Nothing To Force. I Didn't Understand That Even When We Can't Control Our Fate, We Alone Have The Last Say In Matters Of The Heart. We Can Give It Freely, Even In The Worst Of Times, Even When It Isn't Returned.

...he Had A Way Of Taking Your Hand Which Made It Clear He'd Have To Be The One To Let Go." From Alice Hoffman's "local Girls", Pg.102.

I Loved Him Even Now, As He Took A Knife To My Throat, As I Drowned In Blood, As I Whispered "cousin, You Were Wrong. We Were Born To Live.

How Could I Have Been So Stupid To Ignore Everything I’d Had In My Life? The Color Red Alone Was Worth Kingdoms.

I Feel Like My Eyes Are Killing Me At The End Of The Day And That I Shouldn't Use Them.

The End Of The Day

There Was The Blue Sky Above Her And All Those Many Roses, The Ones That Gave Off The Scent Of Cloves In The Rain And The Ones That Left A Trace Of Lemon On Your Fingers, The Ones That Were The Color Of Blood, And Those That Were As White As Clouds. Each One Was Sweeter Than The Next And As Red As Gemstones.

This Was What It Meant To Be Human, To Know That Time Moved And All Things Changed.

She Liked To Disappear, Even When She Was In The Same Room As Other People. It Was A Talent, As It Was A Curse.

He Has The Ability To Catch Someone By The Way That He Looks At Her, And Make Her Wish He Would Go On Looking.

You Don't Fight For Peace Sister,' Nahara Told Me, 'you Embrace It.

Hearts Were Made For Being Broken. There's Really No Way Around It If You Want To Be A Human Being.

Young Sally Owens: He Will Hear My Call A Mile Away. He Will Whistle My Favorite Song. He Can Ride A Pony Backwards. Young Gillian Owens: What Are You Doing? Young Sally Owens: Summoning Up A True Love Spell Called Amas Veritas. He Can Flip Pancakes In The Air. He'll Be Marvelously Kind. And His Favorite Shape Will Be A Star. And He'll Have One Green Eye And One Blue. Young Gillian Owens: Thought You Never Wanted To Fall In Love. Young Sally Owens: That's The Point. The Guy I Dreamed Of Doesn't Exist. And If He Doesn't Exist I'll Never Die Of A Broken Heart.

Falling In Love

They Say That Dogs May Dream, And When Topsy Was Old, His Feet Would Move In His Sleep. With His Eyes Closed He Would Often Make A Noise That Sounded Quite Human, As If Greeting Someone In His Dreams. At First It Seemed That He Believed Sara Would Return, But As The Years Went By I Understood That His Loyalty Asked For No Reward, And That Love Comes In Unexpected Forms. His Wish Was Small, As Hers Had Been -- Merely To Be Beside Her. As For Me, I Already Knew I Would Never Get What I Wanted.

The Only People Out At This Hour Were Ones Who Couldn't Sleep,those Haunted By One Thing Or Another:love Thwarted, Love Lost, Love Thrown Away. They Were The Sort Of People Who Didn't Want To Be Noticed, Who Wanted To Slip Through Shadows, Be Alone With Their Despair.

The More You Feel, The Stronger You Are.

You Are Only Worthy Of What You Prove Yourself To Be.

Proving Yourself

...and So Many Orchards Circled The Village That On Some Crisp October Afternoons The Whole Wold Smelled Like Pie.

I Never Plot Out My Novels In Terms Of The Tone Of The Book. Hopefully, Once A Story Is Begun It Reveals Itself

I Read Betty Smith's "a Tree Grows In Brooklyn," All Of Shirley Jackson's Books, Which I Loved.

You Can't Dispute The Ridiculous. You Can't Argue Reasonably With Evil.

What Was A Rose But The Living Proof Of Desire, The Single Best Evidence Of Human Longing And Earthly Devotion. But Desire Could Be Twisted,after All, And Jealousy Was The Name Of The Rose That Did Well In Arid Souls.

Real Love, After All, Was Worth The Price You Paid, However Briefly It Might Last.

Mothers Always Find Ways To Fit In The Work - But Then When You're Working, You Feel That You Should Be Spending Time With Your Children And Then When You're With Your Children, You're Thinking About Working.

One Of My Favorites Is "time And Again" By Jack Finney. It Takes Place In Manhattan And Goes Back And Forth Between 1882 And The 1950s. It's Really A Cult Book.

What I Like About Fairy Tales Is The Language And The Matter-of-fact Way Of Introducing Magic, Where It's Accepted That A Fox Could Talk Or A Gate Could Just Appear In A Wall. I Think Fairy Tales Are So Psychological.

The Original Fairy Tale Was About The Youngest Sister Going Into A Room In The Castle And Finding All The Bodies Of The Wives That Came Before Her - She Is Confronted With Truth, Thinking About How Often We Think We Know People And We Really Don't.

Crying Wasn't Like Riding A Bike. Give It Up, And You Quickly Forget How It's Done.

You Build Your World Around Someone, And Then What Happens When He Disappears? Where Do You Go-into Pieces, Into Atoms, Into The Arms Of Another Man? You Go Shopping, You Cook Dinner, You Work Odd Hours, You Make Love To Someone Else On June Nights. But You're Not Really There.

Let Everyone See The Blood,' He Said. 'don't Clean It Up. That's The Only Way People Remember.'... I Could See The Blood Inside My Head. It Was With Me Forever, Whether Or Not I Wanted To Forget.

I've Been A Screenwriter For Twenty-five Years. Every One Of My Books Have Been Optioned For Movies And I Have Written A Few Of Those Screenplays.

It Was As If Hope Had Appeared Out Of Nowhere To Settle Beside Her And It Wasn't Going Anywhere, It Wasn't Going To Desert Her Now.

Anyway, The Sort Of Love That Will Not Wait Is Probably Best To Pass By

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James Bryant Conant

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