“In my own worst seasons I've come back from the colorless world of despair by forcing myself to look hard, for a long time, at a single glorious thing: a flame of red geranium outside my bedroom window. And then another: my daughter in a yellow dress. And another: the perfect outline of a full, dark sphere behind the crescent moon. Until I learned to be in love with my life again. Like a stroke victim retraining new parts of the brain to grasp lost skills, I have taught myself joy, over and over again(15).”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“Every one of us is called upon, perhaps many times, to start a new life. A frightening diagnosis, a marriage, a move, loss of a job...And onward full-tilt we go, pitched and wrecked and absurdly resolute, driven in spite of everything to make good on a new shore. To be hopeful, to embrace one possibility after another--that is surely the basic instinct...Crying out: High tide! Time to move out into the glorious debris. Time to take this life for what it is.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“Be careful what you give children, for sooner or later you are sure to get it back. ”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“If you ask me, when something extraordinary shows up in your life in the middle of the night, you give it a name and make it the best home you can.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“Art is the antidote that can call us back from the edge of numbness, restoring the ability to feel for another.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“Want is a thing that unfurls unbidden like fungus, opening large upon itself, stopless, filling the sky.
But needs, from one day to the next, are few enough to fit in a bucket, with room enough left to rattle like brittle brush in a dry wind.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“High fashion has the shelf life of potato salad. And when past its prime, it is similarly deadly.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“It feels strange to me to be living in a box, hiding from the steadying influence of the moon; wearing the hide of a cow, which is supposed to be dyed to match God-knows-what, on my feet; making promises over the telephone about things I will do at a precise hour next year.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“If humanity survives long enough to understand what he really was, they can dig him up and put on display the grandiose depravity of the twentieth century. ”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“I hold on to my adopted shore, chanting private vows: wherever I am, let me never forget to distinguish want from need. Let me be a good animal today. Let me dance in the waves of my private tide, the habits of survival and love.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“When something extraordinary shows up in your life in the middle of the night, you give it a name and make it the best home you can.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“Every one of us is called upon, probably many times, to start a new life. A frightening diagnosis, a marriage, a move, loss of a job... And onward full tilt we go, pitched and wrecked and absurdly resolute, driven in spite of everything to make good on a new shore. To be hopeful, to embrace one possibility after another... Crying out: High tide! Time to move out into the glorious debris. Time to take this life for what it is.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“Want is a thing that unfurls unbidden like fungus, opening large upon itself, stopless, filling the sky. But needs, from one day to the next, are few enough to fit in a bucket, with room enough left to rattle like brittlebush in a dry wind.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“I knew exactly what I should have said: Be careful what you give children, for sooner or later you are sure to get it back.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“You can fool history sometimes, but you can’t fool the memory of your intimates.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
“we went on record as half-bad musicians having wholehearted lives.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from High Tide in Tucson
Barbara Kingsolver
Born place: in Annapolis, Maryland, The United States
Born date April 8, 1955
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“The Muskrat was still lying in his hammock and thinking.
"Good afternoon, Uncle Muskrat!" said Moomintroll. "Do you know that things have begun to happen?"
"Nothing new in any case," said the Muskrat.
"Oh, yes," said Moomintroll. "Completely new. There are people in the forest making secret signs everywhere -- threats or warnings or something. When the silk-monkey and I came home a little while ago, somebody had arranged mamma's jam pears in a pattern that looked like a star with a tail.”
― Tove Jansson, quote from Comet in Moominland
“Exfiltrations are like abortions," I said. "You don't need one unless something's gone wrong. If you need one, don't try to do it yourself. We can give you a nice, clean job.”
― Antonio J. Méndez, quote from Argo: How the CIA & Hollywood Pulled Off the Most Audacious Rescue in History
“Your skill can never buy you love. It may win you admiration and envy, but never love. If that was what you were after, you have wasted your time.”
― Patricia St. John, quote from Treasures of the Snow
“But even as the fear racks my body, it soothes me, comforts me. Soldiers who get washed away in a rush of adrenaline don't survive. In war, fear is the woman your mother warned you about. You knew she was no good for you, but you couldn't shake her. You had to find a way to get along, because she wasn't going anywhere.”
― Hiroshi Sakurazaka, quote from All You Need Is Kill
“But I couldn’t block out the memories, false or not. Couldn’t block out the internal pain I shouldn’t even be able to feel. Couldn’t keep those annoying phony tears that felt so, so real from flowing.”
― Debra Driza, quote from MILA 2.0
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