Jennifer E. Smith · 337 pages
Rating: (27.7K votes)
“But there's no such thing as a completely fresh start. Everything new arrives on the heels of something old, and every beginning comes at the cost of an ending.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“There was no point in waiting for someone who hadn't asked, and there was no point in wishing for something that would never happen.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“There's a difference between loneliness and solitude.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“You can't know the answer until you ask the question.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“The most basic sort of love: to be worried about the one who was worrying about you.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“If you were to draw a map of the two of them, of where they started out and where they would both end up, the lines would be shooting away from each other like magnets spun around on their poles. And it occurred to Owen that there was something deeply flawed about this, that there should be circles or angels or turns, anything that might make it possible for the two lines to meet again. Instead, they were both headed in the exact opposite directions. The map was as good as a door swinging shut. And the geography of the thing- the geography of them- was completely and hopelessly wrong.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“Maybe they were never meant to have more than just one night. After all, not everything can last. Not everything is supposed to mean something.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“There are so many ways to be alone here, even when you're surrounded by this many people.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“When there was nothing but space between you, everything felt like a leap.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“Sometimes it seemed as if his whole life was an exercise in waiting; not waiting to leave, exactly, but simply waiting to go. He felt like one of those fish that had the capacity to grow in unimaginable ways if only the tank were big enough. But his tank had always been small, and as much as he loved his home- as much as he loved his family- he'd always felt himself bumping up against the edges of his own life.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“Something like that," he said, his eyes shining, and she realized just how much there was she didn't know about him. He was like one of her novels, still unfinished and best understood in the right place and at the right time. She couldn't wait to read the rest.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“Not everything can last. Not everything is supposed to mean something.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“How long could a single night really be expected to last? How far could you stretch such a small collection of minutes? He was just a boy on a roof. She was just a girl in an elevator.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“They just stood there, regarding each other silently, the room suddenly as quiet as the elevator had been, as comfortable as the kitchen floor, as remote as the roof. Because that's what happened when you were with someone like that: the world shrank to just the right size. It molded itself to fit only the two of you, and nothing more.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“They were like a couple of asteroids that had collided, she and Owen, briefly sparking before ricocheting off again, a little chipped, maybe even a little scarred, but with miles and miles still to go.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“... they discover that sometimes it is a person rather than a place that anchors you most in the world.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“He was like one of her novels, still unfinished and best understood in the right place and at the right time.
She couldn't wait to read the rest.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“It is what it is..." he murmured, letting the words trail off at the end.
"I hate that expression," Lucy said, a bit more forcefully than intended. "Nothing is what it is. Things are always changing. They can always get better.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“Being on her own had never been a burden. Instead of weighing her down, it buoyed her up; when she was alone, she was lighter. When she was by herself, she felt untethered and free.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“So you’re just here—”
“For a couple of days,” she said, ducking her head. “To see you.”
He smiled. “Really?”
She nodded, wincing already, and he understood why; he knew better than anyone how it sounded, realized how crazy it was to fly halfway around the world to see a person you hardly knew. But he also knew exactly what to say to make her feel better.
“Me too,” he said, moving close so that there was only the rustle of clothing and limbs and beating hearts as he looped an arm over her shoulder. “I only came to see you.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“The quiet between them had gone on for far too long now to pretend it was anything other than what it was. There were no more words; all that was left were two faintly beating hearts.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“There was a lump in her throat as she watched him fidget with the buttons on his vest, and it struck her as the truest form of kindness, the most basic sort of love: to be worried about the one who was worrying about you.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“That was the thing about books, she was realizing; they could take you somewhere else entirely, it was true. but it wasn't the same thing as actually going there yourself.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“She twisted a piece of his T-shirt, then let it go and laid her palm flat against his chest, right over his heart, and he could suddenly feel it again: the steady thump of it drowning out all his other thoughts. It was more drumbeat than countdown, more metronome than ticking clock, and he felt himself carried forward with each muffled beat, as if hope were a rhythm, a song he'd only just discovered.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“Maybe it was possible that you could take someone out of their life and drop them in the middle of another place entirely and they could seem like someone completely different. But even if that were the case, she thought, it wasn't really 'they' change—it was just the backdrop, the circumstances, the cast of characters. Just because you painted a house didn't mean the furniture inside was any different. It had to be the same with people. Deep down, at the very core, they'd still be the same no matter where they were, wouldn't they?”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“For hours, they wrote back and forth, a conversation punctuated by short periods of waiting, where Lucy held her breath and kept watch over her phone, resenting the constraints of technology, the limits of distance.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“Maybe this was why Owen had been so desperate to travel, why she'd longed for it herself without ever really knowing why. It wasn't just that you got to be somewhere else entirely. It was that you got to be someone else entirely, too.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“This, it seemed, was just what happened when you left someone. They disappeared behind you like the wake of a boat.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
“And the geography of the thing--the geography of them--was completely and hopelessly wrong.”
― Jennifer E. Smith, quote from The Geography of You and Me
Jennifer E. Smith
Born place: Chicago, IL, The United States
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“The phone is an instrument of intrusion into order. It is a threat to control. Just when you think you are alone and safe, the call could come that changes your life. Or someone else's. It makes the same flat, mechanical noise for everyone and gives no clues what's waiting there on the other end of the line. You can never be too careful.”
― Janice Galloway, quote from The Trick is to Keep Breathing
“I used to be endlessly troubled by meat-eating people who were uneasy with hunters and hunting. ... How can someone suggest that paying for the slaughter of animals is more justifiable than taking the responsibility for one's food into one's own hands? ... Civilization is a mechanism that allows us to avoid the necessary but ugly aspects of life; most of us do not euthanize our own pets, we don't unplug the life support on our own ailing grandparents, we don't repair our own cars, and we don't process our own raw sewage. Instead, the delegations of our less-pleasant responsibilities is so widespread that taking these things on is almost like trying to swim upriver. It's easier not to do them, and those who insist on doing so are bound to look a little odd.”
― quote from American Buffalo: In Search of a Lost Icon
“The evangelists and pastors mentioned in Ephesians 4:11 are then replaced in First Corinthians 12 with miracles and gifts of healings. These gifts of the Spirit are the primary ones that empower and qualify the evangelistic and pastoral offices. (The entry level into the fivefold ministry gifts is also at the level of working of miracles and gifts of healings because all five ministry offices — apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, and teacher — should be equipped with these two gifts of the Spirit.) Next is the operation of helps, which handles the physical and material aspects of the ministry. One very important helps calling is what I call the “entrepreneurship of the simplicity of giving.” A person called to fulfill this operation is someone of means who has the capacity in his character and his calling to be used by God to pour thousands, if not millions, into the Kingdom of God for the governments of the Church.”
― quote from The Walk of the Spirit - The Walk of Power : The Vital Role of Praying in Tongues
“Someone asked me once at a talk why I so stress the positive with my students yet am such an unstinting critic of those who run our culture and who are killing the planet. I answered immediately, “Power. If I’ve got power or authority over someone, it’s my responsibility to use that only to help them. It’s my job to accept and praise them into becoming who they are.”
― Derrick Jensen, quote from Walking on Water: Reading, Writing, and Revolution
“But at least this got Mouth thinking about how his loneliness wasn't unique. We all suffered. And I guess we all had good times too. Man - if every person who ever felt lonely killed himself, the world would be littered with corpses. And far lonelier.”
― David Lubar, quote from Sleeping Freshmen Never Lie
Burn for Burn
Somewhere In Time
Predestined
Okay for Now
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