Quotes from We Are Water

Wally Lamb ·  561 pages

Rating: (44.2K votes)


“We are like water, aren’t we? We can be fluid, flexible when we have to be. But strong and destructive, too.” And something else, I think to myself. Like water, we mostly follow the path of least resistance.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“Maybe that's what love is. Having someone who guides you through different experiences, coaxes you to try news things but still makes you feel safe.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“a life we didn't choose, chose us”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“One thing I’ve learned in my program is that guilt is a wasted emotion, you know? Look back on the past but don’t stare.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“A life I didn't choose chose me.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water



“So maybe that’s what love means. Having the capacity to forgive the one who wronged you, no matter how deep the hurt was.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“That’s often the case, of course—that creation and madness begin to dance with each other.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“The “what-ifs”: they’ll do a number on you.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“Il destino mischia le carte, ma siamo noi a giocare la partita. Destiny shuffles the cards, but we are the ones who must play the game.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“Sometimes we want something to be true so badly that we convince ourselves that it is true.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water



“All I’m saying, Dad, is that I accept that I don’t know. But I have faith that my Lord and Savior does, so I’m putting myself in His hands. Humbling myself to a wisdom that’s above and beyond me and praying for His guidance.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“comforts the disturbed and disturbs the comfortable:”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“So maybe that’s what love means. Having the capacity to forgive the one who wronged you, no matter how deep the hurt was. At any rate, I’m glad she doesn’t know about the corpse that’s down there in that well. I’ve spared her that much.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“That coincidence is God’s way of staying invisible?”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“It’s as if the work on your canvas has a will of its own. When that happens, it can be quite exciting. But disturbing, too, when, as the painter, you are not in control of your painting.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water



“Of course, all of the coolest icons overdosed and died years ago, which is just as well. How depressing would it be to see a gray-haired Jimi Hendrix wearing a cardigan sweater and reminiscing about the soundtrack of the Summer of Love?”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“Change what you can, accept what you can't, and be smart enough to know the difference.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“This is where the pot is strongest now: at the place where it had been broken.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“Change what you can, accept what you can’t, and be smart enough to know the difference. Viveca comes downstairs first and heads into the”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“This was a career, not an emotional disorder.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water



“Motherless children have a hard time when the mother is gone. That”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“Motherless children have a hard time when the mother is gone.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“and yet she continues to skip rope in my mind and on my canvases, raising her dark, hopeful face to the sky, innocent of the depth of people’s cruelty toward “the other”—those who, for whatever reason, must swim against the tide instead of letting it carry them. . . .”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“It lands halfway down the skirt. The red wine against the green silk makes it look like Gaia, the primordial earth mother, is having her period. I know I should feel guilty. Contrite. I should be rushing to the fridge and grabbing a bottle of club soda before the stain sets, or rushing Viveca’s dress down the street to that dry cleaning place. But I’m not contrite. I’m a little giddy, in fact. I pour another mug of wine and throw it at the other three dresses. In some places the wine seeps in and it dribbles down to the hems in others. I do it again: pour, splash. I feel like Jackson Pollock must have felt, except I’m not dribbling paint; I’m staining beauty with blood.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“I understand there was some controversy about the coroner’s ruling concerning Josephus Jones’s”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water



“Too bad I didn't know you back then, I would have come and rescued you." Like he was Prince Charming or something. Which he is, in a way, because he rescued me from the simple, uncomplicated life I thought I liked until I realized how much I was missing. How lonely that life had been: going to work, going home, and watching TV, going places by myself on weekends.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“If you want people to flock to art, lure them with pancakes.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“Maybe that’s what love is. Having someone who guides you through different experiences, coaxes you to try new things but still makes you feel safe.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


“When a painting I’m working on becomes my singular focus—when I am “in the zone,” as I’ve heard people put it—a trancelike state will sometimes overtake me.”
― Wally Lamb, quote from We Are Water


About the author

Wally Lamb
Born place: in Norwich, Connecticut, The United States
Born date October 17, 1950
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