Quotes from L.A. Meyer

Well,' I shrug, all innocent, 'we all ride our little hobbyhorses, don't we, Mr. Peel?

Randall looks at me with fire in his eye, but he nods and decides to smile at my banter. He gets to his feet, bows low, and says, "I believe I saw my sister's fat friend Pickering down below. Shall we all go to dinner and hear more tales of your adventures?" Hey, Ezra ain't fat, he's... well... sleek is what he is. Sleek, like a well-fed seal. Or, hey, maybe even a silkie...

There is a moment, just before I reach it that I consider going up through the lubber's hole because I'm wearing a dress, but I just can't do it. I go to the edge, do the flip over and land on the foretop. If anyone got a peek at my drawers, well, good for them, I hope they enjoyed it.

Thanks, Tink, for being a good brother to me," I say, misting up a bit. "She's a fine girl, and I just know you'll be very happy together." I give him a kiss on the cheek. "The Brotherhood forever, Jacky," is what he softly says in return, encircling me in his warm embrace. "Forever.

Boys get to do what they want in this world, and girls do not.

Why, then?" I demand. "It is because, Miss Faber," says Mr. Peel, smiling one of his very rare smiles. "It is because you can swim." What?

I'll be a lady tomorrow

My nature is to be cheerful and my foolish self is very likely to be led astray by happy, frivolous things, things of the moment, and I just can't help it, Jaimy, I can't. There is a wildness in me that can't be denied. I

I see you've sent another group of raggedy ship's boys off to sea... All that batch lacks is a tomboy girl to go with them to put them straight.

I have resolved that each morning when I wake up from now on, I will take three long breaths and think about each of them as I draw them in and let them out, and I will remember that time at the end of that rope when I could not draw such breaths. And then I will look at the blue veins in my wrists and will know that my blood is running through them, and for that I will be grateful. Amen. The

It went on like that till some guys got together and came up with the one-god thing—him being God, the Father, and male and all that—and things went downhill for girls ever after that, far as I can figure. It was always, 'Get in your dress, girl, your smock, your shift or your burnoose or your veil, but whatever it is, girl, put it on and shut the hell up,' is how I see it.

I know, Ezra, that I tend to be a bit impulsive at times, but it all seems so reasonable at the time I do these things, and so unreasonable when everyone looks back at what happened and what I did

And so you also see how no skill, no matter how lowly, is ever learned in vain.

I go to the rail and shout after her as she descends the stairs, "But that Mrs. Shinn called me a whore! In front of everybody!" She pauses on the middle steps and looks up at me. "Perhaps, Miss Faber, it is because you continually act like one!

I seek the face of God in the sky and in the waves of the ocean, not in some book or on my knees in some dusty church. "I

I know you don't approve of me or my ways, Ezra, but I got to make my way in this world the best I can. I got to work with what talents I got 'cause ain't nobody gonna look out for me but me. I will play my music, I will sing my songs, I will dance my dances. And sometimes, as I have found in my life, it's easier being a boy. That's the way of it. Till later, Ezra." I

my credo, "Oftimes it seems to me, 'patriotic' rhymes with 'idiotic,

there are biddies, always biddies, everywhere in this world, who are more concerned with the morals of others than they are with their own. A

I weave through all these happy, smiling faces, knowing that we have put on the best show we could—and I do love putting on a good performance, whether sacred or profane. Log

Men, I swear . . . Present them with a female all demure in a dress with modestly covered head, and they are all, So pleased to meet you, Miss and À votre service, Mademoiselle and En su servicio, Señorita, but put that same girl in pants and all fine custom disappears, and all she can expect is a rude slap on her tail. Geez

it is not impossible that I could become Governor of this state. Or even President. I would not mind having a horde of sycophants licking my boots. Actually, that is quite an attractive notion. Thank you, Jacky, I had not thought of that." Amy

his rather jolly nature, which seems to find many things of this world not only interesting but also amusing. Whatever

the many hours Amy and I spent there, she sitting on the bank reading from a book of poems or some dreary political stuff, me with my skirt off and my drawers rolled up, wading in the water. Me turning over stones to see what was under them, she begging me not to eat what I found. The scavenging orphan in me does die hard, I must admit, and I know that sometimes I am a scandal to other, more well-bred people—in this and other ways. "All

While there are some who extol your virtues, Miss Faber, there are others who wonder why you are not yet hanged." "I have determined that hanging would not suit my constitution, Sir, so I have tried to avoid it." A