Quotes About Memories

Houses, trees and fields of flax once flourished here. Summers had been blue with flowers. Now it was a shallow sea of stinking grey from end to end. And this is where you fought the war.

My whole life is out here-the whole of my life...I'd come here naked, as a boy-straight from that river out there-throw my clothes on the floor and climb into that loft and lie there dreaming in the hay...All those summer days-scouring the banks of the Avon for smooth, round stones-scaring up ducks and foxes-kingfishers-swallows...somebody's dog...Oh, God-I want it back. Throwing stones that never reached the other shore. And the games-the games-the games, and all my friends...

A friend need not be kept either within sight or within reach. A friend must be allowed the freedom to find and follow his own path. If one is fortunate, those paths will for a time join. But if the paths separate, it is comforting to know that a friend still graces the universe with his skills, and his viewpoint, and his presence. For if one is remembered by a friend, one is never truly gone. —

It is not frightening to know misfortune. What is frightening is to know lost happiness will never come back again.

I just keep practicing saying goodbye to you

Youth. A once-in-a-lifetime experience.

You just go from day to day and before you know it fifty years are up.

He tells another story about all that dust in those days. "My

established a thriving medical practice and was a fixture at our high school sports games. He never spoke to any of us of the horrors he had seen. When one of his sons wore as a casual jacket one of Doc Auld's Army coats with the major's insignia still attached, I remember thinking

A road trip is a way for the whole family to spend time together and annoy each other in interesting new places.

I could spend the whole afternoon telling you about him, but it's not gonna do much good, is it? You never smelled his hair after he just got out of the bath, or carried him from the car after he'd fallen asleep on the way home, or heard the way he laughed when someone tickled him. So you'll just have to take my word for it: He was a great kid and he made you glad to be alive.

I got PTSD from high school.

these leftover memories

if the world were a museum of memories, a collection of places she'd outgrown.

And later, of course, she got too busy. She asks Royce if he heard anything from Grace, ever. "No. No. Why should I?" "I just thought." "No." "I thought you might have looked her up later on." "Not a good idea." She has disappointed him. Prying. Trying to get at some spot of live regret right under the ribs. A woman.

Here's why at the Jesus beds they can only talk about all the stupid shit they've done—because that's all they are now, all they're ever gonna be, a twitching bunch of memories and mistakes. Regrets. Jesus, Bit thinks. I should've had the decency to go when Julie did.

and you form a map in your heart of all the places that make you so happy

Sentimental memories were like sugar-water icicles.

They've built their nests in the chimneys of my heart: those swallows that you lost.

but she doted on her grandchildren. Wendy was her favorite. Meme loved to have the kids visit

Every now and then she looked around for tangible evidence of his having ever been there. Where were the butterflies? the blueberries? the whistling reed? She could find nothing, for he had left nothing but his stunning absence.

What you do to children matters. And they might never forget.

It had been the longest time since she had had a rib-scraping laugh. She had forgotten how deep and down it could be. So different from the miscellaneous giggles and smiles she had learned to be content with these past few years.

They held hands and knew that only the coffin would lie in the earth; the bubbly laughter and the press of fingers in the palm would stay aboveground forever. At first, as they stood there, their hands were clenched together. They relaxed slowly until during the walk back home their fingers were laced in as gentle a clasp as that of any two young girlfriends trotting up the road on a summer day wondering what happened to butterflies in the winter.