John Jerome > Quotes

“Joinery, it now occurs to me, must be the foundation of all craft. You put two things together to make something else, to accomplish some purpose; the better they fit, or work together, the greater the pleasure from the making.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life

“Snow falling in the woods when there’s no wind is the most peaceful thing I’ve ever seen.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life

“On the solstice: “The tilting of the earth may very well have stopped at the winter solstice, creaking to a halt and starting back the other way, but I was down in the basement at the time, running a power saw, and didn’t hear a thing.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life

“[A]s my breath begins to quiet in the silent woods, I pick up a squeaking, creaking sound, growing steadily louder, that makes the hair stand up on the back of my neck. I snap my head up and overhead, oh my God, here comes three hundred, five hundred, a thousand Canada geese, maybe fifteen hundred, stretching across the sky in a succession of vees. Largest flight I’ve ever seen. Underlit from reflection off the snow, a skyful of silver arrowheads, bound due north for the summer to come. A skyful of physiology, riding the physics of the air toward the pole. Riches, riches, everywhere, just for the paying of attention.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life

“Running is the most elemental sport there is. We are genetically programmed to do it.”
― John Jerome

“: “It’s all chemicals, says the biochemistry text. Chlorophylls keep the leaves green while thy are green, carotenoids – as in butter, corn, canary feathers – turn them yellow when the chlorophyll goes. Tannin adds the browns, the bronzes; something called anthocyanin turns leaves red if the sap of the plant is acidic, blue or purple if it is alkaline. Color is a substance, says the chemist.” – John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play & Other Aspects of Country Life, p. 140.”
― John Jerome