Colleen Oakley > Quotes

“Science can’t explain why two specific people are magnetically drawn to each other instead of repelled. Only love can.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“I suppose all couples feel this way at some point—that their bond is the most special, the strongest, the Greatest Love of All. Not all the time, just in those few and far between moments where you look at the person you’re with and think: Yes. It’s you.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“Every human being—every single one of us—wakes up each morning hoping, believing, that today is not our day. Not our time. That the storm is not yet here. That our island will not be wiped out. That we will see the sunrise the next morning. That life is worth living. Otherwise, we wouldn’t bother getting out of bed.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Invisible Husband of Frick Island

“Relationships don't dissolve over one event, one fight, it's a thousand blows, delivered over time, uppercuts, jabs, crosses, some you barely even feel, and then before you know it, you're on the ground seeing stars and wondering what the hell happened!”
― Colleen Oakley, Close Enough to Touch

“Sometimes it just feels like we still spend so much time trying to teach the house not to catch on fire, instead of teaching the arsonist not to light it.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“And then I keep reading, anyway—but not just because I like the story. I like knowing that I'm touching her with my words. That they're crawling in her ears as she sleeps.”
― Colleen Oakley, Close Enough to Touch

“May we all be loved and love each other so insanely.
May we all be so human.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Invisible Husband of Frick Island

“Why is it called a grandfather clock and not a grandmother clock?” her eldest granddaughter, Poppy, asked once. “Because only a man would find the need to announce it every time he performed his job as required,” Louise replied.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“Nothing in life goes according to plan. Nothing. And the sooner you accept that, the better off you’ll be.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“In life, there were two kinds of friends: friends who would wish you well on your journey to battle, and friends who would jump in the trenches with you.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“She didn’t think anyone in her family appreciated how utterly exhausting it was to be so angry all the time.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“He tells me the AWARE technique is an acronym for Accept the anxiety, Watch the anxiety, Act normal, Repeat, and Expect the best.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“I was going to be getting the food.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“She lay there in the dark and allowed the grief to flow through her veins, thick as mud. She’d learned long ago not to fight it, to make space for it, the way one might for a new tchotchke on the shelf, a souvenir from a trip you didn’t want to forget. That was all grief was, really, Louise had determined—remembering.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“What is it about darkness that compels one to reveal so much?”
― Colleen Oakley, Close Enough to Touch

“why do people always say they could get hit by a bus? Like life is just one big game of Frogger and people are getting struck left and right by dangerous city transport.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“So I can’t explain why, for the next twenty minutes, I stand at the window quietly willing him with my mind to come inside and erase the distance between us.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“pushes the gearshift into park. “Speak of the”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“As a twenty-one-year-old college student, Daisy Richmond’s answer to the question “If you knew you were going to die in one month, what would you do?” was full of adventure and travel to exotic lands. As a twenty-seven-year-old woman who is faced with a recurrence of breast cancer, her answer is very different. Before I Go is the poignant story of Daisy’s journey to navigate the unexpected twists and turns of life, and the painful process of letting go of everything but love.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“I want my husband to not be possibly falling in love with another woman.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“She was so young. She had no idea how long life was. People always said life was short, but it wasn’t. Not really. You could cram so many different lives into one. Be so many different people.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“Patience, persistence, and perspiration are the three keys to success.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Invisible Husband of Frick Island

“again—I’ve realized that’s what grieving is, a constant cycle of feeling better and feeling worse, and I’m hopeful that one day I’ll feel better more often than I feel worse—so”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“Angry women don’t bother me. It’s the ones who aren’t furious that I worry about.” “What?” Tanner asked, confused. “Why?” “Means they aren’t paying attention.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise

“that when he looked at her, she was alive. And when she was away from him, she counted down the seconds until he would be near”
― Colleen Oakley, The Invisible Husband of Frick Island

“Meh. She’s not overly unattractive, but I don’t trust cat people. Maybe it’s the inside knowledge of growing up with one, but I think they’re often like the animals they love—unpredictable and emotionally unstable. You never know when they’ll be aloof and distant or senselessly desperate for your affection.”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go

“Maybe all that matters is that love is a circle. Infinite. Eternal. Present, even when the person you want to be there most is absent.”
― Colleen Oakley, You Were There Too

“Every path has its puddle. That was what Mrs. Olecki always said. No sense dwelling on them—you just gotta walk around them.”
― Colleen Oakley, The Invisible Husband of Frick Island

“To know if I'm alone in my longing, a lighthouse signaling to an empty sea.”
― Colleen Oakley, Close Enough to Touch

“called her “supermodel mark”—just in case”
― Colleen Oakley, Before I Go