Susan > Susan's Quotes

“Books. Cats. Life is Good.”
― Edward Gorey

“Life is a disease: sexually transmitted, and invariably fatal.”
― Neil Gaiman

“Such silence has an actual sound, the sound of disappearance.”
― Suzanne Finnamore, Split: A Memoir of Divorce

“A heart can stop beating for a while, one can still live.”
― Suzanne Finnamore, Split: A Memoir of Divorce

“I do care about real life. It's just not as interesting as what's in my books.”
― Christina Dodd, Storm of Shadows

“If you cannot see the bright side of life, polish the dull side.”
― Christina Dodd, Some Enchanted Evening

“Great minds think alike-especially when they are female.”
― Christina Dodd, Some Enchanted Evening

“Fate Marches on, demanding we find our destinies”
― Christina Dodd

“Life is too short to dance with ugly men”
― Christina Dodd, Some Enchanted Evening

“Pray as if all things depend on God, and work as if all things depend on you.”
― Christina Dodd, Scent of Darkness

“I'm finally getting my life together. Too bad I had to die first.”
― Diana Rowland

“Hey, look, I thought with a miserable laugh, this day just got worse.”
― Diana Rowland, My Life as a White Trash Zombie

“Everything will be alright in the end so if it is not alright it is not the end.”
― Deborah Moggach, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

“The only real failure is the failure to try, and the measure of success is how we cope with disappointment.”
― Deborah Moggach, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

“But it's also true that the person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing. All we know about the future is that it will be different. But perhaps what we fear is that it will be the same. So we must celebrate the changes.”
― Deborah Moggach

“Wherever you go, you can never leave yourself behind.”
― James Conroyd Martin

“What is past, one cannot change,
so each backward glance is a bit of the present slipping away.”
― James Conroyd Martin, Push Not the River

“Sometimes you must put yourself in the way of destiny.”
― James Conroyd Martin

“If you're going to be able to look back on something and laugh about it, you might as well laugh about it now.”
― Marie Osmond

“Happy endings are still endings.”
― Gregory Maguire, Son of a Witch

“Hooray! Hooray! The end of the world has been postponed! ”
― Hergé, The Shooting Star

“A person's a person, no matter how small.”
― Dr. Seuss, Horton Hears a Who!

“You can either practice being right or practice being kind.”
― Anne Lamott

“I don't remember who said this, but there really are places in the heart you don't even know exist until you love a child.”
― Anne Lamott, Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year

“Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art.... It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things which give value to survival.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

“The best people possess a feeling for beauty, the courage to take risks, the discipline to tell the truth, the capacity for sacrifice. Ironically, their virtues make them vulnerable; they are often wounded, sometimes destroyed.”
― Ernest Hemingway

“Breakfast! My favorite meal- and you can be so creative. I think of bowls of sparkling berries and fresh cream, baskets of Popovers and freshly squeezed orange juice, thick country bacon, hot maple syrup, panckes and French toast - even the nutty flavor of Irish oatmeal with brown sugar and cream. Breaksfast is the place I splurge with calories, then I spend the rest of the day getting them off! I love to use my prettiest table settings - crocheted placemats with lace-edged napkins and old hammered silver. And whether you are inside in front of a fire, candles burning brightly on a wintery day - or outside on a patio enjoying the morning sun - whether you are having a group of friends and family, a quiet little brunch for two, or an even quieter little brunch just for yourself, breakfast can set the mood and pace of the whole day.

And Sunday is my day. Sometimes I think we get caught up in the hectic happenings of the weeks and months and we forget to take time out to relax. So one Sunday morning I decided to do things differently - now it's gotten to be a sort of ritual! This is what I do: at around 8:30 am I pull myself from my warm cocoon, fluff up the pillows and blankets and put some classical music on the stereo. Then I'm off to the kitchen, where I very calmly (so as not to wake myself up too much!) prepare my breakfast, seomthing extra nice - last week I had fresh pineapple slices wrapped in bacon and broiled, a warm croissant, hot chocolate with marshmallows and orange juice. I put it all on a tray with a cloth napkin, my book-of-the-moment and the "Travel" section of the Boston Globe and take it back to bed with me. There I spend the next two hours reading, eating and dreaming while the snowflakes swirl through the treetops outside my bedroom window. The inspiring music of Back or Vivaldi adds an exquisite elegance to the otherwise unruly scene, and I am in heaven. I found time to get in touch with myself and my life and i think this just might be a necessity! Please try it for yourself, and someone you love.”
― Susan Branch, Days from the Heart of the Home

“Goodbye Darcy, goodbye Jean, goodbye stone cottage, scratchy towels, fields of wildflowers; good bye gorgeous Peak District ... OK English People, for your own good, get off the roads, here we come!”
― Susan Branch

“The tension between what is, and what we dream of, is important. Not to discount what we have, but to hold onto that middle ground, because it's in there that the magic happens.”
― Susan Branch

“And beyond the timeless meadows and emerald pastures, the rabbit holes and moss-covered oak and rowan trees and the "slippy sloppy" houses of frogs, the woodland-scented wind rushed between the leaves and blew around the gray veil that dipped below the fells, swirling up in a mist, blurring the edges of the distant forest.

(View from Windermere in the Lake District)”
― Susan Branch, A Fine Romance: Falling in Love with the English Countryside