Allison

“You can embark on new and steeper versions of your old sin, you know, and cry tears doing it that are genuine as any.”
― Leif Enger, Peace Like a River

“You know how it is—you grow up with a story all your life, it can transmute into something you neither question nor particularly value. It’s why we have such bad luck learning from mistakes.”
― Leif Enger, Peace Like a River

“It seemed necessary just then to touch base with the Lord. Shutting my eyes, I leaned into the horse. I prayed in words for a little while . . . and then language went away and I prayed in a soft high-pitched lament any human listener would’ve termed a whine. We serve a patient God. . . . Andreeson, who I’d despised, now appeared to my mind as he might’ve to a worried brother. Talk about an unwelcome change. There in the cold, curled against Mr. Ford’s sighing horse, I repented of hatred in general and especially that cultivated against the putrid fed. A pain started up, as of live coals inside, and like that I knew where he was. Knew, with certainty, why he hadn’t come back out of the blizzard. I began to weep. Not only for Andreeson—weeping seems to accompany repentance most times. No wonder. Could you reach deep in yourself to locate that organ containing delusions about your general size in the world—could you lay hold of this and dredge it from your chest and look it over in daylight—well, it’s no wonder people would rather not.”
― Leif Enger, Peace Like a River

“The firelight had restored his face to healthy color and she, all Frenchbraided, scarf unslung, resembled an opportunity missed by Rembrandt.”
― Leif Enger, Peace Like a River