Heather McLaughlin > Recent Status Updates

I'm reading this for a climate change book group. It is very hard. Don't get me wrong, the story is wonderful. But hard on the heart.

"Taking pictures forces you to stop and look. Like my Junior Ranger badges, it’s a form of vacation homework, a task to focus your subjectivity. Photography allows you to feel like you gave a view, a location, a special place its proper due, that you took it all in."

"But I was only learning about those things, I realized, because I was part of the problem."

"...he needed to be somewhere else. Somewhere so completely else that the grief wouldn’t find him. Ignoring the fact that grief is not a stalker but a stowaway, always there and up for any journey."

"But then Simon had never been the particularly sheveled type."

"If human beings are energy, what are eight million of us in those five boroughs?"

"There is no such thing as a happy place. Because when you are happy, everywhere is a happy place. And when you are sad, everywhere is a sad place."

"Like stepping back in time to an older world that probably was not better, but at least was heavily draped in velvet."

"Cherry felt a wave of relief. A riptide. That she hadn’t stepped completely out of her old life into a new one.

Even if that new life might have been lovely."

"As always all mistakes are mine, mine I tell you—you can’t have them . . ."

Ha! That's fabulous.

"Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, I thought, for they are soggy and hard to light."

“Even if other people don’t?” “Other people do,” I said firmly. “There’s a world of damned decent people out there, quietly doing good stuff. You don’t see much of it in the papers, on the news, probably not on the internet. Kindness doesn’t sell. Don’t mean it isn’t there.”

My books went with it.”

“Which was your favorite?” she asked.

“You can’t pick a favorite,” I said. “They’re books. They’re pieces of someone’s mind and soul. They’re almost friends.”

"... that the incurable problem with life was that nothing was ever in balance. That she could not have toddler Frances and 5th grade Frances at the same time. She could not meet adult Frances and have a moment to hold baby Frances all at once. You could not have a little of everything you wanted."

I have always gone with the audiobooks for the series and I absolutely love the way Lisette Lecat reads. So imagine my surprise when I realized I'd requested the ebook from the library and there was another 5 week wait for the audiobook. So I reluctantly dived in. And I can still hear Lisette's voice on every page. It's been delightful. I will still be sure not to make the same mistake next time. Best audiobooks!

"...she was not—as far as she was concerned. Middle age began when…She paused as she asked herself the uncomfortable question. The answer was that middle age began not just yet."

"It is one of those lessons that every child should learn: Don’t play with fire, sharp objects, or ancient artifacts."

There's a tire swing in anticipation of a boy? Girls don't like tire swings? WTF?

Is he really going to be a shit about this? Maybe HE should stay home and take care of the baby while SHE works. His job is a lot more dangerous. Does he want the kid to grow up without a father? They don't need the money. So why is he working? This is bullshit.

"...this is a greatlooking Jeep—all tricked-out like it is. I’ve seen a lot of people stop and take a look at it. I try to discourage the ones that want to leave a rubber duck on it."

"But once I’m a stay-at-home mom with baby Ella Marie you won’t ever have to worry anymore.” She's quitting? Okay, this series is fluff but one of the reasons I stick with it is the radio station. If that switches to diaper changes and play dates I am definitely out.

"One American can really fill a room. I assume it only takes a hundred or so to really fill a country."

"(No, I don’t know why so many important realizations occur when people are in the privy. For some reason, this topic has gone unexplored by serious scholars, even though the classical mathematician Callixus famously conceived his Third Theorem during the aftereffects of a meal of overspiced beans.)"

"Wren was wearing something green that was probably fashionable. It had ruffles, anyway, and no one would wear ruffles if fashion wasn’t involved somehow."

"Shane wondered if there was a term for feeling guilty about not feeling sufficiently guilty. It seemed like a useful word to have."

"Does your mind live in the gutter?"
She shook her head ... "No, but it rents there on occasion."

"Three times while we spoke she said, “He was wearing a helmet,” as if virtue trumped physics." 😥

"I stapled my attention to paperwork."

"eal or not, monsters don’t bother you while you’re peeing. (This is one of the lesser-known laws.)"

"Christianity doesn’t make you repaint the house ecru, as far as I know."