What Hearts by Bruce Brooks

• Now his life had a past, a past that would not get any bigger, that would always be shrinking but would never disappear.
• There were alternatives. A feeling, an object, a person could seem like one thing but be another; an action could seem as if it were taking one turn, but veer off another way. Anything could happen at any time. He was not on tracks.
• He had the chance to create himself in the eyes of the strangers.
• From insight to love was not a big step.
• He placed himself in the world, and the world drew his thoughts outside himself, where they multiplied and spiraled and led him in silent, thrilling flights. And as he expanded into the world, he expanded inside. At these moments an endlessness beyond thought opened inside him. Outside, his mind was whizzing through things, but inside, he was silent, still; sometimes, he knew he was not even breathing.
• These abilities and experiences must appear, somehow, in everything he did, in what he was; but how could anyone be expected to know what he was? He was alone.
• There simply was a right way to do it, and when there was a right way, it should be done.
• It was impossible to fox someone who had no strategy.
• Talent and technique could not create power.
• How could we all know what is about to happen?
• Preference was not knowledge.
• He did not understand giving up. Giving up did not work.
• Nothing in his behavior could be taken as a sign of the deepness inside him.
• The love of a boy could change a girl into a woman.
• For a long time it's been enough just to feel things. Now all of a sudden I want to get it out.
• You want to share something you've made. You put all this work into making something and naturally you want to show it off. It's human nature.
• When we love someone it is because we built that feeling, bit by bit. It's a choice. It's what we make only for ourselves.
• When a girl knows a boy loves her, that--more than anything that can happen to her, until she has a child--gives her happiness. It has nothing to do with her feelings for him. It's a gift, that's all. And when you get a gift, you feel good. Doesn't matter if you haven't got a gift ready to give in return. Something as fine as love from someone, knowing about it means a lot. It can mean everything.
• Trouble doesn't just come from feeling bad when things are going fine. Trouble can also come from feeling good when you shouldn't.
• You have to meet the world halfway.
• If the heart could betray one's good sense--if love could take such liberties as to fasten onto stepfathers--then what hope was there for a boy of intelligence and will? What justice?
• Grace is give, not always received.
• There was a good thing about words: they could rise away from circumstances, they could take their meaning with them, they could move right along with you.

4/13/2007