Quote

To marry was to say you believed in the future and in the past, too-that history and tradition and hope could stay knit together to hold you up.

Paula McLain

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Paula McLain
Age: 59
Born: 1965
Born: October 7
Author
Novelist
Poet
Writer
Fresno
California
Hold
Future
Hope
History
Knit
Past
Marry
Together
Believed
Tradition
Stay

More quotes by Paula McLain

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More and more I find myself at a loss for words and didn't want to hear other people talking either. Their conversations seemed false and empty. I preferred to look at the sea, which said nothing and never made you feel alone.
Paula McLain
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Dogs are easy. If their tails are up and their eyes are soft, you're in.
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I would gladly have climbed out of my skin and into his that night, because I believed that was what love meant.
Paula McLain
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There was only today to throw yourself into without thinking about tomorrow, let alone forever. To keep you from thinking, there was liquor, an ocean's worth at least, all the usual vices and plenty of rope to hang yourself with. Love is a beautiful liar.
Paula McLain
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But when Bumby nursed, his fist clutching the fabric of my robe, his eyes soft and bottomless and locked on mine, as if I were the very heart of his universe, I couldn't help but melt into him.
Paula McLain
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She was also incredibly confident, with a way of moving and talking that communicated that she didn't need anyone to tell her she was beautiful or worthwhile.
Paula McLain
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Why is it every other person you meet says they're an artist? A real artist doesn't need to gas on about it, he doesn't have time. He does his work and sweats it out in silence, and no one can help him at all.
Paula McLain
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It was our favorite part of the day, this in-between time, and it always seemed to last longer than it should--a magic and lavender space unpinned from the hours around it, between worlds.
Paula McLain
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Not everyone out in a storm wants to be saved
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My life was my life I would have to stare it down, somehow, and make it work for me.
Paula McLain
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I also liked to look around at the houses surrounding the park and wonder about the people who filled them, what kinds of marriages they had and how they loved or hurt each other on any given day, and if they were happy, and whether they thought happiness was a sustainable thing.
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Books could be an incredible adventure. I stayed under my blanket and barely moved, and no one would have guessed how my mind raced and my heart soared with stories.
Paula McLain
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... and yet he could also be very charming, in a bookish, infinitely apologetic way.
Paula McLain
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I'd had my share of rain. My mother's illness ... had weighed on me, but the years before had been heavy, too. I was only twenty eight.
Paula McLain
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I miss good old-fashioned honorable people just trying to make something of life. Simply, without hurting anyone else. I know that makes me a sap.
Paula McLain
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Though I often looked for one, I finally had to admit that there could be no cure for Paris.
Paula McLain
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I'd never met anyone so vibrant or alive. He moved like light.
Paula McLain
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This was my one brush with love. Was it love? It felt awful enough. I spent another two years crawling around in the skin of it, smoking too much and growing too thin and having stray thoughts of jumping from my balcony like a tortured heroine in a Russian novel.
Paula McLain
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But love is love. It makes you do terribly stupid things.
Paula McLain
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The way I see it, how can you really say you'll love a person longer than love lasts?
Paula McLain