Rebecca Wells > Quotes

“It’s life. You don’t figure it out. You just climb up on the beast and ride.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“Friends are supposed to act like harbor boats—let you know if you’re off course. But it ain’t always possible…”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“I try to believe," she said, "that God doesn't give you more than one little piece of the story at once. You know, the story of your life. Otherwise your heart would crack wider than you could handle. He only cracks it enough so you can still walk, like someone wearing a cast. But you've still got a crack running up your side, big enough for a sapling to grow out of. Only no one sees it. Nobody sees it. Everybody thinks you're one whole piece, and so they treat you maybe not so gentle as they could see that crack.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Sidda can't help herself. She just loves books. Loves the way they feel, the way they smell, loves the black letters marching across the white pages...”
― Rebecca Wells, Little Altars Everywhere

“life is short but it is wide. this too shall pass.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“She longed for porch friendship, for the sticky, hot sensation of familiar female legs thrown over hers in companionship. She pined for the girliness of it all, the unplanned, improvisational laziness. She wanted to soak the words 'time management' out of her lexicon. She wanted to hand over, to yield, to let herself float down the unchartered beautiful fertile musky swamp of life, where creativity and eroticism and deep intelligence dwell.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“See, she goes places when she reads. I know all about that. When I'm reading, wherever I am, I'm always somewhere else.”
― Rebecca Wells, Little Altars Everywhere

“She used to say she could taste sleep and that it was as delicious as a BLT on fresh French bread.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Sometimes you just have to reach out and grab what you want, even when they tell you not to. This is something that I've struggled with my whole life long.”
― Rebecca Wells, Little Altars Everywhere

“What does my smile look like now? Vivi wondered. Can you reclaim that free-girl smile, or is it like virginity- once you loose it, that's it?”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“I have been to the edge and lived to tell the tale..”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“But all she wanted to do was lie in bed, eat Kraft macaroni and cheese, and hide from the alligators.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Listen to me, Siddalee, and listen good: There is no excuse to let your looks go, no matter how poor you are. Cleanliness is next to Godliness, but honey let me tell you, ugliness will get you nowhere.”
― Rebecca Wells, Little Altars Everywhere non-returnable

“But who has time to write memoirs? I’m still living my memoirs.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“I want to lay up like that, to float unstructured, without ambition or anxiety. I want to inhabit my life like a porch.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“At the beauty of what she had stumbled onto, at the fear that something terrible would happen because she was not vigilant enough. She cried at the fear of something so good that she would not be brave enough to bear it.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“…the love we most cherish will, of necessity, bring us pain. Because that love is like the setting of a body with broken bones. But I want to stage the setting. I want to direct all scenes.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“Smoke, drink and never think.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“Sadness can find you anywhere, anytime, so you better have fun when you can.”
― Rebecca Wells, The Crowning Glory of Calla Lily Ponder

“They wanted to rock, they wanted to roll, they wanted to feel the peculiarly human feeling of having a perfect night in an imperfect world.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“... a full moon shimmered over central Louisiana. This was no rinky-dink moon. This was a moon you had to curtsy to. A big, heavy, mysterious, beautiful, bossy moon. The kind you want to serve things to on a silver platter.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“When the Deep Purple falls,
Over sleepy garden walls,
And the stars begin to flicker in the sky,
Thru the mist of a memory
You wander back to me,
Breathing my name with a sigh.

In the still of the night,
Once again I hold you tight,
Tho' you're gone, your love lives on
When moonlight beams.

And as long as my heart will beat
Lover, we'll always meet
Here in my Deep Purple dreams.”
― Rebecca Wells

“Good enough is good enough. Perfect will make you a big fat mess every time.”
― Rebecca Wells, The Crowning Glory of Calla Lily Ponder

“Of all the secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood the most divine was humor.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“The soft aroma of old worn cotton from a linen chest, the lingering smell of tobacco on an angora sweater; Jergen's hand lotion, sauteed green peppers and onions; the sweet, nutty smell of peanut butter and bananas, the oaken smell of good bourbon. A combination of lily of the valley, cedar, vanilla, and somewhere, the lingering of old rose. These smells are older than any thought. Mama, Teensy, Neecie, and Caro, each one of them had an individual scent, to be sure. But this is the Gumbo of their scents. This is the Gumbo Ya-Ya. This is the internal vial of perfume I carry with me everywhere I go.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“...you do not have too many boogeymen for me. You have just the right number.”
― Rebecca Wells

“This is a cardinal Ya-Ya rule: you must meet each person's eyes while clinking glasses in a toast. Otherwise, the ritual has no meaning, it's just pure show. And that is something the Ya-Yas are not.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display

“She walks barefoot into the humid night, moonlight on her freckled shoulders. Near a huge, live oak tree on the edge of her father's cotton fields, Sidda looks up into the sky. In the crook of the crescent moon sits the Holy Lady, with strong muscles and a merciful heart. She kicks her splendid legs like the moon is her swing and the sky, her front porch. She waves down at Sidda like she has just spotted an old buddy.
Sidda stands in the moonlight and lets the Blessed Mother love every hair on her six-year-old head. Tenderness flows down from the moon and up from the earth. For one fleeting, luminous moment, Sidda Walker knows there has never been a time when she has not been loved.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Life is short, but it is wide. Genevieve Whitman taught me that.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the YA-YA Sisterhood

“Shep claimed eating cake like that so early in the morning was a 'whore's breakfast.' The rest of them didn't care. They were happy little whores who didn't worry about saving a morsel. ”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“There is the truth of history, and there is the truth of what a person remembers. As {she} sat at the edge of {the lake}, memory blossoms floated unbounded, as though breathed, no words spoken. Like birds that fly across national borders, between countries at war at each other.”
― Rebecca Wells, Little Altars Everywhere

“His tall, lanky body had the wrinkles of sleep, and he smelled like cotton and dreams.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Say there is no truth. Say there are only scraps that we feebly try to sew togethr.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Many people are more like the earth than we know. Maybe they have fault lines that sooner or later are going to split open under pressure.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“What they don't know is that I went over the edge years ago, and lived to tell the tale.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“There is the truth of history, and there is the truth of what a person remembers.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“These are all I have. I do not have the wide, bright beacon of some solid old lighthouse, guiding ships safely home, past the jaggedrocks. I only have these little glimmers that flicker and then go out.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“True love is not a crock, but patriotism is.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Once the scent caught me on the street in Greenwich Village. I stopped in my tracks and looked around. Where was it coming from? A shop? The trees? A passerby? I could not tell. I only knew the smell made me cry. I stood on the sidewalk in Greenwich Village as people brushed by, and felt suddenly young and terribly open, as if I were waiting for something. I live in an ocean of smell, and the ocean is my mother.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“She leaned down and smelled the skin at Connor's shoulders right at the spots where, as Martha Graham might have said, his own wings might have been attached.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Sidda was tired of being vigilant, alert, sharp. She longed for porch friendship, for the sticky, hot sensation of familiar female legs thrown over hers in companionship. She pined for the girlness of it all, the unplanned, improvisational laziness. She wanted to soak the words "time management" out of her lexicon. She wanted to hand over, to yield, to let herself float down into the uncharted beautiful fertile musky swamp of life, where creativity and eroticism and deep intelligence dwell.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Because I miss them. Because I need them. Because I love them.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“It kills me to think I didn't spot her headed for the rocks. Friends are supposed to act like harbor boats-let you know if you're off course.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“She breathed in the vast world of suffering and pure, dark love, and as she did, a well of compassion began to flow in her.”
― Rebecca Wells

“The notes danced through the June air; Vivi could feel them dust her hair and shoulders. She could feel the notes enter her and settle deep into her bones.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“In the crook of the crescent moon sits the Holy Lady, with strong muscles and a merciful heart. She kicks her her splendid legs like the moon is her swing and the sky, her front porch. She waves down at Sidda like she has just spotted an old buddy.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“A scent that disturbs me and delights me. It smells like ripe pears, vetiver, a bit of violet and something else- something spicy almost biting and exotic.”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

“Every time I thought that I was "put together," I realized that we're always putting ourselves together, gathering the world in, letting it sift down and form us.”
― Rebecca Wells, The Crowning Glory of Calla Lily Ponder

“Sometimes I wonder if any of us are cut out for the lives we lead.”
― Rebecca Wells, Little Altars Everywhere

“I live in an ocean of smell…”
― Rebecca Wells, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood Display