Leaving Time

by Jodi Picoult

there’s an explanation for everything you see.

The moral of this story is that sometimes, you can attempt to make all the difference in the world, and it still is like trying to stem the tide with a sieve. The moral of this story is that no matter how much we try, no matter how much we want it … some stories just don’t have a happy ending.

Negative moments get remembered. Traumatic ones get forgotten, or so warped that they are unrecognizable, or else they turn into the big, bleak, white nothing I

When someone leaves you once, you expect it to happen again. Eventually you stop getting close enough to people to let them become important to you, because then you don’t notice when they drop out of your world.

we must admit there may be a few things that we are not supposed to know.

Either I can Go Positive—create a message from someone dead that anyone in their right mind would want to hear, such as Your grandfather wants you to know that he’s at peace, and he wants you to be at peace, too.

“When the body expires, it’s over. Done. Elvis has left the building. But the soul is still intact. If you’ve led a decent life and you don’t have a lot of regrets, you may hang around for a bit, but sooner or later you’ll finish the transition.” “Transition?”

if you want answers, you better be ready to hear them.”

But I know there are two ways to live: Jenna’s way, where you hang on to what you have in a death grip so you don’t lose it; or my way, where you walk away from everything and everyone that matters before they can leave you behind. Either way, you’re bound to be disappointed.

You know how sometimes you have a dream about someone from your past who you barely remember and whose name you couldn’t recall if your life depended on it? It means that you accessed that path serendipitously, and found a bit of buried treasure.

“If no one hears you, are you even talking?”

Maybe growing up is just focusing on what you’ve got, instead of what you don’t.

me. “I don’t know what would have been worse. Learning Alice was dead and couldn’t come home, or learning she was alive and didn’t want to.

I instruct: “ ‘I may not be Fred Flintstone, but I can make your Bed Rock.’ ”

said that when you’re a point, all you see is the point. When you’re a line, all you see is the line and the point. When you’re in three dimensions, you see three dimensions and lines and points. Just because we can’t see a fourth dimension doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It just means we haven’t reached it yet.”

People always think they’re going to be reunited with their loved ones for eternity, once they die. Let me tell you: It doesn’t work that way. The afterlife isn’t just a continuation of this one.

“I think grief is like a really ugly couch. It never goes away. You can decorate around it; you can slap a doily on top of it; you can push it to the corner of the room—but eventually, you learn to live with it.”

Don’t do any intentional harm to yourself or anyone else, and get happy.

One of the most amazing things about elephants mourning in the wild is their ability to grieve hard, but then truly, unequivocally, let go.

the energy sent out into the universe by a random thought can actually bring about an outcome.

A bruise is how the body remembers it’s been wronged.

“Sometimes I think there’s no such thing as falling in love. It’s just the fear of losing someone.”

Now, I have something to add to that. When you’re asleep, you think there’s a whole other world that feels completely real while you are dreaming it.

You have to find what’s lost.

Just because you leave someone doesn’t mean you ever let them go.

If you think about someone you’ve loved and lost, you are already with them. The rest is just details.