Nicholas Souter

“Which is the greater sin? To care too much? Or too little?”
― K. Ritz, Sheever's Journal, Diary of a Poison Master

“When does the enchantment start?
We were sitting side by side, facing the mountains.
"It started when the earth was born." Her eyes was closed. Her face was golden in the setting sun. "It never stops. It is, always. It's just here."
So what do we do?"
She smiled. "That's the secret." Her cupped hands rested in her lap. "We do nothing. Or as close to nothing as we can." Her face turned slowly to me, though her eyes remained closed. "Have you ever done nothing?"
I laughed. "My mother thinks I do it all the time."
"Don't tell her I said so, but your mother is wrong." She turned back to the sun. "It's really hard to do nothing totally. Even just sitting here, like this, our bodies are churning, our minds are chattering. There's a whole commotion going on inside of us."
"That's bad?" I said.
"It's bad if we want to know what's going on outside ourselves."
"Don't we have eyes and ears for that?"
She nodded. "They're okay most of the time. But sometimes they just get in the way. The earth is speaking to us, but we can't hear because of all the racket our senses are making. Sometimes we need to erase them, erase our senses. Then maybe the earth will touch us. The universe will speak. The stars will whisper.”
― Jerry Spinelli, Stargirl

“You have to sit with your longing and know that you may not get what you want; you have to encounter the danger of longing for something without the expectation of getting your desire.”
― Philippa Gregory, The Lady of the Rivers

“  Mary fought a savage impulse to slam the door on the couple. But they were too interesting to ignore in the circumstances of the murder. She caught sight of Richard spitting out a mouthful of hair.”
― Susan Rowland, Murder on Family Grounds