Stone Work Quotes

“Snow falling in the woods when there’s no wind is the most peaceful thing I’ve ever seen.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life

“On the solstice: “The tilting of the earth may very well have stopped at the winter solstice, creaking to a halt and starting back the other way, but I was down in the basement at the time, running a power saw, and didn’t hear a thing.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life

“Joinery, it now occurs to me, must be the foundation of all craft. You put two things together to make something else, to accomplish some purpose; the better they fit, or work together, the greater the pleasure from the making.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life

“[A]s my breath begins to quiet in the silent woods, I pick up a squeaking, creaking sound, growing steadily louder, that makes the hair stand up on the back of my neck. I snap my head up and overhead, oh my God, here comes three hundred, five hundred, a thousand Canada geese, maybe fifteen hundred, stretching across the sky in a succession of vees. Largest flight I’ve ever seen. Underlit from reflection off the snow, a skyful of silver arrowheads, bound due north for the summer to come. A skyful of physiology, riding the physics of the air toward the pole. Riches, riches, everywhere, just for the paying of attention.”
― John Jerome, Stone Work: Reflections on Serious Play and Other Aspects of Country Life