Cottonwood Quotes

“Strange, how the world could move on even when it had been shaken to its foundations.”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“Well? Sanford prompted. She looked at him.

"Well what?"

"What was the point? Why did you do this?"

She stared at him in obvious confusion. "I wanted to help."

"Shouldn't that count for something?”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“I should hate to see our own race judged by the darkest deeds of the worst men at the most evil hours of our history.”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“I wanted to help."
"Shouldn't that count for something?"
"What, just wanting to?" She shook her head, leaning away from him. "I know people say that it's the thought that counts, but here in the real world, good intentions are about as useful as fairy wands and wishes. Nothing matters but what a person does."
"I don't agree," he said simply.”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“Beginning the day in a bad mood made it awfully easy to find reasons to stay there.”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“I’m sorry things went so wrong,” she said. “It was pretty silly of me to think it wouldn’t.”
“Yes,” he replied, so matter-of-factly that she felt her cheeks glowing a little. “But it was a good thing while it lasted. Even the smallest good things matter, Sarah.”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“I will say only that First Contact did not bring aids to end world hunger or cure disease, only the great responsibility—and great cost—of housing nearly half a million refugees. And so was born the International Bureau of Immigration.”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“Discouragement and love, what else were big sisters for?”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood

“Sarah indulged in a few more of these bleak thoughts, but just the fact that she could indulge in them while lying in her memory-gel bed in the back of her two-bedroom house with her Konaluv waiting for her to come into the kitchen and ask it for some coffee made her feel even worse.

And what good did that do? Whether or not she slept in a bed or drank coffee made no difference to the living conditions in Cottonwood, or any other camp, for that matter.

Feeling bad didn't fix anything.”
― R. Lee Smith, Cottonwood