The Evening Chorus Quotes

“Time doesn’t really soften anything. Memories heave up, you know. Still sharp.”
“Forgetting takes practice,” says Enid. “You have to work at it.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“The truth is that you do forget people. When you conjure them up, long after they have gone, you can’t recall the essence of them, just the outline.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Another time might be easier than this one, but there’s only the time you’re in, thinks Enid. And it’s always going to be lacking somehow. Best to spend some of your moments here on earth noticing what else is here with you instead of concentrating solely on your own misery.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“The strong don't necessarily survive, but the mean invariably do.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“The truth is that you do forget people. When you conjure them up, long after they have gone, you can't recall the essence of them, just the outline.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“You can't undo actions with words.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Perhaps effort doesn't matter, it isn't what ensures survival.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“If you pretend to feel a certain way, eventually you do feel that way.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“This is the problem with time…It doesn't follow its own rules. It stretches or compresses at will. It's either a lingering house guest or an escape artist.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“I like the candor of dogs. They're always honest about what they're feeling.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“It’s so hard to get life right, she thinks, pulling the blanket tight around her shoulders. All the small balances are impossible to strike most of the time. And then there are the larger choices.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Each little flower has a history and cultural references, is a superstition or a cure for something.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“All those days of walking the heath, collecting her specimens, reinforced in her a need to look to the natural world for her own location. Now, even in London, she is constantly searching out the trees and grass, the flowers, to determine her position in the urban landscape. She looks to the natural world to guide her in how she moves through the city, in how she thinks about her own life.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Flight is not the astonishing thing. I have always thought that the miracle of birds is not that they fly, but that they touch down.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“This is why James likes birds- because they are all possibility. They make a line in the aid, the invisible line of their flight, and this line can join up with other lines or lead somewhere entirely new. All you have to do is believe that the line exists and learn how to follow it. And sometimes life will make this same invisible line for him, make him see where he came from, what he is attached to.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Forgetting takes practice…You have to work at it.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Time doesn't really soften anything. Memories heave up, you know.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Loneliness is sometimes cured by visiting with people, and sometimes it's made worse by the same thing.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“It's better to have no secrets. Lies are always harder to manage than the truth.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“The period before something learns to be afraid is the most dangerous of all, because it is then the creatures are the most vulnerable.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“It’s so hard to get life right, she thinks, pulling the blanket tight around her shoulders. All the small balances are impossible to strike most of the time. And then there are the larger choices. It’s hopeless. She might as well be one of those gannets, tossed about by the gusts of wind that drive up from the Atlantic.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“If you pretend to feel a certain way, eventually you do feel that way. That has been a surprisingly pleasant lesson to learn in life.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Sometimes life seems very unfair.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus

“Enid had sent Rose a card with the words “I’m sorry” on it. She hadn’t known what else to say because at that point she wasn’t sure James knew anything about Toby Halliday. But now she wishes that she had said something else. Now that she’s in love again herself—a complete surprise really, after all this time, and with someone she never expected to be in love with—Enid would tell Rose that she understands love is never the same. You can love different people over the course of a lifetime, but you won’t love any two of them the same way, and quite frankly, you will love some of them more than others. A great deal more. If Toby was that to Rose—if he was the one she loved the most—then Enid would have said to her, “You will continue. But you will not recover. Don’t expect that.”
― Helen Humphreys, The Evening Chorus