Ducks, Newburyport Quotes

“the fact that you’ll never know what sort of person you might have been if you’d read different stuff”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that there are times, maybe the most unlikely times, that you realize you're simply thrilled to be alive, and what a great piece of luck it is just to be a part of things, to have a body, so you can feel and see and walk the earth, for just a little while”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that we all go on pretending things are fine, hoping everything’s a-okay, even though everything is nowhere near okay and we all know it, no matter how many candlelit vigils you hold”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“he fact that there seems to be no problem in America that can’t be solved by murdering your whole family or your boss or a whole crowd of strangers, and maybe yourself”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that two whole jars of bay leaves is really like a lifetime’s supply, the fact that I wonder if every household has too many bay leaves, the fact that the number of bay leaves you own can easily get out of hand,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that it’s unbelievable but every single thing alive has its own center of being, and looks out on the world from that point of view, even a worm, or a jellyfish, hamsters, owls, the fact that even a leaf has feelings, the fact that you know the leaves are enjoying this warm sun going right through them,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“...the fact that there’s a lot you have to blank out if you want to get through life...”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that nothing you do seems innocent anymore”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that I'd happily do just about anything for people, anything, even spend time with them, if they'd just stop hurting my feelings”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that a real apocalypse would be such a vindication, if you’d spent all this dough getting ready for it,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that a police officer on TV said what used to be a fist fight or road rage is now a shooting, and what used to be a domestic dispute is now a gun rampage, and what used to be a tardy or disruptive student is now a school shooter, the fact that the police aren’t much better themselves, the fact that what used to be an arrest or a warning is now a split-second execution”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that now it’s Philip Glass on the radio, the fact that I wonder how many people in Ohio care about Philip Glass,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“dogs can be trained to predict their owners' epileptic fits, but not the other way around”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that I really need a professional declutterer, or at least a book on decluttering from the library, unless they've decluttered the library too and have no books anymore”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that Stacy seems to feel some kind of rapport with that woebegone creature, the fact that whether this is because she feels fierce and free, or caged and cowed, doesn’t bear thinking about.”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that if we all blow ourselves to smithereens, at least Pepito has existed, and that is good, the fact that it’s just plain good he was in the world,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that I'd really like to be reading Persuasion right now instead of latticing pies, the fact that I never seem to get past Anne’s first reunion with Captain Wentworth lately, because Jake interrupts, the fact that all the older kids were the same, the fact that I have to hide out like Anne Frank almost, to read anything, the fact that I should have a little closet to go to, with a chair, a lamp, and a lock on the door, the fact that I guess it’s called a bathroom,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that we like Julie & Julia, only we just hate the Julie bits, the fact that why couldn’t they have just made a movie about Julia Child”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that maybe men think if they just name everything, everything’ll be okay, the fact that it’s like dogs marking their territory”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“their phones actually, trying to get inside them somehow,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“He photographed it, but it was kind of hard to make it out, like those 3D pictures I just can’t do, Duck Family Rescued From Pool, the fact that the Ackroyds kept finding dead field mice in their little pond, the fact that they came to drink and fell in and couldn’t get out, the fact that they should’ve put in some little mouse stairs.”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“Italians answer the phone, “Pronto,” the fact that Mommy never knew what to say when they said that, the fact that she struggled with Italian during that year in Rome, poor duck.”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that most people live and die where they were born, or they leave home and live somewhere else for decades but come back to pass away, like migrating birds”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“The fact that I try to bear grudges but in the end the original reason for it drifts away and I´m left with just a sort of negative feeling about someone, but no evidence, and I don´t know whether to carry on the grudge or not.”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“The fact that Open Carry-type guys are always quoting from the Bible, and you get tired of hearing it all, the fact that can´t they read something else once in a while, like Babar or something, or Winesburg Ohio, maybe some Jane Austen”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“...but going through old photos just makes me paralytically sad, and I don't really have time to get frozen to the spot, weeping over old photos, most days anyway, the fact that I think you can overdo remembering stuff, you really can...the fact that I remember Declan Kieberds talk at Notre Dame... and he said people fetishize the past...the fact that I can't understand people who want to go over and over old times, getting all nostalgic and stuff, the fact that I'm scared of old times, the fact that old times are soggy, saggy cradles of regret...”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that I think I’m getting Resignation Syndrome”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that who can relax”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“hydrangea,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport

“the fact that it’s kind of strange for a government to poison its own people,”
― Lucy Ellmann, Ducks, Newburyport