Beyond That, the Sea Quotes

“We love people for all sorts of different reasons and in all sorts of different ways, she says. Remember that. And it only gets better, the older you get. Young love isn’t necessarily the best love.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“There’s something to be said for talking while walking. You don’t have to look at the person. You can keep your eyes on the path, on your shoes, on the landscape. And somehow that means that more gets said.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“So many things she would have done differently. Regret, she has found, is the loud thing that’s left.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“When you look back, it’s so easy to see the path that you’ve traveled. But looking forward, there are only dreams and fears.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“Oh, why can’t time be stopped in those moments. Why is it so hard to understand how fleeting it all is?”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“Some secrets are weights to be borne. Others are gifts, little bits of warmth, to be revisited again and again. No one else ever needed to know. No one else had the right to know. It was theirs and theirs alone. In the navy darkness he saluted to the east.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“She’s anxious for them to leave, but she knows she will spend all day waiting for them to return.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“why can’t time be stopped in those moments. Why is it so hard to understand how fleeting it all is?”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“Some secrets are weights to be borne. Others are gifts, little bits of warmth, to be revisited again and again. No one else ever needed to know. No one else had the right to know. It was theirs and theirs alone.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“He’d never thought of it like that. The thanks part of the holiday. It was a day, a nice day, to get together with everyone. A day when Father was too distracted to be annoyed with him. But he wasn’t sure his family felt thankful.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“It's a nice thought, though, isn't it? ... Dead or alive, we carry these people with us.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“She often finds it hard to reconcile the girl she was then with the adult she is now.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“When anticipation is everything. When everything is new. When there are no consequences, when there is no after.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“Better, always, to protect one’s heart.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“death has a way of providing freedom.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“William wrote down a list a few years ago of all the ways he would be a better parent.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“All Beatrix wanted to do was to be outside, to walk and walk and walk. She didn't want to be on the subway or in a taxi or on a bus. She wanted to walk until she became part of the city, until her feet simply gave out.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“They walk back through the cemetery along the winding paths, the occasional breeze blowing only the highest branches of the trees.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“This ocean that she’s swimming in right now, the ocean that separates her from them, has grown wider over the past year. That life, that girl has begun to evaporate.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“Do you think, Millie says, these people even know there’s a war on? That people are dying every day?”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“What’s your favorite part, she asks. The cousins? The food? The thanks? The thanks.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“What must this be like for her? To be sent away from home, by yourself? Nancy wonders what kind of a parent could make this choice, although she knows she has no idea what it’s like to live through a war.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“Better that she go to America, he thought, where the fingers of war were less likely to touch her. But he never told her that he’d forced Millie’s hand. He let her believe it was Millie’s choice.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“Some secrets are weights to be borne. Others are gifts, little bits of warmth, to be revisited again and again.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“She was struck, whenever she saw the island from the mainland, by how different it was when seen from afar. It was beautiful, a blurry patch of green, caught up between the ocean and the sky. It was also so small that she could hold it in the palm of her hand. When they were on the island, though, she was the one who was small; it was her whole world. It was as though nowhere else existed.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“He doesn't want to go inside. Here, the view is the same, and he knows, when he steps inside, things will be different.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea

“It's a nice thought, though, isn't it? ... Dead or alive, we carry this people with us.”
― Laura Spence-Ash, Beyond That, the Sea