A Grandmother Begins the Story Quotes

“Different ways to tell a story. Some tellers make a noise to announce the coming of the story for get someone else to call everyone's attention. Some wait for people to gather around, for the quiet to settle. Others just begin. They don't wait for everyone to lean in - that'll happen soon enough. They don't speak loudly or even want everyone to hear. Those that hear are the ones the story was meant for.”
― Michelle Porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story

“People get themselves ready to die. They start going through their memories and bringing out their stories one by one as if there was a photo album in their head and they've got to get through it before leaving. They want to move those stories around, make them mean something. They want it all to mean something. For some people, they can't stand the meaning of their lives and they think they can make up for it real quick at the end. It's like they reach out to grab what isn't theirs to take.”
― michelle porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story

“But regret is worth nothing because you can’t be walking all the paths or you wouldn’t be walking any path at all.”
― Michelle Porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story: A Novel

“The part of you that’s still thinking about living, reach into that. All I know to say is we’ve got to play our music no matter who leaves us and no matter who fails us, no matter the memories preying on us in the small hours of the night.”
― Michelle Porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story: A Novel

“Hope can be a lie. It can be an awful thing, in my opinion. But this wasn’t a false hope. This was real.”
― Michelle Porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story: A Novel

“People get themselves ready to die. They start going through their memories and bringing out their stories one by one as if there was a photo album in their head and they’ve got to get through it before leaving. They want to move those stories around, make them mean something. They want it all to mean something. For some people, they can’t stand the meaning of their lives and they think they can make up for it real quick at the end. It’s like they reach out to grab what isn’t theirs to take.”
― Michelle Porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story: A Novel

“Light the smudge, breathe deep, from this sacred tobacco, cedar, sweetgrass, and sage, burn all jealousy and hatred from this earth. O sacred smoke, make the world and us whole again; we women, this is what we do: sew and smudge, make the ugly, beautiful.”
― Michelle Porter, A Grandmother Begins the Story: A Novel