Silas House > Quotes

“I had always found comfort in the leaves, in their silence. They were like a parchment that holds words of wisdom. Simply holding them in my hand gave me some of the peace a tree possesses. To be like that-to just be-that's the most noble thing of all.”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“Sometimes just being still is the best thing you can do for yourself.”
― Silas House, Eli the Good

“I've never understood why people run to get out of the rain in the summertime... People will drive miles and miles to go jump in a cool swimming hole, but when it rains, they scatter.”
― Silas House, Eli the Good

“Since that night I have come to understand that sometimes the best families of all are those we create ourselves, the people we choose to be with.”
― Silas House, Eli the Good

“I always tell my writing students that every good piece of writing begins with both a mystery and a love story. And that every single sentence must be a poem. And that economy is the key to all good writing. And that every character has to have a secret.”
― Silas House

“You are so good. So good, you’re always feeling so much. And sometimes it feels like you’re gonna bust wide open from all the feeling, doesn’t it? People like you are the best in the world, but you sure do suffer for it.”
― Silas House

“They are wildflowers. They would not want a name.”
― Silas House & Neela Vaswani, Same Sun Here

“Any two people can set and jaw all day long, but it takes two people right for each other to set together and just be quiet.”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“Maybe all the secrets of life were written on the surface of leaves, waiting to be translated. If I touched them long enough, I might be given some information no one else had.”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“In New York, the buildings are like mountains in some ways, but they are only alive because of the people living in them. Real mountains are alive all over.”
― Silas House, Same Sun Here

“Strange, how such a small realization can affect everyone's life forever. In movies there is always a carefully staged moment - a big crescendo of music, close- ups of the actors' faces, the camera slowly pulling away to let all this sink in for the viewer...but, in real life, most all of the extraordinary things happen with no more loudness than a whisper.”
― Silas House, Eli the Good

“Every morning I was renewed, though. Air and light healed me, over and over. I got to where I depended on it. When I was feeling my worst, I would step out into the yard and put my hands on the branches of the little redbud. It made me feel like I was saying a prayer, to do this. I know that sounds like foolishness, but that little tree was like an altar for me. I stood there in the cold of early winter, wishing for the redbud to bear leaves so that I might put my face against them.”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“Whole scenes of your life slip away forever if you don't put them down in ink.”
― Silas House, Eli the Good

“Now I had seen the grief of the two strongest people I knew. And somehow, Daddy's and Edie's crying made them seem even stronger to me. It was better to cry than to suck it up and go around conjuring hate in your heart”
― Silas House, Eli the Good

“I liked how your teacher said we were 'kindred spirits'. I looked that up on m-w .com and it says that means we are related spirits, like family who is not blood family. I told Mamaw this and she said, 'Sometimes that's the best family of all.”
― Silas House & Neela Vaswani, Same Sun Here

“Maybe all the trees were God.--A Parchment of Leaves”
― Silas House

“When he was nearly thirty-six, my brother Jem got his heart badly broken when his fourth marriage fell apart, mostly because his wife never could get used to Boo, who lived with them and creeped her out by making little wooden dolls of her and putting them in the hollow tree out front.”
― Silas House

“I wondered if we were put on this earth only to destroy every beautiful thing, to make chaos. Or were we meant to overcome this? Did bad things happen so that goodness could show through in people?”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“It seems like there are so many homesick people in the world. It seems like so many of us live far away from where we were born.”
― Silas House & Neela Vaswani, Same Sun Here

“Forgiveness is the easiest thing in the world, Justin thinks. All you do is just decide to do it, and then it’s done. Instantly you feel better, like pushing aside a quilt that is too heavy for sleeping. Forgetting is the hard part.”
― Silas House, Southernmost

“It’s more important to show him how to be good to people than how to judge them.”
― Silas House, Southernmost

“I appricated that Nell was talking to me like a grown-up, but I had no idea what she meant. Still, I could see that the words flowed together like water over a riverbed.”
― Silas House, Eli the Good

“Writing is a supernatural thing.”
― Silas House

“When they lived in Key West Justin thought the Everything lived in the ocean. Sometimes he thought the ocean was God. But if the Everything lives anywhere, it's in a river. Because the river moves along and touches every little thing on it's way. An he thinks the Everything would be quiet like a river. Event still sometimes. The ocean is always moving and noisy. The sky's always changing. But rivers are always there, even when the water has moved on. You've got to find the Everything wherever you are.”
― Silas House, Southernmost

“Since reading this book, everyone I pass on the street seems full of stories and dreams and a secret sadness.”
― Silas House & Neela Vaswani, Same Sun Here

“I wondered if the trees were God. They were like God in many respects: they stood silent, and most people only noticed them when the need arose.”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“When you have a child, you have to put things aside, though. You have to live for them, if not for yourself. I was aware of this. I knowed that I could not let myself die inside, so I struggled through and made a way for myself. Most important, I tried to find a way to get joy into my life. I made a way for the possibility of joy. I looked for it anywhere I could find it. I got up early and stepped out onto the porch to see day come in.”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“Autumn air is good for the lungs.”
― Silas House, A Parchment of Leaves

“There was some comfort in knowing that, although the world was being torn in two, there were still remarkable things that went on being, that refused to lose their shine. Some days it was only the wonder that kept us going.”
― Silas House, Lark Ascending

“…as long as there were still cedar trees and dogs, I reckoned I had a reason to keep going.”
― Silas House, Lark Ascending