Aaron Hartzler Quotes

The closer you look, the more you see.

Learning how to walk away uses a different set of muscles, new ones that I haven't yet developed.

Why do you like birds so much?' I asked.
A look of pity flitted over her face, followed by a smile. 'Because they can fly, silly.

Some moments should only be recorded in our hearts.

What about me?" I choke. "Do you owe me something? I was just as wasted as she was. Why do I get driven home and kept safe but not her? Why not just leave me to Dooney and Deacon and the boys in the basement?

Not being able to say no isn't the same as saying yes.

Fear is the reason I can't let this go, either. It's the reason Rachel needs to believe that whatever happened is Stacey's fault. It's why she insists that we're all very different from Stacey. Because the truth is that if it could happen to Stacey, it could happen to any of us. By

will be boys' is what people say to excuse guys when they do something awful.

Given enough time, everything changes. Maybe this sense of how fragile our connections are is what makes us obsessed with saving them - writing them down, taking pictures, recording them in tweets, documenting them with status updates and videos. It is clear to me now that when the earth does move beneath our feet - when our hearts slam and scrape and break apart - when we barely survive the flood, we take precautions. We

Sometimes I get the feeling [my parents have] asked me to hold this big invisible secret for them, like a backpack full of rocks--all these things they don't want to know about themselves. I'm supposed to wear it as I hike up this trail toward my adulthood. They're already at the summit of Full Grown Mountain. They're waiting for me to get there and cheering me on, telling me I can do it, and sometimes scolding and asking why I'm not hiking any faster or why I'm not having more fun along the way. I know I'm not supposed to talk about this backpack full of their crazy, but sometimes I really wish we could all stop for a second. Maybe they could walk down the trail from the top and meet me. We could unzip that backpack, pull out all of those rocks, and leave the ones we no longer need by the side of the trail. It'd make the walk a lot easier. Maybe then my shoulders wouldn't get so tense when Dad lectures me about money or Mom starts a new diet she saw on the cover of a magazine at the grocery store.

Sometimes, change happens over eons. Other times, in the blink of an eye.

I want to tell her that I don't think a book from the Bronze Age is a good enough reason to relegate women to the role of "helpers" for all time.

There's no going back. Once you know something for sure, the only path through it is forward. Alfred

Why does everybody say 'feminist' that way?" "What way?" "The way Dooney kept saying 'herpes' after health class last year. Like it's this terrible, unspeakable thing.

Don't judge a book by its cover. Mom is always saying that, but most of the time, I think that's exactly what people are asking us to do: Please. Judge me by my cover. Judge me by exactly what I've worked so hard to show you.