Brian Andreas Quotes

For a long time she flew, only when she thought no one else was watching.

Every day he stood in front of the Bank of America. You're trapped in the belly of a big pink pig, he said. We ignored him. We had work to do.

Opening a door to the mysteries, hoping to shed a little dark on all the stuff we think we know.

Aerobics:
Death take me now & spare me the pain, she said. It was difficult for me to get that excited. Get a grip, I said, it's only aerobics.

Hoping something will happen soon, so she can sit down & watch it with a fresh bowl of popcorn.

I spent a long time trying to find my center until I looked closely at it one night & found it had wheels and moved easily in the slightest breeze. So now I spend less time sitting and more time sailing.

There are things you do because they feel right and they may make no sense and they may make no money and it may be the real reason we are here: to love each other and to eat each other's cooking and say it was good.

Most people don't know there are angels whose only job is to make sure you don't get too comfortable & fall asleep & miss your life.

I didn't listen to her because she was my mother & wouldn't know anything until I was much older.

Trapped mainly by wanting things to be exactly as they are, only better

If you were smart, you'd probably spend more time stretching, he said & I said, If I were really smart, I'd probably spend more time just sitting in the shade drinking lemonade.

One Child:
I hope it will be said we taught them to stand tall & proud, even in the face of history & the future was made new & whole for us all, one child at a time.

Empty Spaces:
After his father died he carried his life more gently & left an empty space for the birds & other creatures.

I think my life would be easier, she said,
if I could just get my selves to agree on something.

Quiet Spaces
We had gone far enough together to listen easily in the quiet spaces.

Ten Commandments:
I asked her why she never told us about the Ten Commandments & she said she wasn't ever that good with numbers so she loved everything as best she could & I remember thinking who needs all those rules anyway with a mother like her around.

Waiting for the pen to dry up so he can start fresh with thoughts that are worth new ink.

I don't really like coffee, she said, but I don't really like it when my head hits my desk when I fall asleep either.

When I was 5, he said, my family forgot & left me at the fair. I wandered around in the bright sounds & smells of hot sawdust & cotton candy for hours. It was already too late by the time my parents found me.
I haven't been fit for decent society since.

Don't you hear it? She asked & I shook my head no & then she started to dance & suddenly there was music everywhere & it went on for a very long time & when I finally found words all I could say was thank you.

Real Reason:
There are things you do because they feel right & they may make no sense & they may make no money & it may be the real reason we are here: to love each other & to eat each other's cooking & say it was good.

There are days I drop words of comfort on myself like falling leaves and remember that it is enough to be taken care of by my self.

Songs to Herself:
She waved at all the people on the trains & later, when she saw they didn't wave back, she started singing songs to herself & it went that way the whole day & she couldn't remember having a better time in her life.

I once had a garden filled with flowers that grew only on dark thoughts but they need constant attention & one day I decided I had better things to do.

feels like some kind of ride but it's turning out just
to be life going absolutely perfectly

When she played her music even the night demons stopped their work & it took them some time to remember what it was they were doing & the best of them had no stomach for it for a long time after that.

Living Memory
I carry you with me into the world,
into the smell of rain
& the words that dance between people
& for me, it will always be this way,
walking in the light,
remembering being alive together

I used to believe my father about everything but then I had children myself & now I see how much stuff you make up just to keep yourself from going crazy.

I've read a lot of books, so I know bunches of stuff that sounds like it could be true.

If you're talking to a child, you're going, 'This is the wonder of science and here's why I'm so fascinated by it.'

Start here & go until you die, he said. What's so complicated about that?

In those days, we finally chose to walk like giants and hold the world in arms grown strong with love
And there may be many things we forget in the days to come,
But this will not be one of them.

When I first discovered the moon, he said, I gave it a different name. But everyone kept calling it the moon. The real name never caught on.

These are the multiple shadows because there were a lot of things she walked away from without a word of explanation when she was younger & she still thinks about them more than she needs to.

A few said they'd be horses. Most said they'd be some sort of cat. My friend said she'd like to come back as a porcupine. I don't like crowds, she said.

I used to wait for a sign, she said, before I did anything. Then one night I had a dream & an angel in black tights came to me & said, you can start any time now, & then I asked is this a sign? & the angel started laughing & I woke up. Now, I think the whole world is filled with signs, but if there's no laughter, I know they're not for me.

Invention:
I always wanted to invent something that would move around & make funny noises & would change the world as we know it & I forgot all about that until we had kids & now I see I came pretty close.

I still fly a lot in my dreams, she told us, but I try to stay close to the ground. At my age, a fall can be pretty serious.

She tapped her finger and nothing happened and she thought she had lost her magic, but it had only changed and it took her awhile to figure it out.

Someone asked them to be quiet, so it's just a matter of a time before all hell breaks loose.

When I die, she said, I am coming back as a tree with deep roots and I'll wave my leaves to the children every morning on their way to school & whisper tree songs at night in their dreams. Trees with deep roots know about the things that children need.

The first time her laughter unfurled its wings in the wind, we knew that the world would never be the same-

We sat in the car
& the night dropped
down until the
only sounds were
the crickets &
the dance of our voices
& for a moment
the world became
small enough to
roll back & forth
between us.

I buried a nickel under the porch when I was 8, she said, but one day my grandma died & they sold the house & I never got to go back for it.
A nickel used to mean something, I said.
She nodded. It still does, she said & then she started to cry.

That was the day the ancient songs of blood and war spilled from a hole in the sky
And there was a long moment as we listened and fell silent in our grief
and then one by one,
we stood tall
and came together
and began to sing of life and love and all that is good and true
And I will never forget that day when the ancient songs died because there was no one in the world to sing them.

When you start to crack open, don't waste a moment gathering your old self up into something like you knew before. Let your new self splash like sunlight into every dark place and laugh and cry and make sounds you never made & thank all that is holy for the gift ...

Thousand Moments:
I still remember the day the world took you back & there was never time to thank you for the thousand scattered moments you left behind to watch us while we slept.

She always camouflaged herself as a crowd. I've never been lonely, she said, but sometimes it's hard to think above the noise.

Single Mind:
If I love you with all my heart, she said, what will you give me? & then she stopped & said I didn't have to answer that because she was going to do it anyway.

She told me once that the year she went to England she painted her buttons yellow so she would remember what the sun felt like.

Today all I could remember was the way your body held the ocean of myself & for one moment there was only one us in all creation.

I like geography best, he said, because your mountains & rivers know the secret. Pay no attention to boundaries.

There is nothing more I ask of this life than this moment, exactly so. And suddenly forever seems like too short a time.

This used to be a mean monster until he got sick one winter with the flu & stayed in bed & watched too much Little House on the Prairie & now the littlest thing & he starts to cry.

More Fair:
They left me
with your shadow,
saying things like
Life is not fair
& I believed them
for a long time.
But today,
I remembered
the way you laughed
& the heat
of your hand
in mine
& I knew that
life is more fair
than we can
ever imagine
if
we are there to live it

Smaller World:
I know he's not really gone, she said, but the world still feels smaller to me today.

Favorite Places:
I'm not that good at being a tourist because I'm always looking at the way the light shines in your hair or the way your dress opens to the wind & my favorite places in the world are places filled with you.

Season of Joy:
She asked me when the season of joy was supposed to end & I said I didn't really think there was an exact date, so we left the tree up till June that year.

The Whole World:
My favorite thing
is being your lap
while we sit there
together & love
the whole world.

Once upon a time there was a boy who knew what he was going to be from the very moment he was born. As soon as he was able to talk, he told everyone, I am a builder of dreams. No one in his family had any idea what that meant, except maybe his Aunt Dorothy, who knew about dreams & how they form you into the thing you're going to be, even when you think you have other plans.

The rest of his family did things like work with numbers & fix old cars & bake bread in a bakery. When he first told them what he was going to be, they thought it was cute & then, when it didn't stop, it was something not to be mentioned at family gatherings & finally, it was something that would lead to personal suffering if he didn't start getting his head on straight, by god. So, he stopped saying it out loud, but he never forgot & when he got older, he moved away & his family told the neighbors he was working as a manager & every one nodded & was pleased that he'd finally come around to viewing life as it was & not how you wish it would be.

But he didn't really care because he was building things of air & sunlight & the laughter of children & the sharp smell of lighter fluid at a summer barbecue & the flash of color on the throat of a hummingbird & all of them were things that had no real name, but people felt them all the same. They felt them all the same...

They came to sit & dangle their feet off the edge of the world & after awhile they forgot everything but the good & true things they would do someday.

There was a single blue line of crayon drawn across every wall in the house. What does it mean? I asked. A pirate needs the sight of the sea, he said and then he pulled his eye patch down and turned and sailed away.

The Wonder of it All:
Sitting there in your pajamas & all the time in the world & if I could keep any moment it would be this: watching you & holding my breath with the wonder of it all.

Permanence:
Just because they die, she said, doesn't mean they go away.

She said she usually cried at least once each day not because she was sad, but because the world was so beautiful & life was so short.

My grandmother used to say life was so much easier when you were simple-minded.
It's taken me almost my whole life to understand what she meant.

Anyone can slay a dragon ... but try waking up every morning and loving the world all over again. That's what takes a real hero.

There came a moment in the middle of the song when he suddenly felt every heartbeat in the room & after that he never forgot that he was part of something much bigger

I'm an outsider by choice, she said, but I'm hoping that won't be my choice forever.

Last Minute:
I have to buy all my presents at the last minute, she said, or I get too excited & just give them away.

Is willing to accept that she creates her own reality except for some of the parts where she can't help but wonder what the hell she was thinking

Side by Side:
We sat side by side in the morning light & looked out at the future together.

The clock is a conspiracy & a crime against humanity
and I would not own one
except I miss appointments without it.

They came to sit & dangle their feet off the edge of the world & after awhile they forgot everything but the good & true things they would do someday.

This is a giant block of whatever is most difficult for you to carry & trust me on this, you'll carry it more times than you can count until you decide that's exactly what you want to do most & then it won't weigh a thing anymore

In the end, I think that I will like that we were sitting on the bed, talking & wondering where the time had gone.

I'm not sure if there's one right place I'm supposed to be, he said, but I know a couple of wrong places I'd give a second try in a heartbeat.

The World Itself:
When she held out her arms, the world itself wrapped around me & held me tight.

I have a renewed commitment to elegance, she said, in case you think I'm just spending money for the fun of it.

Such Small Things:
For a long time there were only your footprints & laughter in our dreams & even from such small things, we knew we could not wait to love you forever.

Resorting to connecting the dots this morning because it was a long night & he needs to do something really simple to get started again.

I should probably give up pretending I'm going to be somebody someday, he said, but a rich fantasy life is one of my best qualities.
- Fantasy Life

Hoping to Fall Out:
Leaning out as far as she can, hoping she'll fall soon, so she can stop worrying about whether it will happen or not.

He kept a piece of algae behind his ear to remind him of his roots. A million years ago every place was a little place by the sea, he would say & my mind would go blank & I would swim through the day without a care in the world & it all seemed so familiar that I knew I would go back someday to my own little place by the sea.

I've always liked the time before dawn because there's no one around to remind me who I'm supposed to be so it's easier to remember who I am.

What makes you an adult? he said & I said it's mainly a height requirement & the willingness to keep quiet when people say stupid things.
- Adult Club

Rules for making the world:
1. Stand up & do the thing you see needs doing.
2. That's it.
(If it was easy, we'd be having a different conversation.)
- Action Plan

The most important thing you leave behind is the stuff that turns into treasures when children find it

Quiet Prayer:
As long as the sun shall rise goes the old lovers vow. But we are children of a scientific age & have no time for poetry. Still, I offer a quiet prayer of thanks for the sunlight each time I see your face.

What I'm mostly good at is sleeping, he once told me in confidence, but he added, I don't see much future in it.

Partners:
Tied together by stuff too difficult to explain to someone new

What are the rules? I said & he said you run & you run & you run until you fall over. There's a couple others in there for variety, he added, but that's the main one.

Time stands still best in moments that look suspiciously like ordinary life.