Mattie Quotes

You know, it's kind of hard because I really - I see kids on their Rollerblades and their bikes, and just running around, climbing trees, and I used to do that. And I loved doing that. ~ Mattie Stepanek

She smiles at me and then goes over to stand in front of the light. She tells me one thing before she walks into that glowing warmth. "I'm not your mother, Mattie. ~ Apryl Baker

To save myself, I would try to summon up a vision of Mattie, but I could not see her. I could not imagine her. Some nights in the midst of this loneliness I swung among the scattered stars at the end of the thin thread of faith alone.
And then I would wake up and be in awe to see the daylight coming and my old familiar workaday life taking shape again in the dear world. Coherence and clarity returned. I could imagine myself again. I could imagine Mattie Chatham. I could imagine Port William. ~ Wendell Berry

Mattie loves to read. Was born to read. I love to listen to Mattie read. The way her voice rises two octaves above everyone else's. The way the words collide-an endless train of sounds that doesn't require breath. ~ Carmen Rodrigues

Mattie was a grown woman in love, and they had to let her go, with their blessing, enduring what could not be helped. And there was no use in thinking of that fluid, glistening instant that always seems, in looking back, to have come between what might have happened and what happened, when one might have made some little choice that would have changed forever the course of things. ~ Wendell Berry

I write to express my thoughts, my feelings. I want people to think. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Unity is strength ... when there is teamwork and collaboration, wonderful things can be achieved. ~ Mattie J.T. Stepanek

He kissed her violently, wanting to somehow inhale her into himself, unable to stop the fury of his reaction, the trembling rocking hunger for her - so vast and all-encompassing, he couldn't stand it.
Mattie, flowing all around him, met his savagery. He clasped her hips hard against him, found himself biting her neck, laving her breasts with his tongue. He felt such unblunted, furious desire he thought he might die of it. ~ Barbara Samuel

Yeah, Mel! If she shoves you again, smack her in the face!" bellowed Mika.
Kira glared at Mika.
"I mean, beat her in the race! ~ Katie Mattie

Oh, take the liberty! That's what I would have done if Ethan and Mattie had run off together and left me on this forsaken farm. I would have packed my satchel and my portmanteau and climbed aboard a train bound West, and gazed out the window at what there was to see across this vast country. City spires in the midst of wheatfields, and miles of chards with fruit on the bough, and high bridges over broad rivers, and mountains of clouds the likes of which I'd never seen, and birds of a kind I'd never seen before. And there'd be a city where I'd stay, and there'd be an old couple in a fine house of many rooms, and I'd tend them and see
they kept neat, and on my days off I'd wind my black hair in a fashionable way with tortoiseshell combs, and hold my head high, and go out to see what that city had to offer. ~ Gina Berriault

Closing her eyes for a moment against the pain and loss, Carrie asked quietly, "And what if I don't feel any forgiveness for her?" Softly, Mattie whispered, ~ Suzanne Woods Fisher

Then Mattie journeyed away from her home toward freedom and her family, leaving behind the bones of generations of her ancestors and their captors ~ Laila Ibrahim

I have a song deep in my heart, And only I can hear it. If I close my eyes and sit very still ... It is so easy to listen to my song. When my eyes are open and I am so Busy and moving and busy, If I take time and listen very hard, I can still hear my Heartsong. It makes me feel happy. Happier than ever. Happier than everywhere And everything and everyone In the whole wide world. Happy like thinking about Going to Heaven when I die. My Heartsong sounds like this: I love you! I love you! How happy you can be! How happy you can make this whole World be. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Mattie," he said silently to no one in the room, "you're a little girl. But nobody stays a little girl or a little boy long - take me, for instance. All of a sudden little girls wear lipstick, all of a sudden little boys shave and smoke. So it's a quick business, being a kid. Today you're ten years old, running to meet me in the snow, ready, so ready, to coast down Spring Street with me; tomorrow you'll be twenty, with guys sitting in the living room waiting to take you out. All of a sudden you'll have to tip porters, you'll worry about expensive clothes, meet girls for lunch, wonder why you can't find a guy who's right for you. And that's all as it should be. But my point, Mattie - if I have a point, Mattie - is this: kind of try to live up to the best that's in you. If you give your word to people, let them know that they're getting the word of the best. If you room with some dopey girl at college, try to make her less dopey. If you're standing outside a theater and some old gal comes up selling gum, give her a buck if you've got a buck - but only if you can do it without patronizing her. That's the trick, baby. I could tell you a lot, Mat, but I wouldn't be sure that I'm right. You're a little girl, but you understand me. You're going to be smart when you grow up. But if you can't be smart and a swell girl, too, then I don't want to see you grow up. Be a swell girl, Mat. ~ J.D. Salinger

Mattie felt drained, as though someone had stood her on her head and poured her entire heart and soul right out of her body. ~ Cathie Pelletier

Keep all special thoughts and memories for lifetimes to come. Share these keepsakes with others to inspire hope and build from the past, which can bridge to the future. ~ Mattie J.T. Stepanek

I would not have lasted a minute, literally a minute, on this Earth without God and angels by my side, because I was born. And right as I was born, I went into a respiratory arrest. So, big things that keep me going are friends and family, God. And another thing is looking forward to what's going to happen tomorrow. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Even though the future seems far away, it is actually beginning right now. ~ Mattie J.T. Stepanek

We still can't see you!" groaned Alice.
"How do we fix that?" asked Melanie.
"I don't know...think visible thoughts," said Colleen.
"Think visible thoughts?" yelled Melanie.
"Actually, that might work. Do it Izzy, ~ Katie Mattie

The big television crouched in the shadowy beam of the porch light. Mattie could see its black, open face, and she felt as though she were looking into the mouth of a deep, dangerous cave. ~ Cathie Pelletier

I never question God. Sometimes I say, 'Why me? Why do I have such a hard life? Why do I have this disease? Why do I have siblings who died?' But then I think and say, 'Why not me?' ~ Mattie Stepanek

His mouth was wet and hot and intensely demanding, so sharp and piercing with need that it broke through Mattie's defenses the way nothing else could have. A burst of excruciating hunger made her almost frantic with wanting him. She shifted in his arms and met his kiss wide open, giving as furiously as she took.
"Oh, Mattie," he said against her mouth. "I've never wanted a woman in my life like I want you. You're driving me crazy. ~ Barbara Samuel

It doesn't matter how you pray. Just pray. All religions are beautiful and they all have one common belief. There's something bigger and greater than us that can give us and take from us life. It is better than the here and now. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Seeing Mattie sitting across from me was a new kind of pain. She put on a good face for me, ~ Ravi Howard

Remember to play after every storm. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Every year, once a year, in Maryland, I go for a week and overnight camp with about 50 to 60 kids with muscular dystrophy, all ages, seven to 21. And it is really fun. I have some great friends there and wonderful counselors. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Make them care, Mattie,' she said softly. 'And don't you ever be sorry.'
-Emily Wilcox ~ Jennifer Donnelly

Goebbels was known for his wit; Martha, for a time, considered him charming. "Infectious and delightful, eyes sparkling, voice soft, his speech witty and light, it is difficult to remember his cruelty, his cunning destructive talents." Her mother, Mattie, always enjoyed being seated next to Goebbels at banquets; Dodd considered him "one of the few men with a sense of humor in Germany ~ Erik Larson

Mattie sat at the table, obsessing, orbiting around herself. She was sick of her worried, hostile mind. It would have killed her long before, she felt, if it hadn't needed the transportation. ~ Anne Lamott

She was Mattie Tucker now, mother of three and a good forty pounds heavier, casting that burning eye over them all, reaching way back for a southern pleasantry that was more like a Halloween apple with a razor blade in it: 'Well, don't y'all make just the perfect family of four? ~ John Burnham Schwartz

Mattie watched him cross the clearing with long-limbed ease, his movements loose and calm. His hair shone in the sunlight. Her heart caught. Strider.
Yes, she loved him. It wasn't logical or sensible or anything of those other things. He was not the kind of man she'd daydreamed about all of her life, safe and stolid and dependable, but he was the one. The One. ~ Barbara Samuel

I'll bet you want to know how a person like Stocky can be thrown into a debtors' prison, something this country outlawed about two hundred years ago. Right?" Samantha slowly nodded. Mattie continued, "More than likely, you're also certain that throwing someone in jail because he cannot pay a fine or a fee violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. And, you are no doubt familiar with the 1983 Supreme Court decision, the name escapes me right now, in which the Court ruled that before a person can be thrown in jail for not paying a fine it must be proven that he or she was willfully not paying. In other words, he could pay but he refused. All this and more, right? ~ John Grisham

Wars should be fought with words, not bombs, not weapons. And calm words. I think that wars should be fought over a chessboard and a cup of something to drink. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Well, it seems to me that there are books that tell stories, and then there are books that tell truths ... The first kind, they show you life like you want it to be. With villains getting what they deserve and the hero seeing what a fool he's been and marrying the heroine and happy endings and all that ... But the second kind, they show you life more like it is ... The first kind makes you cheerful and contented, but the second kind shakes you up. ~ Jennifer Donnelly

She breathed deeply of the freedom she found in Mattie's presence. Here she had no choice but to be herself. The carefully erected decoys she was constantly shuffling and changing to fit the situation were of no use here. Etta and Mattie went way back, a singular term that claimed co-knowledge of all the important events in their lives and almost all of the unimportant ones. And by rights of this possession, it tolerated no secrets. ~ Gloria Naylor

But my point, Mattie - if I have a point, Mattie - is this: kind of try to live up to the best that's in you. If you give your word to people, let them know that they're getting the word of the best. If you room with some dopey girl at college, try to make her less dopey. If you're standing outside a theater and some old gal comes up selling gum, give her a buck if you've got a buck - but only if you can do it without patronizing her. That's the trick, baby.' -Last Day of the Last Furlough ~ J.D. Salinger

I read it: "A man earned daily for 5 days and 3 times as much as he paid for his board, after which he was obliged to be idle 4 days," it said. "Upon counting his money after paying for his board he found that he had 2 ten-doller bills and 4 dollers. How much did he pay for the board, and what were his wages?"
"All right. Think now," Weaver said. "How would you begin to solve it? What's your X?"
I thought. Very hard. For quite some time. About the man and his meager wages and shabby boardinghouse and lonely life. "Where did he work?" I finally asked.
"What? It doesn't matter, Matt. Just assign an X to-"
"A mill, I bet," I said, picturing the man's threadbare clothing, his worn shoes. "A woolen mill. Why do you think he was obliged to be idle?"
"I don't know why. Look, just-"
"I bet he got sick," I said, clutching Weaver's arm. "Or maybe business wasn't good, and his boss had no work for him. I wonder if he had a family in the country. It would be a terrible thing, wouldn't it, if he had children to feed and no work? Maybe his wife was poorly, too. And I bet he had..."
"Damn it, Mattie, this is algebra, not composition!" Weaver said, glaring at me.
"Sorry," I said, feeling like a hopeless case. ~ Jennifer Donnelly

The way of life is not as easy as some people think ... like me. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Sunset is still my favorite color, and rainbow is second. ~ Mattie Stepanek

My disease is a very rare form of muscular dystrophy, called disautonomic mitochondrial myopathy. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Do you see those dull stars?" She outlined the formation with her finger.
"A pentagram," whispered Scott.
"Yes, but not just any pentagram. Take a look through the telescope."
Scott approached the eyepiece.
"They're not stars!"
"What do they look like?" asked Jenn.
Scott studied each of the figures.
"It can't be," he stuttered. "Planets?"
"Exactly what I thought."
"But how? They're completely off their orbits."
"The earth's off its axis."
"Mount Etna erupted."
"Greece had a earthquake."
"The whole universe has gone mad!" Scott exclaimed.
"And my friends have supernatural powers," said Jenn. ~ Katie Mattie

People will come up to me everywhere and say, 'Ah, I saw you on 'Larry King,' and, 'Ah, I saw you on 'Oprah.' And it's really nice, and a lot of people say, 'Is it a pain?' And I say 'No.' And it's not annoying. ~ Mattie Stepanek

If you live feeling like
Your glass is half empty, well,
It may as well be empty all the way. ~ Mattie J.T. Stepanek

This is as true a story as has ever been told: the story of my love for Mattie, and, I suppose, her love for me in return. ~ Laila Ibrahim

If you have enough breath to complain about anything, you have more than enough reason to give thanks about something. ~ Mattie Stepanek

A heartsong doesn't have to be a song in your heart. It doesn't have to be talking about love and peace. It can just be your message. It can be your feeling. Some people might even call it a conscience, even though that's not really what it is. It's your message, what you feel like you need to do. ~ Mattie Stepanek

I think that someone is watching out for me, God, my guardian angel, I'm not sure who that is, but they really work hard. ~ Mattie Stepanek

I want to keep publishing books, and writing and spreading my heartsong through the world. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Step One: Grab Mattie. Step Two: Run. It wasn't much of a plan. But what it lacked in potential it made up for in simplicity. ~ Ted Rabinowitz

Sad things happen. They do. But we don't need to live sad forever. ~ Mattie J.T. Stepanek

I choose to live until death, not spend the time dying until death occurs. ~ Mattie Stepanek

The man was in his late thirties, with coarse black hair and a powerfully angled face. The horse with him made a sudden noise, a high whining sound, and its graceful head tossed, jerked. The man let the reins go, and the horse galloped to the fence where Zeke stood waiting.
Mattie glanced at him. He'd climbed onto the fence and leaned over the top, softly whistling a series of notes. On his face was an expression Mattie had never seen - equal parts joy and sorrow. ~ Barbara Samuel

Mattie once asked me ... she'd just come home flush from a crush on Jonah Sweeten and asked me how you know when you like someone, and if I liked any boys like she did, and I didn't know what tot tell her. That I tried not to think about that kind of stuff, because it was painful, because I thought I could ever have it, but when I did end up liking someone, it always made me ache right down to my core. I realized pretty early on that the who didn't really matter so much. That anybody who listens to me, I end up loving them just a little. ~ Courtney Summers

I think I may have to grow up without growing old. I think we're going to have to define differently what I'm going to be. We're going to have to define my growing up differently. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Mattie sticks out her tongue, and I take that as my dismissal. ~ Jill Hathaway

Is there no peace for the naked?" Sister Mattie wore a bed cap of sensible white lace.
"I think you mean peace for the wicked," corrected Lady Linette ...
"Why would that apply?" asked Sister Mattie, before closing her door on both the problem and the noise. ~ Gail Carriger

Fran? Frances Hill, you stop that right now! What the devil's got into you? Ada, you should be ashamed! Braying like a mule, you are! And you, Mattie Gokey ... would you like to tell me what could possibly be so funny? ~ Jennifer Donnelly

We all have life storms, and when we get the rough times and we recover from them, we should celebrate that we got through it. No matter how bad it may seem, there's always something beautiful that you can find. ~ Mattie Stepanek

One of the things I most wanted to do in New York was to go to a performance by Martha Graham. For me, she's Miss Mattie T. Graham. I thought she needed something in the middle. If she's going to be an honorary Southerner, she's got to have something in the middle, so I just put an initial T and a period. ~ Eugene Walter

Live your best life, be your best self, give what you wish to receive. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Mattie rolled his eyes. "And I've have my fair share of ugly in my life, so I'm kind of used to it".
"You better not be referring to me, sack-sucker". ~ Lila Rose

Sometimes my body wakes me up and says 'Hey, you haven't had pain in a while. How about pain?' And sometimes I can't breathe, and that's hard to live with. But I still celebrate life and don't give up. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Expressing my feelings and then the opportunity to share it with others is just such a gift. ~ Mattie Stepanek

ghost. No way am I gonna get bullied by anyone or anything - especially ghosts. "Mattie, you okay?" Mrs. Olson is eyeballing me with concern. I haven't moved to get out of the car. "All good, Mrs. O," I smile weakly at her. "Just tired." Taking a deep breath, I open the door and force myself out. I am not afraid, I chant over and over. The other kids are still at school, so the house is pretty empty. Mrs. O had told me earlier we had a new foster kid in the house, but I'm betting he's at school too. She sends me upstairs with the promise to bring me a sandwich and a glass of milk. The doctors said no caffeine for a while, so my favorite drink in the world, Coke, is off limits. At least until I can escape and get to a gas station. I need it like an addict needs crack. My room is exactly as I left it, the bed turned down and my clothes thrown into a corner. A simple white dresser and mirror, desk, and a twin bed covered in my worn out quilt decorate the room. ~ Apryl Baker

It's the song in your heart that wants you to help make yourself a better person, and to help other people do the same. Everybody has one. ~ Mattie Stepanek

You have to come downstairs now!" panted Alice.
"What's wrong?"
"Everything! Izzy's floating, Melanie ran into the wall, my hand made a silver ball and Colleen smashed my keys though the wall!" Alice huffed.
"Wait, what? Slow down, I didn't catch a word you said," said Jenn.
"Come on! ~ Katie Mattie

If it came to a magic genie, I would ask him for two extra wishes. One would be that no one would have to live with the muscular dystrophy disease or any disease. And the second one would be world peace, that we just stop fighting, talk about things, and we could live in harmony once again, like God intended us to do. ~ Mattie Stepanek

According to Mattress Mattie you couldn't make money in bed by yourself, so I had no choice but to get wet and dirty. ~ Liliana Hart

Of course I am!" Mattie stomped her foot, and the entire house shook. "Everyone should be afraid of change - people die in such times. ~ Ekaterina Sedia

He looks me right in the eyes, and those brown ones of his are full of comfort. Not sympathy or regret, or even hesitation. His eyes make me think of home. I feel at home with him. I've never felt that before, not even when my mom was still alive. She loved me, but never made me feel the warmth and comfort of a real home, but Officer Dan can. "Mattie. ~ Apryl Baker

We always have to choose to live our lives to the fullest. No one is better or worse than anyone else. We are different and beautiful. ~ Mattie Stepanek

Cripes Miss Wilcox, they're not guns,' I said.
No, they're not Mattie, they're books. And a hundred times more dangerous. ~ Jennifer Donnelly

CHARLIE: So you can't even see Ivy's point? MATTIE FAE: No. CHARLIE: That Little Charles and Beverly share some kind of ... complication. MATTIE FAE: Honey, you have to be smart to be complicated. CHARLIE: That's our boy. Are you saying our boy isn't smart? MATTIE FAE: Yes, that's what I'm saying. ~ Tracy Letts

Sophronia was minding her own business and running late to luncheon, as was her custom. She'd let to learn the advantage of punctuality. As she told Sister Mattie the third time she was late to household potions and poisons, nothing interesting happened until after an event commenced. ~ Gail Carriger

He looked up at the rain and closed his eyes, his hands still wrapped around her back. Mattie knew with an acute awareness that she would always remember this moment: both of them nude in the falling twilight of a mountain summer, sated and yet still hungry, Zeke's strong face tipped to received the gift of rain, his broad hands warm on her. ~ Barbara Samuel

Now I know why I had that dream last night. It was a premonition forewarning me of the death of my cooking career!"
"I doubt that your cooking career is over. You may be working at Coney Island until you retire, but you'll still be a chef," smiled Colleen.
Alice laughed, her face softened.
"Hey! Maybe if you're lucky you could work at Denny's!" said Melaine. "They're open twenty-four-seven and have an incredible breakfast menu. I would definitely come and support you."
"Thanks Mel, but I'm more of a IHOP girl," said Alice. ~ Katie Mattie

My life mission is to spread peace to the world. ~ Mattie Stepanek

I have this love for Mattie. It was formed in me as he himself was formed. It has his shape, you might say. He fits it. He fits into it as he fits into his clothes. He will always fit into it. When he gets out of the car and I meet him and hug him, there he is, him himself, something of my very own forever, and my love for him goes all around him just as it did when he was a baby and a little boy and a young man grown. ~ Wendell Berry

Though I should have known better, I had to ask. "What is furniture disease?"
She looked at me like I had the IQ of a grape. "It's when your chest falls into your drawers. Get ready for it, honey, because with that rack of yours, you'll be using them as knee pads before you know it. ~ Annelise Ryan

God gives me hope that there is something greater than us, something better and bigger than the here and now, that can help us live. ~ Mattie Stepanek

MATTIE FAE: I'm still very sexy, thank you very much. VIOLET: You're about as sexy as a wet cardboard box, Mattie Fae, you and me both. Don't kid yourself. ~ Tracy Letts

Curl moaned. Mattie rocked. Propelled by the sound, Mattie rocked her out of that bed, out of that room, into a blue vastness just underneath the sun and above time. She rocked her over Aegean seas so clean they shine like crystal, so clear the fresh blood of sacrificed babies torn from their mothers arms and given to Neptune could be seen like pink froth on the water. She rocked her on and on, past Dachau, where soul-gutted Jewish mothers swept their children's entrails off laboratory floors. They flew past the spilled brains of Senegalese infants whose mothers had dashed them on the wooden sides of slave ships. And she rocked on.
She rocked her into her childhood and let her see murdered dreams. And she rocked her back, back into the womb, to the nadir of her hurt, and they found it-a slight silver splinter, embedded just below the surface of her skin. And Mattie rocked and pulled-and the splinter gave way, but its roots were deep, gigantic, ragged, and they tore up flesh with bits of fat and muscle tissue clinging to them. They left a huge hole, which was already starting to pus over, but Mattie was satisfied. It would heal. ~ Gloria Naylor

It wasn't that Mattie didn't believe in God. She did, she most surely did. She just didn't like some of the things He did, is all. ~ Cathie Pelletier

Let this truly be
The celebration of
A New Year…
Let us remember
The past, yet
Not dwell in it.
Let us fully use
The present, yet
Not waste it.
Let us live for
The future, yet
Not count on it

Written by Mattie, aged 11 ~ Mattie Stepanek

The doctor said, 'He can't last a week.' And I did. And they said, 'There's no way this kid's going to last a month.' And I did. And so they said, 'Two years. He's not going to make it.' Two years. 'Five years. He can't do that.' I lived to be five years. 'He's never going to hit double digits.' And here I am, a new teenager. ~ Mattie Stepanek