Thayer Quotes

Does every woman at some point in her life wander through the sleeping house, looking in at her husband and children, and wonder what she's doing here, in this particular life? ~ Nancy Thayer

Nantucket is a place where some kind of magic happens, it's where I met my husband 32 years ago, and we've been together since the day we met. It's the kind of place that when people come here, they think they'll be happy. I see people falling in love or recovering from some conflict here, and I wanted to capture that. ~ Nancy Thayer

There's a certain gravity in Stokes, due to the situations I have to handle. ~ Thayer David

It is not what you give your friend, but what you are willing to give him that determines the quality of friendship. ~ Mary Dixon Thayer

She acknowledged each person's nearness to the dead and helped the group in its struggle for order-who grieved most, whose pain was most real-because in life there is always hierarchy, and it is frankly not profitable to remain modest and anonymous, not even at a funeral. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

None of great sages of China preached the precept of love as a guideline for human behavior ... ~ James Thayer

I'll often rush out from Dark Shadows, having made a 5.30PM appointment, working for a couple of hours. ~ Thayer David

The piecemeal criticism which, like the fly, scans only the edge of a plinth in the great edifice upon which it crawls, disappears under a criticism that is all-comprehending and all-surveying. ~ William Greenough Thayer Shedd

The 2006 event logo combines the twin spires of Churchill Downs, one of the great signature elements in sports, with the greatest international day of Thoroughbred racing. We look forward to displaying the logo widely throughout the commonwealth of Kentucky, and to our international outlets. ~ Damon Thayer

The first time I saw you," I say, "I had a premonition. I had the feeling I'd found the thing I'd always been waiting for. The next time I saw you, it was the same. And every time after it's been the same. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Fabulous Aunt Fancy had died on her sixtieth birthday while parachuting from an airplane. ~ Nancy Thayer

Lying is a full time occupation, even if you tell just one, because once you tell it, you're stuck with it. If you want to do it right, you have to visualize it, conjure the graphics, tone, and sequence of action, then relate it purposefully in the midst of seemingly spontaneous dialogue. The more actual the lie becomes to the listener, the more actual it becomes to the teller, which is scariest of all. Some people really get to believing their own lies. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

The history of sea power is largely, though by no means solely, a narrative of contests between nations, of mutual rivalries, of violence frequently culminating in war. The profound influence of sea commerce upon the wealth and strength of countries was clearly seen long before the true principles which governed its growth and prosperity were detected. To secure to one's own people a disproportionate share of such benefits, every effort was made to exclude others, either by the peaceful legislative methods of monopoly or prohibitory regulations, or, when these failed, by direct violence. The clash of interests, the angry feelings roused by conflicting attempts thus to appropriate the larger share, if not the whole, of the advantages of commerce, and of distant unsettled commercial regions, led to wars. On the other hand, wars arising from other causes have been greatly modified in their conduct and issue by the control of the sea. Therefore the history of sea power, while embracing in its broad sweep all that tends to make a people great upon the sea or by the sea, is largely a military history... ~ Alfred Thayer Mahan

I need something fun to get my mind off of pretending to die and I didn't have any squibs under water. ~ Maria Thayer

Music is one of the most efficient mood elevators we have. People in nursing homes, whether ambulatory or even bedridden, whether lucid or not, would be provided with great pleasure by your playing. Maybe they could even dream, return to the best times in their lives, when they were loved. ~ Nancy Thayer

They were sorting, or classifying. It's easy-anyone dressed funny is the enemy, especially if they reject your supremacy or do not acknowledge school as entertainment. If the enemy tries to look like you and act like you, only in more affordable clothes, that person is still the enemy, only of a more contemptible, less terrifying variety- ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

I was an American girl; I possessed what our culture valued most-independance and blind courage. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

When I was hired by the University of Washington extension school to teach the one-year fiction writing course - 96 classroom hours - I quickly determined that I knew only about an hour's worth off the top of my head. ~ James Thayer

They say that travelling broadens your mind, but first you must have a mind. ~ William Greenough Thayer Shedd

Life on earth may be limited, but grandchildren were the promise of the eternal. ~ Nancy Thayer

They tend to lay dormant for a while but often come back, and then the cheques come in! ~ Thayer David

Sometimes I think together we are the worst kind of calamity." Thayer grinned back. Severine's lips burned. "Then I've never wanted to be destroyed so bad. ~ Calia Read

I love Errol Morris so much; he's one of my heroes. ~ Maria Thayer

As an actor, I'll take any job. ~ Maria Thayer

The sea slapped ominously, confessing its strategic impartiality. The sea is an international sea, and the sky a universal sky. Often we forget that. Often we think that what is verging upon us is ours alone. We forget that there are other sides entirely. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

When you stop looking forward to things, you get used to low expectations and you realise, what's the big deal about success anyway? If we're all to attain everything we've been conditioned to desire - wealth, fame, education, prestige, security - then those things will become so prevalent that they'll become meaningless. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

And loneliness. I should say something of loneliness. The panic, the sweeping hysteria that comes not when you are without others, but when you are without yourself, adrift. I should describe the filthy province of mind, the blighted district inside, the place so crowded you cannot raise the lids of your eyes. Your shoulders are drawn and your head has fallen and your chest is bruised by the constant assault of your heart. (p. 37) ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Having to talk to people was the one thing, but soliciting conversation was something else. If I acted squirmy or didn't make eye contact, they would want to know what was wrong, and I would have to say, Nothing, since nothing really was wrong. Nothing is an easy thing to feel but a difficult thing to express ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Chocolate makes everything better, in the end," he announced, and Thayer fully agreed.
Thayer gave him a smile of gratitude and watched Castel lift his spoon from the saucer. He dipped it, gracefully, into his coffee and gave it a light stir.
"Too many people rush to stir such delicate flavours. Take too long and they will clog together to become a lump of bitterness in your coffee. But take your time and be gentle with them," Castel explained, quietly, "and they will create a symphony of flavours, to melt in your mouth," he said, leaning down, just until his nose was over his cup, to take a long inhale. He smiled and straightened, extracting the spoon to place it back on his saucer. "Now try it."
Thayer took a sip and almost felt his toes curl at the luxurious taste.

~ Cinnamon Kiss ~ Elaine White

Ah, well! then the young woman was only in advance of the age," said Miss Archer; "and what with that and the telephone, and that dreadful phonograph that bottles up all one says and disgorges at inconvenient times, we will soon be able to do everything by electricity; who knows but some genius will invent something for the especial use of lovers? something, for instance, to carry in their pockets, so when they are far away from each other, and pine for a sound of 'that beloved voice,' they will have only to take up this electrical apparatus, put it to their ears, and be happy. Ah! blissful lovers of the future! ~ Ella Cheever Thayer

If someone is doing something crazy - or what I think is crazy - I'm watching, but also am I keeping the actual seriousness of someone actually running for president in my mind all the time? ~ Maria Thayer

Economist Frederick Thayer has studied the history of our balanced-budget crusades and has come up with some depressing statistics. We have had six major depressions in our history (1819, 1837, 1857, 1873, 1893 and 1929); all six of them followed sustained periods of reducing the national debt. We have had almost chronic deficits since the 1930s, and there has been no depression since then - the longest crash-free period in our history. ~ Molly Ivins

The pug owner continued, "Not to be a Grinch, I only ask because I'd forgotten how much work dogs are. They have to be walked several times a day, and it's holy murder crawling out of bed early on a dark winter morning to take Poppy out. But she yips and yaps and scratches at the bed until I do. Then there's the matter of chewing. I can't tell you how many leather shoes Poppy's ruined. And she's not even a big dog, certainly not one of those eternally hungry dogs like yellow Labs who will eat anything, even the contents of wastebaskets, no matter how much you feed them. ~ Nancy Thayer

My experience is that an original and compelling idea for a novel is a rare thing. ~ James Thayer

Your generation does everything so fast I think you've forgotten how to enjoy the pleasures of going slow. ~ Nancy Thayer

Hell is only loneliness, a place without play for the soul, a place without God. How could there be God in loneliness when God is presence? ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

It's never too late - in fiction or in life - to revise. ~ Nancy Thayer

Those far distant, storm-beaten ships, upon which the Grand Army never looked, stood between it and the dominion of the world. ~ Alfred Thayer Mahan

I wondered what the value was, in the Darwinian sense, of making fast friends like that. There must be some scientific significance to being a follower, to allowing yourself to be persuaded by personality ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Kate lost a mother," I said, "but I lost a nothing."
Kate doesn't feel that way," Jack assured me.
But what about everybody else besides Kate? How can I ever explain to anyone what she was when she and I had no name? People need names for everything. I wasn't a relative or a friend, I was just an object of her kindness."
He wiped my cheeks, saying Ssshh. I buried my face in his shoulder.
True kindness is stabilizing," I went on. "When you feel it and when you express it, it becomes the whole meaning of things. Like all there is to achieve. It's life, demystified. A place out of self, a network of simple pleasures, not a waltz, but like whirls within a waltz."
You're the one now," Jack said definitively. "That's why you met her. She had something she had to pass on." (p. 95) ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

It is never, never too late, in a story or in real life, to correct. ~ Nancy Thayer

question. "I don't know. I like Boston. And I like being close to my mom." "And your sisters." Arden hesitated. This was officially a first date, ~ Nancy Thayer

If you travel internationally, you will feel shocked by contemptuous talk of America. To hear your fellow citizens characterized as barbarians who know nothing of love, food, health, and religion, but everything of lawsuits, fast food, and guns, is to experience a national fidelity of which you may not have thought yourself capable. And yet, you're at a loss for a defense. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

I wondered if Kate would harden as my mother had when she was young and her own mother died. Some people exist quite well in injury. It's like having gills to breathe underwater. Some people are clever about not drawing others into their affliction. You could hardly tell by looking at my mother that she was a stranger to providence. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Why remain polite but powerless, in love but a beggar? ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

It was then that I began to write. Writing helps when you can't talk to your friends; it wasn't that my friends were untrustworthy, it's just that I would never discuss something that was hardly real as though it were really real. Often people do this, forcing friends into authenticating an imaginary life. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

If I'm so popular, why did they replace me with Tommy Thayer? ~ Ace Frehley

It was strange to experience in one night the difference between wanting something you cannot have and having something you cannot want. I wished it wasn't my time to learn it. No one else seemed to be learning much of anything. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

No matter how wild the winds or rough the seas of life, libraries stand ready, beaming their reliable lights, guiding us toward knowledge, pleasure, consolation, wisdom, and hope. ~ Nancy Thayer

I love not serious documentaries, too, but I love seeing people at their wits' end, I guess. ~ Maria Thayer

He owns Douchedome. All assholes compete in the douche form of the Olympics at Douchedome. ~ Calia Read

If friendship is like a cathedral, then forsaken friendship is like roofless ruins... ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Who is getting more pleasure from this rocking, the baby or me? ~ Nancy Thayer

I can only write one novel at a time. The author of the Perry Mason novels, Erle Stanley Gardner, often worked on four novels simultaneously, and produced a million words a year. I'm envious. ~ James Thayer

Time is a blank paper we paint with our best colors; is a gift to feel well and exercising happiness. ~ Markus Thayer

Optimism is when you're not sure where life is going to take you, so naturally you anticipate the best possible outcome ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

No one knows how it is that with one glance a boy can break through into a girl's heart. ~ Nancy Thayer

When you lose your parents as a child, you are indoctrinated into a club, you re taken into life's severest confidence. You are undeceived. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Sometimes you can't help but destroy the intricate things in life. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Sometimes a day is a symbolic day, and you behave symbolically. Sometimes you search inside for a feeling, and, finding none, you remember that no feeling is frequently the most possible feeling. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

I remember him. Jaxton only knew I existed long enough to take the piss out of me. He certainly never liked me." Roman sighed, giving his side of the story, though it was a slanted
one. Only three people knew the real story; him, Jaxton and Ben, and it was far from the tale of bully and victim that Jaxton kept telling people.
"Yeah, that's what he said," Thayer agreed, with a laugh.
Roman wasn't even surprised. Disappointed, but never surprised. ~ Elaine White

Now that I'd experienced being a woman to a man I was in love with, I'd become self-conscious about being a woman to the world in general. Of course, being female is always indelicate and extreme, like operating heavy machinery. Every woman knows the feeling of being a stack of roving flesh. Sometimes all you've accomplished by the end of the day is to have maneuvered your body through space without grave incident. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

I don't believe in the idea of the strong woman; there is simply woman. ~ Melissa Thayer

I think we've established a convention on the show that allows us to do pretty much anything we want to. ~ Thayer David

Nothing is an easy thing to feel but a difficult thing to express (pg 20). ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Jocks were pretty much exempt from the standards that bound the rest of us. Teachers and administrators humor them because it's in everyone's interests to coax them through school and get them out of the building. Since it's unethical to turn them loose on society, they get sent to college to be kept out of the mix until their frontal lobes develop more fully. As enticement they are given sports scholarships that will later amount to nothing, not even good health. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Sophie felt as if she were encased in a glass globe called summer. ~ Nancy Thayer

I'm strictly a movie person. I mean, I watch the HBO documentaries and Netflix. ~ Maria Thayer

Say what men may, it is doctrine that moves the world. He who takes no position will not sway the human intellect. ~ William Greenough Thayer Shedd

Say it ' he said the words caught at the base of his throat. 'No one.' 'No one ' I sad I swore 'but you.' I said it because it was true. There was no one but him and there never would be. I loved him with pain and with something greater than pain with a barren ache that pealed not in the heart but in the desert dry alongside it. I know it was so even then: if in his arms I was a woman beyond them I was nothing. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

The Great Point lighthouse rose at the far end of the barrier beach, a tall white steeple to the sky, with a working light flashing at the top. Here was the end of the island, the great point where the Atlantic Ocean met Nantucket Sound in a froth of waves. All along the point, enormous fat seals lolled on the sand, occasionally lumbering in and out of the water, grunting and lounging like a tribe of overfed Roman emperors. ~ Nancy Thayer

It's better to keep grief inside. Grief inside works like bees or ants, building curious and perfect structures, complicating you. Grief outside means you want something from someone, and chances are good you won't get it. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

What is freedom when you're too beholden to act spontaneously ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Getting lost just means not understanding. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

they were that rarest of human creatures: genuinely happy people. ~ Nancy Thayer

The surer of himself an admiral is, the finer the tactical development of his fleet, the better his captains, the more reluctant must he necessarily be to enter into a melee with equal forces, in which all these advantages will be thrown away, chance reign supreme, and his fleet be place on terms of equality with an assemblage of ships which have never before acted together. ~ Alfred Thayer Mahan

The families of graduating seniors emptied out of cars, sheepish in uncommon splendor, like milling clans at the origin of a parade. There is something spent about the families of teenagers; possibly it's the look of exhausted loyalties. Perhaps it's only right that we grow overbig in someone else's space. Perhaps we need to tire and differentiate, leave and adapt. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Having therefore no foreign establishments, either colonial or military, the ships of war of the United States, in war, will be like land birds, unable to fly far from their own shores. To provide resting places for them, where they can coal and repair, would be one of the first duties of a government proposing to itself the development of the power of the nation at sea. ~ Alfred Thayer Mahan

Someone who knows she is beautiful, who is always told that she is beautiful, but who, deep down, does not feel very beautiful. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

That some unevangelized men are saved, in the present life, by an extraordinary exercise of redeeming grace in Christ, has been the hope and belief of Christendom. It was the hope and belief of the elder Calvinists, as of the later. ~ William Greenough Thayer Shedd

I mostly, for someone who makes a lot of their living in comedy - and even for someone who doesn't make their living in comedy - I don't watch a lot of comedy. ~ Maria Thayer

I have work to do as a human being. ~ Maria Thayer

Severine was a greedy, selfish person. She wanted everything. Right now, sitting here with Thayer, she wanted to keep this moment forever. Nothing gave her the right to desire it so much. ~ Calia Read

A man's ideal, like his horizon, is constantly receding from him as he advances toward it. ~ William Greenough Thayer Shedd

On opening sentences: "If in the first chapter a hurricane is going to blow down an oak tree which falls through the kitchen roof, there's no need to first describe the kitchen." ~ James Thayer

and after she went, Dalton didn't last long. His death certificate listed heart failure as the cause, but Owen Gray knew it had been loneliness and grief. After ~ James Thayer

We are spontaneous when we are at our genuine best. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

I think I have between twenty and thirty commercials playing at present. ~ Thayer David

But in fact there are infinite subtleties to identity-that is to say, there is the way that you are, which is the sum of the way you are becoming and the way you have been, which does not take into account the way you secretly wish to be. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

I have discovered the meaning of life. It resides in what I can wrest from each day that I live. ~ Nancy Thayer

The universe is always speaking to us ... sending us little messages, causing coincidences and serendipities, reminding us to stop, to look around, to believe in something else, something more. ~ Nancy Thayer

I could never settle for anything less than a renegade and a runaway, a descendant of greatness capable of voluntary disinheritance. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

Evan looked down at the woman who was ruining his life. ~ Thayer King

The most terrible thing about marriage, I suppose, is that we know and understand each other's weaknesses and fears as much as we know our strengths and desires. ~ Nancy Thayer

It is easy to fool yourself. It is possible to fool the people you work for. It is more difficult to fool the people you work with. But it is almost impossible to fool the people who work under you. ~ Harry Bates Thayer

People with motorcycles always assume that everyone without one wants a ride. I didn't want to offend him, so I said sure. ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

It was frankly sort of confusing, the way everyone stared at our bodies exactly as they tried to erase the ideas of our bodies from our minds. We were supposed to get over ourselves but no one was supposed to get over us. The female body was our worst handicap and our best advantage
the surest means to success, the surest course to failure. (p. 72) ~ Hilary Thayer Hamann

As an actor, I was just satisfied to work. ~ Thayer David

I need time to develop the idea into a plot before I talk about it. ~ James Thayer

We spend our lives in the attempt to capture memory forever; to capture moments; to capture Time itself. ~ Melissa Thayer