Tree Huggers Quotes

We are particularly frustrated that so much of our politics today consists of lines first written during the clashes, domestic and foreign, of the 1960s. This "Groundhog Day" approach to replaying the culture war's tropes is perhaps nowhere in greater evidence than in how Americans talk about patriotism. Patriotism, as an idea, has been co-opted over the course of a generation by right-wingers who use the flag not as a symbol of transcendent national unity, but as a sectarian cudgel against the hippies, Francophiles, free-lovers and tree-huggers who constitute their caricature of the American left. The American left, for its part, has been so beaten down by this star-spangled caricature that it has largely ceded the very notion of patriotism to the right. As a result, the first reaction of far too many progressives to any talk of patriotism is automatic, allergic recoil. Needless to say, this reaction simply tightens the screws of the right's imprisoning caricature. ~ Eric Liu

I'm pretty sure that when babies are born in Oregon, they leave the hospital with birth certificates - and teeny-tiny sleeping bags. Everyone in the state camps. The hippies and the rednecks. The hunters and the tree huggers. Rich people. Poor people. Even rock musicians. Especially rock musicians. Our band had perfected the art of punk-rock camping, throwing a bunch of crap into the van with, like, an hour's notice and just driving out into the mountains, where we'd drink beer, burn food, jam on our instruments around the campfire, and sack out under the open sky. Sometimes, on tour, back in the early hardscrabble days, we'd even camp as an alternative to crashing in another crowded, roach-infested rock 'n' roll house.
I don't know if it's because no matter where you live, the wilderness is never that far off, but it just seemed like everyone in Oregon camped. ~ Gayle Forman

So-called global warming is just a secret ploy by wacko tree-huggers to make America energy-independent, clean our air & water, improve fuel-efficiency of our vehicles, kickstart 21st century industries, & make our cities safer & more livable. Don't let them get away with it! ~ Chip Giller

For all of the hurtling towards climate change, there's also a lot more understanding of it than there was when we were kids. They don't call environmentalists tree huggers any more, so there's hope! ~ Ewan McGregor

Why we Americans should be so dendrophilic in our homes, and so dendrophobic in our business-districts is another subject of study which should be referred to our anthropologists. ~ George R. Stewart

Humph…You'll fit right in here in Frisco, lots of tree huggers. ~ Elle Klass

It's obsequious little nicety-nice girls like me who allow assholes to run the world: Miss Harlot O'Harlots, billionaire phony tree huggers, hypocrite drug-snorting, weed-puffing peace activists who fund the mass-murdering drug cartels and perpetuate crushing poverty in dirt-poor banana republics. It's my petty fear of personal rejection that allows so many true evils to exist. My cowardice enables atrocities. ~ Chuck Palahniuk

Predictably, the national broadcaster - a viper's nest of socialists, tree-huggers and ugly, barren females - had seized on the survey, exhuming one of its bleeding-heart ideologues to moan about funding cuts to education. ~ Michelle De Kretser

Corporate polluters, their phony think tanks and political toadies like to marginalize environmentalists as tree huggers, or radicals. But there is nothing radical about clean air or water. ~ Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

The environmental agenda seems swept under the rug a lot, and environmentalists are looked at as tree-huggers who aren't dealing with the real issues when in fact someone needs to be keeping an eye on how we're treating the planet. When politicians bring up the environment, they're immediately labeled as being anti-business. But for the sake of the planet on which we live, we need to take the environment into account. ~ Rachel Dratch

It's very bad form to spy on one's host," he said, planting his hands on his hips and somehow managing to look both authoritative and relaxed at the same time.
"It was an accident," she grumbled.
"Oh, I believe you there," he said. "But even if you didn't intend to spy on me, the fact remains that when the opportunity arose, you took it."
"Do you blame me?"
He grinned. "Not at all. I would have done precisely the same thing."
Her mouth fell open.
"Oh, don't pretend to be offended," he said.
"I'm not pretending."
He leaned a bit closer. "To tell the truth, I'm quite flattered."
"It was academic curiosity," she ground out. "I assure you."
His smile grew sly. "So you're telling me that you would have spied upon any naked man you'd come across?"
"Of course not!"
"As I said," he drawled, leaning back against a tree, "I'm flattered."
"Well, now that we have that settled," Sophie said with a sniff, "I'm going back to Your Cottage. ~ Julia Quinn

I like making pies. I have a bunch of fruit trees in my backyard. My loquat tree sprouted, and I like making loquat pie. They're really hard to peel and everything, and it took me forever, but they make the best pies. They're amazing. ~ Kristen Stewart

The fruit falls off the tree. You don't shake it off before it's ready to fall. ~ Al Pacino

Desire may be compared to a minute seed. It is like a big banyan tree growing out of a seed, which is no bigger than a dot. ~ Sarada Devi

Olo, Remi, Kwuga, Nur, Anajama, Rhoden. Only Olo and Remi were in my group. Everyone else I met in the dining area or the learning room where various lectures were held by professors onboard the ship. They were all girls who grew up in sprawling houses, who'd never walked through the desert, who'd never stepped on a snake in the dry grass. They were girls who could not stand the rays of Earth's sun unless it was shining through a tinted window.

Yet they were girls who knew what I meant when I spoke of "treeing." We sat in my room (because, having so few travel items, mine was the emptiest) and challenged each other to look out at the stars and imagine the most complex equation and then split it in half and then in half again and again. When you do math fractals long enough, you kick yourself into treeing just enough to get lost in the shallows of the mathematical sea. None of us would have made it into the university if we couldn't tree, but it's not easy. We were the best and we pushed each other to get closer to "God. ~ Nnedi Okorafor

Can you feel the connection? We breathe so that the trees thrive and the trees breathe so that we are able to live. Perfect symbiosis… ~ Sanchita Pandey

It seems strange," said he, as he watched the Tin Woodman work, "that my left leg should be the most elegant and substantial part of me." "That proves you are unusual," returned the Scarecrow. "and I am convinced that the only people worthy of consideration in this world are the unusual ones. For the common folks are like the leaves of a tree, and live and die unnoticed." "Spoken like a philosopher!" cried the Woggle-Bug, ~ L. Frank Baum

We, drinking love at the furthest springs,
Covered with love as a covering tree,
We had grown as gods, as the gods above,
Filled from the heart to the lips with love,
Held fast in his hands, clothed warm with his wings,
O love, my love, had you loved but me! ~ Algernon Charles Swinburne

We are separated from God on two sides; the Fall separates us from Him, the Tree of Life separates Him from us. ~ Franz Kafka

Nature makes trees put down deep roots before having them bear fruit, and even this is done gradually. ~ Vincent De Paul

To fly from one tree to another, the raven hangs itself, hawklike, on the air. I hang myself that same way in sleep, between one day and the next. ~ Louise Erdrich

The thorns which I have reap'd are of the tree
I planted; they have torn me, and I bleed.
I should have known what fruit would spring from such a seed. ~ George Gordon Byron

Some families have secrets buried so deep, they're the only thing holding the roots in the ground. You dig up those secrets, you loosen the soil, weakening the tree. ~ Ni'chelle Genovese

Let the trees be consulted before you take any action
every time you breathe in thank a tree
let tree roots crack parking lots at the world bank headquarters
let loggers be druids specially trained and rewarded
to sacrifice trees at auspicious times
let carpenters be master artisans
let lumber be treasured like gold
let chain saws be played like saxophones
let soldiers on maneuvers plant trees give police and criminals a shovel
and a thousand seedlings
let businessmen carry pocketfuls of acorns
let newlyweds honeymoon in the woods
walk don't drive
stop reading newspapers
stop writing poetry
squat under a tree and tell stories. ~ John Wright

I was hung on a tree, made of tongues of the weak. The branches and bone of the liars and thieves. ~ 30 Seconds To Mars

A tree Cannot grow In its parents' shadows. ~ Octavia Butler

Can you plant a sapling and expect it to grow into a tree overnight? You have to water it, nurture it, give it sunlight, rain, and manure, and then slowly, it will grow. ~ Anand Neelakantan

I'm just so tired. I'm so, so tired all the time.' A tear slips down her face, all the way down till it drops off her chin, and she doesn't brush its trail away.
And I remember being in that jungle, lost in the darkest, wildest part of it, where fearsome beasts and carnivorous plants lurk between every tree. All I could do was lie down on the wet leaves. Bugs crawled up my legs, and I couldn't care enough to brush them off. ~ Emery Lord

Madame? What do I look like?"
"You have many thousands of freckles."
"Papa used to say they were like stars in heaven. Like apples in a tree. ~ Anthony Doerr

A statesman who shakes the fruit trees of his neighbors - to dislodge the worms. ~ Ambrose Bierce

A tree lives on its roots. If you change the root, you change the tree. Culture lives in human beings. If you change the human heart the culture will follow. ~ Jane Hirshfield

Even the highest tree has an axe waiting at its foot. ~ Ian Fleming

The main hallway of the Sternwood place was two stories high. Over the entrance doors, which would have let in a troop of Indian elephants, there was a broad stained-glass panel showing a knight in dark armor rescuing a lady who was tied to a tree and didn't have any clothes on but some very long and convenient hair. The knight had pushed the vizor of his helmet back to be sociable, and he was fiddling with the knots on the ropes that tied the lady to the tree and not getting anywhere. I stood there and thought that if I lived in the house, I would sooner or later have to climb up there and help him. He didn't seem to be really trying. ~ Raymond Chandler

just got back from a beautiful eve of winter solstice snowshoeing. my heart was lost and enlivened by both the hush of the mountainous snow world and a very fun irreverence with friends. i shared a solstice quote but did not share this one.

so in the spirit of the year--happy solistice! may there be ever present and growing light in your life as nature unfolds the same in the upcoming months.

"sharp is the night, but stars with frost alive leap off the rim of earth across the dome. it is a night to make the heavens our home. more than the nest whereto apace we strive. lengths down our road each fir-tree seems a hive, in swarms outrushing from the golden comb. they waken waves of thoughts that burst to foam: you throb in me, the dead revive. yon mantle clothes us: there, past mortal breath, life glistens on the river of death. it folds us, flesh and dust; and have we knelt, or never knelt, or eyed as kine the springs of radiance, the radiance enrings: and this is the soul's haven to have felt." --from _winter heavens_ ~ George Meredith

That night, I met some old college friends at Soho House, a private club in the meatpacking district of Manhattan. I hadn't seen them since I'd joined the community, and they hardly recognized me. They spent a half hour discussing how awkward and introverted I used to be. Then their conversation turned to work and movies. I tried to contribute, but I had trouble focusing on the words. They just floated into my ear and accumulated there like wax. I felt like I didn't fit in with them anymore. Fortunately, an Amazonian woman with tree-trunk thighs and a lethal boob-job soon stumbled past the table. She was a foot taller than me and somewhat drunk. "Have ~ Neil Strauss

It was a girl playing a harp, like in an orchestra. It was in this tree at our campsite. And since it was breezy weather that weekend, the girl's arms were almost always turning. ~ Paul Fleischman

A great tree develops over time and can tell stories not only those of happiness, but also those that contain pain from what it has seen over the years, and as a result is the wise ancient tree that it is today. As the seasons change, the tree naturally goes through changes as well: where the leaves turn yellow and orange in the fall, falling by the Winter, returning in the Spring, and with full set of new leafs by the Summer. Love is no different in that there will be times when we are fully naked in the Winter, and left to wonder about Spring when it seemed so easy to love, yet the wise tree knows that no winter will last forever no matter how cold it may be. ~ Forrest Curran

If you want to find Cherry-Tree Lane all you have to do is ask the Policeman at the cross-roads. ~ P.L. Travers

Love is like encountering a forest and having to chop down every tree but one. Oh, and you have to chop down each tree by hugging it until it falls. ~ Dark Jar Tin Zoo

I found a hollow in an old, forgiving tree, curled up within it, and hoarded my thoughts like acorns. ~ Sarah Diemer

In the trees this afternoon, he was a giver of bread and teddy bears. ~ Markus Zusak

The Pomegranate

The only legend I have ever loved is
the story of a daughter lost in hell.
And found and rescued there.
Love and blackmail are the gist of it.
Ceres and Persephone the names.
And the best thing about the legend is
I can enter it anywhere. And have.
As a child in exile in
a city of fogs and strange consonants,
I read it first and at first I was
an exiled child in the crackling dusk of
the underworld, the stars blighted. Later
I walked out in a summer twilight
searching for my daughter at bed-time.
When she came running I was ready
to make any bargain to keep her.
I carried her back past whitebeams
and wasps and honey-scented buddleias.
But I was Ceres then and I knew
winter was in store for every leaf
on every tree on that road.
Was inescapable for each one we passed.
And for me.
It is winter
and the stars are hidden.
I climb the stairs and stand where I can see
my child asleep beside her teen magazines,
her can of Coke, her plate of uncut fruit.
The pomegranate! How did I forget it?
She could have come home and been safe
and ended the story and all
our heart-broken searching but she reached
out a hand and plucked a pomegranate.
She put out her hand and pulled down
the French sound for apple and
the noise of stone and the proof
that even in the place of death,
at t ~ Eavan Boland

Some fish were jumping up the beach and into the tree, which struck me as an odd thing for a fish to do, but I tried not to be judgmental about it. I was feeling pretty raw about my own species, and not much inclined to raise a quizzical eyebrow at others. The fish could play about in trees as much as they liked if it gave them pleasure, so long as they didn't try and justify themselves or tell each other it was a malign god who made them play in trees. ~ Douglas Adams

For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there, they struggle with all the force of their lives for one thing only: to fulfil themselves according to their own laws, to build up their own form, to represent themselves. Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured. And every young farmboy knows that the hardest and noblest wood has the narrowest rings, that high on the mountains and in continuing danger the most indestructible, the strongest, the ideal trees grow.

Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the anci ~ Hermann Hesse

My wisdom tells me that this is probably so. We are all made of the same stuff, remember, we of the Jungle, you of the City. The same substance composes us - the tree overhead, the stone beneath us, the bird, the beast, the star - we are all one, all moving to the same end. Remember that when you no longer remember me, my child." "But ~ P.L. Travers

It isn't often that Aunt Dahlia lets her angry passions rise, but when she does, strong men climb trees and pull them up after them. ~ P.G. Wodehouse

I will rise now and go about the city in the streets, and in the broad ways I will seek the one I love." She is whispering that, and she whispers, "I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine. He said, this stature of mine is like to a palm tree, and my breasts like clusters of grapes. He said he would come to me then. I am my beloved's and his desire is only toward me. ~ Neil Gaiman

We are only a dream of a dream. This world is not what it seems. We are the wind that carries the seeds. We are the roots of the banyan tree. We are love offered on the wing that stretches across eternity. We are a chord in life's symphony. We are the Silent Awakening ! ~ Tina Malia

Symmetry is only a property of dead things. Did you ever see a tree or a mountain that was symmetrical? It's fine for buildings, but if you ever see a symmetrical human face, you will have the impression that you ought to think it beautiful, but that in fact you find it cold. The human heart likes a little disorder in its geometry, Kyria Pelagia. Look at your face in a mirror, Signorina, and you will see that one eyebrow is a little higher than the other, that the set of the lid of your left eye is such that the eye is a fraction more open that the other. It is these things that make you both attractive and beautiful, whereas ... otherwise you would be a statue. Symmetry is for God, not for us. ~ Louis De Bernieres

How did the Blonde break her leg raking leaves? She fell out of the tree. ~ Al Abama

Grow your tree of falsehood from a small grain of truth. Do not follow those who lie in contempt of reality. Let your lie be even more logical than the truth itself, so the weary travelers may find repose. ~ Czeslaw Milosz

Nothing happens without waiting. The seed in the ground does not become a tree overnight. It goes through seasons, nurturing, watering, pruning before it bears fruit. ~ Ngina Otiende

When you take a tree that is rooted in the ground, and transfer it from one place to another, the tree will no longer bear fruit. And if it does, the fruit will not be as good as it was in its original place. This is a rule of nature. I think if I had left my country, I would be the same as the tree. ~ Abbas Kiarostami