347 Quotes by Jerry Spinelli

You” – he pointed at me – “are the black pearl.

Nobody knows who said it first, but somebody must have: ‘Kid’s gotta be a maniac.

He’s so cute, I can’t help myself.

But feelings, they don’t care about telling. They just go right on, piling on top of one another like a big sandwich.

It was the day of the worms. That first almost-warm, after-the-rainy-night day in April, when you bolt from your house to find yourself in a world of worms. They were as numerous here in the East End as they had been in the West. The sidewalks, the streets. The very places where they didn’t belong. Forlorn, marooned on concrete and asphalt, no place to burrow, April’s orphans.

Best friends are always together, always whispering and laughing and running, always at each other’s house, having dinner, sleeping over. They are practically adopted by each other’s parents. You can’t pry them apart.

Nobody has the time, the time cannot be owned. The time is free to everyone.

I faced the gaudy sunflower on her canvas bag – it looked hand-painted and at last my eyes fell into hers. I said, ‘Thanks for the card.’ Her smile put the sunflower to shame. She walked off.

You’re cheating yourself out of today. Today is calling to you, trying to get your attention, but you’re stuck on tomorrow, and today trickles away like water down a drain. You wake up the next morning and that today you wasted is gone forever. It’s now yesterday. Some of those moments may have had wonderful things in store for you, but now you’ll never know.