13 Quotes by Meredith Marple

… I notice differences in how we all handle the mahjong tiles. Pat and Amy treat the tiles with something bordering on reverence. They silently select tiles for discard from their racks and place them gently on the tabletop, in a dainty almost whispering motion. Sue and I place our discard tiles down so they make that clicking sound I have always loved hearing. Betty flings her tiles onto the tabletop with a throw-away motion befitting the worthless items they are.

He didn’t fold his arms around her, and he didn’t hold her close. Instead, he gave her a kiss that suggested a future.

If his choice now was to risk either sunshine with a chance of rain or heatstroke with a chance of tornado, he’d go with the sunshine.

I was feeling sorry for myself and immediately assumed her life was going better than mine. Ridiculous, of course—no one can know what a stranger’s life is like. Often we don’t even know what a loved one’s life is like. We all keep so many things to ourselves.

Our inner selves go on without us sometimes, trusting we’ll catch on eventually. Sometimes it’s too late when we do—too late to let the other person know what we’ve learned.

I didn’t think of myself as competitive. I thought in terms of having fun playing games and trying to win, but with me it was more hoping to win. I didn’t have that killer instinct they say is required to get to the top. I couldn’t see myself behaving as my dad did with his vociferous love for golf and football. The house resounded with his yells and groans during PGA and NFL tournaments. It seemed to me that yelling in itself required a killer instinct.

The ski club was a frugal and intergenerational group. It gave dime-store trophies for speed and agility within categories of gender, age, and experience, and so eventually everyone got a trophy.

Mallory’s brothers and sister were very much like their parents. Only Mallory seemed to need extra hugs and support. At the same time she knew she’d never get that from her parents or siblings. She’d have to go beyond them for that kind of attention. She wasn’t needy; she was just on another end of the normal range from them. She had learned to hold back from asking for what she needed, afraid it was too much.

Strategically placed at the level of her T3 vertebra, just below the deepest back on any of her blouses, was a tattoo of the human brain. He had to look away or else he’d jump her bones all over again. The brain got him every time.