The Choice

Quotes

1. No pretenses, no attempts to impress, no one trying to show anyone up.

   p. 12

2. 

   That was one of the great things about being single: A person could pretty much do what he wanted, whenever he wanted, and introspection was only an option.

   p. 54

3. 

   "Traveling has less to do with seeing things than experiencing them...."

   p. 101

4. 

   Parents might believe themselves to be the bosses, but in the end it was the kids who made the rules.

   p. 16

5. 

   ...He was with the woman and daughters he loved, and who could ever need or want anything more than that?...It was just a normal day, a day like any other. But most of all, it was a day in which everything was exactly the way it should be.

   p. 272

6. 

   You're doing the best you can, right? Isn't that what we always tell each other?

   p. 227

7. 

   These days, it seemed that the only thing he was certain about was the knowledge that he wouldn't trade his years with Gabby for anything. Without her, his life had little meaning. He was a small-town husband with a small-town occupation and his cares were no different from anyone else's. He'd been neither a leader nor a follower, nor had he been someone who would be remembered long after he passed away. He was the most ordinary of men with only one exception: He'd fallen in love with a woman named Gabby, his love deepening in the years they'd been married. But fate had conspired to ruin all that, and now he spent long periods of his days wondering whether it was humanly possible to fix things between them.

   p. 199

8. 

   ...he often wondered when exactly her feeling for him finally overwhelmed those she'd had for Kevin... He wasn't sure; capturing a specific instant like that was no more possible than locating a specific drop of water in the ocean.

   p. 193

9. 

   ...he realized that the same thing that made women initially attractive to him--their need to be taken care of--was the very thing that eventually signaled he end of the relationship. How did that old saying go? If you've been divorced once, you might be right in thinking your ex was the problem. If you've been divorced three times? Well, folks, the problem is most definitely you. Granted, he hadn't been divorced, but the point was well taken.

   p. 144

10. 

    Finding a woman with a sense of humor had been the one piece of advice his father had given him when he'd first begun to get serious about dating, and he finally understood why his dad had considered it important. If conversation was the lyrics, laughter was the music, making time spent together a melody that could be replayed over and over without getting stale.

    p. 166

11. 

    "But I'm different now than i was then. Just like I was different at the end of the trip than I'd been at the beginning. And I'll be different tomorrow than I am today. And what that means is that I can never replicate that trip. Even if I went to the same places and met the same people, it wouldn't be the same. My experience wouldn't be the same. To me, that's what traveling should be about. Meeting people, learning to not only appreciate a different culture, but really enjoy it like a local, following whatever impulse strikes you."

    p. 102

12. 

    He often felt that too many people lived their lives acting and pretending, wearing masks and losing themselves in the process.

    p. 51

13. 

    "In other words, when the going get tough, the tough get going."

    p. 115

14. 

    "Love is a wonderful thing. It makes life worthwhile. I love being in love." "Spoken like a man with plenty of experience. But keep in mind that true love lasts forever." "Poets would say that true love always ends in tragedy."

    p. 132

15. 

    How far should a person go in the name of true love?

    p. 191

16. 

    ...people always said that parenting and worrying were synonymous...

    p. 193

17. 

    'He who does nothing is the one who does nothing.'...'Blessed are the lazy who lie in boats, for they shall inherit a suntan.'

    p. 107

18. 

    Was living together a step toward the future or just a way to continue the present?

    p. 58

19. 

    ...he remembered being very happy. But things change. People change. Change was one of the inevitable laws of nature, exacting its toll on people's lives. Mistakes were made, regrets form, and all the was left were repercussions that made something as simple as rising from the bed seem almost laborious.

    p. 3

20. 

    The past was gone and the future had yet to unfold, and he knew he should focus his life on the present...yet his day-to-day existence suddenly struck him as endless and unbearable.

    p. 258

21. 

    Marriage, each of them realized intuitively, was about compromise and forgiveness. It was about balance, where one person complemented the other.

    p. 203

22. 

    But would she do it differently if she could? She doubted it. Her experiences growing up ad formed her into the woman that she'd become, just as his experiences had formed him, and she didn't regret them. And yet...she knew that wasn't the question that mattered. ...she realized the choice before her was this: Where do I go from here? It is never too late to change things.

    p. 168

23. 

    Thinking back, he recalled events he wished he could change, tears he wished had never been shed, time that could have been better spent, and frustrations he should have shrugged off. Life, it seemed, was full of regret, and he yearned to turn back the clock so he could live parts of his live over again. One thing was certain: He should have been a better husband.

    p. 192

24. 

    He loved his wife but hated what life with her had become, cursing himself for even thinking this way.

    p. 228

25. 

    "...people are pretty much the same. Especially through adolescence and early adulthood. For the most part, people go through the same experiences and think the same thing, but somehow on one ever escapes the belief that his experience is unique in every conceivable way."

    p. 111

26. 

    Stories are as unique as the people who tell them, and the best stories are those in which the ending is a surprise.

    p. 1

27. 

    It went without saying that he felt guilty about what had happened, but married friends had assured him that guilt was the cornerstone of any good marriage. It meant that a conscience was at work, values were held in high esteem, and reasons to feel guilty were best avoided whenever possible.

    p. 2

That’s all the quotes.

27 quotes in the collection · come back when we add more