Beach Music

But no one walks out of his family without reprisals: a family is too disciplined an army to offer compassion to its deserters.

Fantasy is one of the soul's brighter porcelains.

I do not know why it is that I have always been happier thinking of somewhere I have been or wanted to go, than where I am at the time. I find it difficult to be happy in the present.

The water was pure and cold and came out of the Apennines tasting like snow melted in the hands of a pretty girl.

In silence, we watched the water shimmer like a peacock's feather in that shining foil of soft tide in retreat.

"Carolina beach music," Dupree said, coming up on the porch. "The holiest sound on earth."

The best thing about a small town is that you grow up knowing everyone. It is also the worst thing.

"It's politics, sugarpeeps," I said. "It makes everybody stupid. When you grow up, you'll know what I mean."

[...] I learned from those evening recitals that music could ache and hurt, that beautiful music was a place a suffering man could hide.

One can do anything, anything at all, I thought, if provided with a passionate and gifted teacher.