Backyard Deck Quotes

Sadie, do you see this? This is a persimmon tree! This is my favorite fruit." Marx picked a fat orange persimmon from the tree, and he sat down on the now termite-free wooden deck, and he ate it, juice running down his chin. "Can you believe our luck?" Max said. "We bought a house with a tree that has my actual favorite fruit!" Sam used to say that Marx was the most fortunate person he had ever met - he was lucky with lovers, in business, in looks, in life. But the longer Sadie knew Marx, the more she thought Sam hadn't truly understood the nature of Marx's good fortune. Marx was fortunate because he saw everything as if it were a fortuitous bounty. It was impossible to know - were persimmons his favorite fruit, or had hey just now become his favorite fruit because there they were, growing in his own backyard? He had certainly never mentioned persimmons before.

I am told by people all the time that they simply do not have time to read and listen to all the material they have purchased or subscribed to. But time is democratic and just. Everyone has the same amount. When I choose to read with my mid morning coffee break and you choose to blather about trivia with friends, when I choose to study for an hour sitting on my backyard deck at day's end but you choose to watch a TIVO'd American Idol episode, we reveal much. When someone says he does not have the time to apply himself to acquiring the know-how required to create sufficient value for his stated desires, he is a farmer surrounded by ripe fruit and vegetables, whole grains, and a herd of cattle on his own property who dies of starvation, unable to organize his time and discipline himself to eat.

She unlocked the door, and they walked through to the small backyard. It was fall, and two of their three fruit trees were in season: a Fuyu persimmon tree and a guava tree. “Sadie, do you see this? This is a persimmon tree! This is my favorite fruit.” Marx picked a fat orange persimmon from the tree, and he sat down on the now termite-free wooden deck, and he ate it, juice running down his chin. “Can you believe our luck?” Marx said. “We bought a house with a tree that has my actual favorite fruit.” Sam used to say that Marx was the most fortunate person he had ever met—he was lucky with lovers, in business, in looks, in life. But the longer Sadie knew Marx, the more she thought Sam hadn’t truly understood the nature of Marx’s good fortune. Marx was fortunate because he saw everything as if it were a fortuitous bounty. It was impossible to know—were persimmons his favorite fruit, or had they just now become his favorite fruit because there they were, growing in his own backyard? He had certainly never mentioned persimmons before. My God, she thought, he is so easy to love. “Shouldn’t you wash that?” Sadie asked. “It’s our tree. Nothing’s touched it except my grimy hand,” Marx said. “What about the birds?” “I don’t fear the birds, Sadie. But you should have one of these.” Marx stood, and he picked another fruit for himself and one for her. He walked over to the hose at the side of the house, and he rinsed the persimmon. He held out the fruit to her. “Eat up, my love. Fuyus only yield every other year.” Sadie took a bite of the fruit. It was mildly sweet, its flesh somewhere between a peach and a cantaloupe. Maybe it was her favorite fruit, too?

We would all be sitting in our deck chairs in the backyard, and we would look up, and all of a sudden, the Air House—or maybe even some specific part of the Air House—would be gone. Poof. High-altitude precision bombing. Curtis LeMay won the battle. Haywood Hansell won the war.

For all his courtly title, the monarch (Danaus plexippus, thank you, Madame Goody) is the most down-home of butterflies. That is, before they were virtually extirpated by air pollution and pesticides, monarchs were familiar figures in most American neighborhoods. They fluttered their zigzag course (as if under the orders of some secret navigator whose logic was as fanciful as true) across backyards and vacant lots and swimming holes and fairgrounds and streets of towns and cities: they have been spotted from the observation deck of the Empire State Building by surprised tourists from Indiana who thought they had left such creatures down by the barn. Indeed, wherever there is access to milkweed (Asclepias syriaca: let's not carry this too far, Madame G.) there you will find monarchs, for the larvae of this species is as addicted to milkweed juice as the most strung-out junky to smack. His appetite is awesome in its singularity for he would rather starve than switch.

The girl circled in my arm was clean and fresh, and her sleeping breath was humid against the base of my throat. Something stirred in me in response to her helplessness, and yet at the same time I resented her. I had seen too damn many of these brisk and shining girls, so lovely, so gracious, and so inflexibly ambitious. They had counted their stock in trade and burnished it and spread it right out there on the counter. It was all yours for the asking. All you had to do was give her all the rest of your life, and come through with the backyard pool, cookouts, Eames chairs, mortgage, picture windows, two cars, and all the rest of the setting they required for themselves. These gorgeous girls, with steel behind their eyes, were the highest paid whores in the history of the world. All they offered was their poised, half-educated selves, one hundred and twenty pounds of healthy, unblemished, arrogant meat, in return for the eventual occupational ulcer, the suburban coronary. Nor did they bother to sweeten the bargain with their virginity. Before you could, in your hypnoid state, slip the ring on her imperious finger, that old-fashioned prize was long gone, and even its departure celebrated many times, on house parties and ski weekends, in becalmed sailboats and on cruise ships. This acknowledged and excused promiscuity was, in fact, to her advantage. Having learned her way through the jungly province of sex, she was less likely to be bedazzled by body hunger to the extent that she might make a bad match with an unpromising young man. Her decks were efficiently cleared, guns rolled out, fuses alight, cannonballs stacked, all sails set. She stood on the bridge, braced and ready, scanning the horizon with eyes as cold as winter pebbles. One

As Matt began to turn the pages, he found himself distracted. His eyes began drifting around the room, finally coming to rest on the silent air conditioner that sat in one of his windows. He walked over to the air conditioner and turned it on full blast. Its soft hum was music to his ears. And what about music? Matt grinned and placed a tape in his tape deck and turned up the volume. Everything sounded and felt so good. Suddenly he remembered his reading lamp. He reached over to the wall and flipped the lamp’s switch. When the light came on, Matt whooped with joy. He felt a thrill of excitement as he turned on his clock radio. He even set the alarm to go off. “And TV!” Matt cried, racing over to his television set. “I’m going to watch TV!” By the time Mrs. Carlton appeared in the doorway, Matt was sitting on his bed reading, after turning on every electrical appliance in his room. “What on earth is going on in here?” his mother called over the din. Matt looked up from his book and grinned. “I was just checking to make sure that everything still works,” he told her. Mrs. Carlton shook her head. “Come and get yourself some breakfast,” she told Matt. “And for heaven’s sake take a bath and change your clothes.” As she walked away Matt could hear her mumble under her breath, “The way that boy looks after a simple backyard camping trip. You’d think he was just through a war!

stillborn baby he had held in his hands this morning. After caring for Adriana Chapman for years as she suffered one miscarriage after another, he had hoped he’d be delivering her healthy baby on Christmas Eve. She had taken excellent care of herself during her high-risk pregnancy, eating healthy, doing yoga, meditating and resting as much as possible. Then one misstep and she’d fallen down the stairs from her deck to the backyard. A freak accident that ultimately killed her baby. In all his years as an obstetrician, he’d learned to disconnect emotionally from his patients, but today he hadn’t been able to. Adriana’s

On our first night looking at the new book, we marveled over the photo and description of Argiope aurantia, the Black and Yellow Argiope spider, common throughout the United States. And the very next day, for the first time ever, we found a wriggling cluster of freshly emerged argiope spiderlings under the lowest wooden step of our back deck. While Claire hovered over the spiderlings and sketched them in her notebook, I wondered over the fact that if we'd found these spiders just the day before, we would have known nothing about them. And I was sure, on some level, that it was learning about them that allowed us to find them, Whenever I renew a commitment to studying raptors or gulls or crows or the birds in my backyard, more are given, more show themselves. Our efforts are rewarded, our studies are enhanced in experience. I cannot explain this, and I am reluctant to sound too woo-woo but we can take this as confidently as if it came from the Oracle at Delphi: the more we prepare, the more we are "allowed" somehow to see. This is a guarantee: select a subject, obtain a proper field guide, study it well, and you will see more than you ever have of your chosen subject — and more than that besides.

The back door opens again a few minutes later and I stand, fully prepared to wrestle the phone away from her. But Morgan’s not standing in my backyard. “Hey, you.” I blink. He’s here. Dark-red T-shirt, brown fedora. I blink again. The corner of his mouth turns up and I take off in a sprint, fly down the stairs of the deck, and jump into his arms, which he wraps tight around me. His hand cups the back of my head and repeatedly strokes my damp hair. Our bodies sway back and forth, and I slowly slide down until my feet touch the ground. I take a step back to study him. “You’re a hat guy again.” I grin. “But, that means--” I gasp when I pull the hat off him. “Your hair! You cut it!” I reach up and rake my hand through his subdued curls, more like waves now. “I cut it for you.” His hands at my bare waist send shivers through my core. “I liked the curls, you know.” “You thought I had a perm!” He leans his head back and laughs fully. “That’s the very definition of not liking the curls.” I giggle and shrug. “They grew on me. But this can grow on me too.

The young couple in their first home marveled at the two raccoons in the moonlight of the backyard. The young couple could not conceive that there would ever be a time when they would not be in their house watching raccoons through the kitchen window. There had been one raccoon on the deck, eating the cat's food, and when it registered some motion from inside the house, the young man putting his arm around his young wife, it ran down into the yard, pausing for a moment to make a sound and the second raccoon ran out of the darkness and together they trundled off. To the young couple, this moment felt as though it would exist forever, this life they had, and even when he sat by her bedside in the hospital, slipping in and out of herself, looking much changed without her teeth, he felt as though all he had to do was rise from the chair and look out of the window, steadying himself on the sill so he wouldn't slip again, to see those two dark creatures who had long since returned to the generalized life of the Earth.

The young couple in their first home marveled at the two raccoons in the moonlight of the backyard. The young couple could not conceive that there would ever be a time when they would not be in their house watching raccoons through the kitchen window. There had been one raccoon on the deck, eating the cat's food, and when it registered some motion from inside the house, the young man putting his arm around his young wife, it ran down into the yard, pausing for a moment to make a sound and the second raccoon ran out of the darkness and together they trundled off. To the young couple, this moment felt as though it would exist forever, this life they had, and even when he sat by her bedside in the hospital, slipping in and out of herself, looking much changed without her teeth, he felt as though all he had to do was rise from the chair and look out of the window, steadying himself on the sill so he wouldn't slip again, to see those two dark creatures who had long since returned to the generalized life of the Earth.

They hadn’t had much of a chance to talk about work before Jake and Matt showed up. That led to a re-cap of Thursday night’s trip to Lion’s Head. Matt’s version of events cast Rafe in the weeniest of lights, of course. “This dude had a hot chick crawling all over him, and he couldn’t even get it up.” “Fuck you, asshole, see if I’m ever willing to be your wingman again.” Rafe flipped his friend the bird before grabbing another handful of chips. They were on Dean’s deck, in his backyard, which overlooked Rafe’s old backyard. Now just Liv’s. After the kiss-that-wasn’t-a-kiss-but-was-a-whole-lot-more yesterday, Rafe had a plan. Well, more of a pipe dream than a plan. He wanted Liv back. She was working tonight. Otherwise he’d just hop the fence and try again. And even though he’d had a nap, he wasn’t truly well rested, which he’d need, because he figured that between him admitting he wanted her back and actually getting her back

Because he was leaving Liberia, Chris had tried selling his Italian made, Vespa motor-scooter. It had seen a lot of use and I know that he didn’t buy it new, but it ran and was transportation for him. ‘I’ll give you fifty for it.” I said. “The hell you will,” was his curt reply, “One hundred and fifty makes it yours.” “Don't make me laugh; it's not worth the fifty I'm offering.” I could see his face turn beet-red knowing that I had him over a barrel. “Tell you what Chris, let's cut it in half and depart friends.” I offered. I don’t think he could believe his good luck, as he was quick to accept. “Done,” he said “but you pay the taxes and license!” Of course I knew that these charges were mine but I pretended to groan anyway. With the deal done I was now the proud owner of the motor scooter. Right after the license was transferred, I rode it into a backyard body shop and had it cleaned up and painted bright red. No longer would I have to depend on a taxi or others for transportation. I was free to zip here and there at will. From now on it was the first thing off and the last thing onto the ship. I had Bo-Bo Ben, the ship’s carpenter, make a cradle to secure it and had brackets welded to the main deck behind the house, to lash it down. It still left enough elbow-room for the crew to fish off the stern.

I’m twenty-seven years old. I’ve worked all morning at the lab, and things are going so well I almost shrug off the party. I’ve been doing that a lot lately—neglecting friends and social engagements to steal just a few more hours in the cleanroom. I first notice you in the far corner of the small backyard as I stand on the deck, sipping a Corona-and-lime, my thoughts still back at the lab. I think it’s the way you’re standing that catches my attention—boxed in by a tall, lanky guy in tight black jeans who I recognize from this circle of friends. He’s an artist or something. I don’t even know his name, only that my friend Kyle has said to me recently, Oh, that guy fucks everyone. I can’t explain it, even to this day, but as I watch him chatting up this dark-haired, dark-eyed woman in a cobalt-blue dress—you—a flash of jealousy consumes me. Inexplicably, insanely, I want to hit him. Something in your body language suggests discomfort. You aren’t smiling, your arms are crossed, and it occurs to me that you’re trapped in a bad conversation, and that for some reason, I care. You hold an empty wineglass, streaked with the dregs of a red. Part of me urges, Go talk to her, save her. The other half screams, You know nothing about this woman, not even her name. You are not that guy. I find myself moving toward you through the grass, carrying a new glass of wine, and when your eyes avert to mine, it feels like some piece of machinery has just seized in my chest. Like worlds colliding. As I draw near, you take the glass out of my hand as if you had previously sent me off to get it and smile with an easy familiarity, like we’ve known each other forever. You try to introduce me to Dillon, but the skinny-jeaned artist, now effectively cockblocked, makes his excuses and bails. Then it’s just the two of us standing in the shade of the hedgerow, and my heart is going like mad. I say, “I’m sorry to interrupt, but it looked like you might need rescuing,” and you say, “Good instincts. He’s pretty, but insufferable.” I introduce myself. You tell me your name. Daniela. Daniela.