Quotes From "Stargirl" By Jerry Spinelli

It's in the morning, for most of us. It's that time, those few seconds when we're coming out of sleep but we're not really awake yet. For those few seconds we're something more primitive than what we are about to become. We have just slept the sleep of our most distant ancestors, and something of them and their world still clings to us. For those few moments we are unformed, uncivilized. We are not the people we know as ourselves, but creatures more in tune with a tree than a keyboard. We are untitled, unnamed, natural, suspended between was and will be, the tadpole before the frog, the worm before the butterfly. We are for a few brief moments, anything and everything we could be. And then..and then -- ah -- we open our eyes and the day is before us and .. we become ourselves. . Jerry Spinelli

This was the start of a period that blurs as I try to recall it. Incidents seem to cascade and merge. Events become feelings, fellings become events. Head and heart are contrary historians. Jerry Spinelli

What she saw, she felt. Her eyes went straight to her heart. Jerry Spinelli

I understood. I suffered. But whose sake was I suffering for? I kept thinking of Señor Saguaro's question: Whose affection do you value more, hers or the others'? Jerry Spinelli

Sometimes I try to erase myself. And then, if I've done a good job, I'm erased. I'm nothing. And then the world is free to flow into me like water into an empty bowl. And I see. I hear. But not with eyes and ears. I'm not outside my world anymore, and I'm not really inside it either. The thing is, there's no difference between me and the universe. The boundary is gone. I am it and it is me. I am a stone, a cactus thorn. I am rain. . Jerry Spinelli

You know, there's a place we all inhabit, but we don't much think about it, we're scarcely conscious of it, and it lasts for less than a minute a day. It's in the morning, for most of us. It's that time, those few seconds when we're coming out of sleep but we're not really awake yet. For those few seconds we're something more primitive than what we are about to become. We have just slept the sleep of our most distant ancestors, and something of them and their world still clings to us. For those few moments we are unformed, uncivilized. We are not the people we know as ourselves, but creatures more in tune with a tree than a keyboard. We are untitled, unnamed, natural, suspended between was and will be, the tadpole before the frog, the worm before the butterfly. We are, for a few brief moments, anything and everything we could be. Jerry Spinelli

Home is everything you can walk to. Jerry Spinelli

And the trouble with bad times is, you can't sleep through them. Jerry Spinelli

So distracting, so complete is she that she is gone before many realize that she had no escort, she was along, a parade of one. Jerry Spinelli

So distracting, so complete is she that she is gone before many realize that she had no escort, she was alone, a parade of one. Jerry Spinelli

I'm looking over a four-leaf clover that I overlooked before. Jerry Spinelli

At the same time, we held back. Because she was different. Different. We had no one to compare her to, no one to measure her against. Jerry Spinelli