LINDSAY EDMUNDS

Peters Township, Pennsylvania, USA

 

 

The morning began with an irritating crowd of chores such as getting information together for my tax preparer, attending to old emails, etc. By the time I settled down to find a suitable quotation, I was not optimistic I could do anything wonderful on this rainy Monday.

 

But I found one right away, from Come Dance with Me. (Thanks, Russ, for being so good at what you do.) I wrote it out, slightly abridged for length, on yellow paper and drove the yellow paper and myself to the local Barnes & Noble, where I put the quotation prominently in the Dance section of the bookstore. Because Anthony's tag line is elegant and concise, I used it almost verbatim. No photo ops here -- but a bit of grace in the middle of the day.

 

Lindsay
 

 

“When I got home I opened the door, took a deep breath of silence, took my coat off, got Top Hat off the video shelf, poured myself some cask-strength Bowmore Islay Malt, added water judiciously, and settled back to watch Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. Fred by himself has never interested me much despite the wonderful things he could do; the enchanting Ginger, however, as a partner of independent spirit, gave him importance and validated his masculinity by acknowledging his mastery and following his lead. . . . Their dancing was real. Unlike western stars who perform impossible feats with handguns and western presidents who command hundreds of thousands of expendable stuntmen and women, Fred and Ginger actually did what they did.”

 

from Come Dance With Me

Bloomsbury Publishing, London (2005), pp. 88-89

 

This extract from his thirteenth novel is distributed on 4 February 2008 in celebration of his eighty-third birthday.

  


 

 

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Lindsay's 2007 4qation

 

Dear Krakes,

 

The weather is stormy in Pennsylvania -- snow by tonight -- and I am just back from SA4Qation 2006. This year's quotation is from The Moment Under the Moment:

 

  We make stories because we are story. The fabric of our myths and folk-tales is in us from before birth. The action systems of the universe are the origin of life and stories. The pattern of blue-green algae and the numinous wings of the Great Nebula in Orion and the runic scrawl of human chromosomes are stories.

from Household Tales

  

 

 

Underneath the quotation I wrote:

 

Today is the 81st birthday of Pennsylvania-born writer Russell Hoban. He lives in London now; he still writes books. Some fans of his work celebrate his birthday each year by leaving quotations from his books in random places -- all over the world.

 

Our story is here:
www.thoughtcat.com/sa4qe

 

 

I left the quotation on a cafe table in a big Barnes & Noble bookstore. It seemed right.
 

- Lindsay

 

 

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Lindsay's 2005 4qation

 

Friends,

 

Today is a bright Friday, and I didn't have to work, so I was able to go SA4quating.

 

First quote:

 

 

 

Her brown loaves were like bread from a fairy tale; her potato pancakes sizzled with lust and tasted of fidelity.

 

from Mr Rinyo-Clacton's Offer

  

 

 

First place: the Galleria, Pittsburgh, Pa. The Galleria is an small upscale mall, with a parking garage and skylights. Sound system was playing "Daydream" by the Lovin' Spoonful. Williams Sonoma sells kitchen equipment; thus, it got the honor of the quote. I found a yellow pottery mixing bowl in a design called "circus." There was a lion. I turned the bowl so that the lion faced outward, and placed the yellow paper in front of the bowl.

 

Second quote:

 

 

 

When I was between twelve and thirteen I was lying in bed one night not asleep, not awake, and all at once I was looking down at myself from the ceiling. It wasn't a dream, I don't know what it was. I don't know anything about ecstasy. It happened another time that year too.

 

from Turtle Diary

  

 

 

Second place: South Hills Village, Pittsburgh, Pa. Sound system was playing "Am I Standing Still?" by Jewel. Walked here and there. Then, because I needed to replace a watch battery, I went to the watch-accessory kiosk on the lower level, where I ran into my aunt, who was replacing her watchband. I cannot tell you how weird and unlikely that was. We chatted, had coffee. Sometime during coffee, I decided to leave the quotation at Lazarus. (Lazarus is a local department store chain, now owned by Macys.) I thought to leave the yellow paper tucked under a pillow on a very expensive bed. The name of the bed was "Silverdream."

Below both quotations I wrote:

 

"Today (2/4/05) is Mr Hoban's 80th birthday, and this quotation has been left in tribute to him. To find out more about this remarkable writer, go to: http://www.thoughtcat.com/sa4qe."

 

 

Lindsay
 

 

 

 

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Lindsay's 2004 Quotes

 

Pennsylvania is where it all began for me. I was born here, in a hospital that later was turned into a beer factory, and I am living here again, after spending most of my adult life elsewhere.  Pennsylvania also was where I was launched on my lifetime enthusiasm for Russ's books, when I checked a copy of Turtle Diary out of a semi-rural library in the middle of the state.

 

So it felt right to take my 2004 SA4QE quotation to the semi-rural library in Peters Township, Pennsylvania, where I now live. It is from Turtle Diary, of course.

 

This lovely quotation, about the healing power of a good relationship, has always been one of my favorites:

 

 

 

I didn't know how lonely I'd been until the loneliness stopped. Now when I looked at my flat it seemed to have been cleared of invisible wires criss-crossed in patterns of pain that had been there for years, I saw myself in days past, years past, stepping carefully and trying to keep my balance. There were the kitchen, the bathroom, the sitting-room, the bedroom, the spare room. There were the books, the drawing-table, the typewriter, Madame Beetle, the clutter, all the spaces and places where I stood or sat or lay down, all the things that I touched and used in my daily effort to piece together an eggshell life from broken fragments. George had given me so much that even if there came a time without George I could bear it now and not step carefully nor build my broken eggshell with mad patience. He hadn't done anything special, it was simply his way of being.

  

 

 

 

Lindsay
 

 

 

 

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Lindsay's 2003 Quotes

(Gaithersburg, Maryland, USA)

 

 

The day started out dark, with lashing rain, as I drove around on my SA4QE mission. I chose three quotations:

 

from FREMDER

Dream: a rushing in the air behind the visible world.

 

Trains run through the center of old town Gaithersburg at all hours. At night the whistles sound lonesome, the way they do. There is much rushing of air at the train station, and a huge, unreal-looking antique locomotive on a sidetrack.  I left this quotation on a bench in the ticket office/waiting room.

 

from TURTLE DIARY

The waves were silver under the moon, the spray flew up from the rocks on either side of the harbour entrance, there was a beacon on the headland. The champagne tasted like clear and bubbling bright new mornings without end.

Great Beginnings is a Gaithersburg store that, like Turtle Diary, concerns itself with launching. At Great Beginnings you see dozens of model nursery rooms, each one emanating hope and happiness for the new life it is meant to contain. I left this lovely quotation on a chest of drawers in one display that caught my eye.

 

from TURTLE DIARY

Come, I said to the self inside me, come out and take your chance.


If you don't go to health clubs regularly, you may not be aware that they are places of great introspection. It is normal to arrive, exercise, and leave without saying two words to anyone. People are in communion with the machines, the weights, and their own private selves. So I left this quotation at Fitness First in Germantown, MD, in a locker.


Lindsay

 

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