How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
"Know what that is, all around us, Winnie?" said Tuck, his voice low. "Life. Moving, growing, changing, never the same two minutes together. This water, you look out at it every morning, and it looks the same, but it ain't. All night long it's been moving, coming in through the stream back there to the west, slipping out through the stream down east here, always quiet, always new, moving on." (12.4)
Tuck's getting pretty deep here, defining life and all. To him, life means moving (like water!)—something he and his family can't very well do.
Quote #8
"It's a wheel, Winnie. Everything's a wheel, turning and turning, never stopping. The frogs is part of it, and the bugs, and the fish, and the wood thrush, too. And people. But never the same ones. Always coming in new, always growing and changing, and always moving on. That's the way it's supposed to be. That's the way it is." (12.6)
Another metaphor! This time, life is a wheel. What do a wheel and water have in common? Yep, they're always moving.
Quote #9
"Living's heavy work, but off to one side, the way we are, it's useless, too. It don't make sense. If I knowed how to climb back on the wheel, I'd do it in a minute. You can't have living without dying. So you can't call it living, what we got. We just are, we just be, like rocks beside the road." (12.10)
"You can't have living without dying." Talk amongst yourselves.