Dodie Smith

Only half a page left now. Shall I fill it with 'I love you, I love you'-- like father's page of cats on the mat? No. Even a broken heart doesn't warrant a waste of good paper.

I have really sinned. I am going to pause now, and sit here on the mound repenting in deepest shame...

Your pain and anger will pass, but the guilt would remain with you for always.

It is rather exciting to write by moonlight.

And who says you always have to understand things? You can like them without understanding them -- like 'em better sometimes.

We were restless for ages...After a while I heard an owl hooting and calmed myself by thinking of it flying over the dark fields _ and then I remembered it would be pouncing on mice. I love owls, but I wish God had made them vegetarian.

Thinking of death--strange, beautiful, terrible and a long way off--made me feel happier than ever.

I couldn't make it out - why you ever let me, I mean. I understand now. Things like that happen when you're in love with the wrong person. Worse things. Things you never forgive yourself for.

Of course, he sees creation as discovery. I mean, everything is already created, by the first cause---call it God if you like; everything is already there to be found.

Then I told myself that as I never gave the Church a thought when I was feeling happy, I could hardly expect it to do anything for me when I wasn't. You can't get insurance money without paying in premiums.

The thought came to me that perhaps it is the loving that counts, not the being loved in return - that perhaps true loving can never know anything but happiness.

I didn't make any mistake. I know that when he nearly asked me to marry him it was only on impulseIt is part if a follow-my-leader game of second-best we have all been playing - Rose with Simon, Simon with me, me with Stephen and Stephen, I suppose, with that detestable Leda Fox-Cotton. It isn't a very good game; the people you play it with are apt to get hurt.

I am a restlessness inside a stillness inside a restlessness.

Now, paper and pencils," said Miss Marcy, clapping her hands.Writing paper is scarce in this house, and I had no intention of tearing sheets out of this exercise book, which is a superb sixpenny one the Vicar gave me. In the end, Miss Marcy took the middle pages out of her library record, which gave us a pleasant feeling that we were stealing from the government, and then we sat round the table and elected her chairman.

Just to be in love seemed the most blissful luxury I had ever known. The thought came to me that perhaps it is the loving that counts, not the being loved in return - that perhaps true loving can never know anything but true happiness.