Kaui Hart Hemmings Quotes & Sayings

I miss her despite the fact that she envisioned the rest of her life without me. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

If Joanie dies before me, I wonder if I'll ever be with another woman. I can't imagine going through all of the preliminary stuff - the talk, the chatter, the dinners. I'd have to take someone places, explain my history, make jokes, dole out compliments, hold back farts. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I feel like having details from their day and having a plot and action and things to do is much more revealing than having a character sitting and thinking to themselves. When I'm writing, I want people to actually have a goal, something that's dragging them forward. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Hey," he says.
I feel foolish for being out of breath and standing over him. The moonlight cuts a line down my chest. "Hey," I say.
"Checking on me?"
"I couldn't sleep. Scottie. She's in the bathroom." I stop talking.
"Yeah?" he says and sits up.
"She's playacting." I don't know how to say it. I don't need to say it. "She's kissing the mirror."
"Oh," he says. "I used to do some messed-up things as a kid. Still do."
I feel wide awake, which always makes me angry in the middle of the night. I'm useless without sleep. I can't get myself to go back to my own room. I sit on the end of the bed by his feet. "I'm worried about my daughters," I say. "I'm worried there's something wrong with them."
Sid rubs his eyes.
"Forget it," I say. "Sorry for waking you up."
"It's going to get worse," he says. "After your wife dies." He holds the blanket up to his chin. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Stop it, Barry," Joanie said. "Get ahold of yourself. This is just how we work."
I agreed. When she told Shelley I was useless, I heard the smile in her voice and knew she was pretending to be irritated. Really, she wouldn't know what to do without my uselessness, just as I wouldn't know what to do without her complaints. I take it back. It's not that we don't treat each other well; it's just that we're comfortable enough to know that sarcasm and aloofness keep us afloat, and we never have to watch where we step.
"You are both so cold," Barry said that night. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Writing has never been like therapy for me, but blogging comes a little closer - I can smack-talk freely and frequently, and this is good for me. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I tell Esther she should ease up on lard. There's no need to mix lard in with Scottie's rice, chicken, and beans. I tell her she hasn't read the blogs. I've read the blogs. I know what Scottie should eat. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Because feeling love does make you feel superior. Until you find out you aren't loved back. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I think grief and fear are going to come to him suddenly. They'll be undiluted and words won't work. We're all going to get hit and won't know how to hit back. I wish I knew the answers, how to help myself and the people who will hurt all around me. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

When a place comes across vividly in a novel, it's often compared to a character. I can remember writing teachers who encouraged me to treat setting as if it were a character, to give it three dimensions, to make it come alive, jump off the page. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

It's useless to criticize things that people love and something that speaks to them. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I don't ask what Alex sees in him because I'm afraid my disapproval will make her latch on to him even more. That's how it works. I'll have to pretend he doesn't bother me and that I don't want to drown him in the bay. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Sometimes I loved the disruptive student in class who livened up lectures with wisecracks - it put a spin on things, added flavor, made me laugh. Other times, I wished the heckler would just shut up so I could learn something. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Perhaps I did nothing because I don't have enough fear to be a good parent. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

A sea of red lights, and I slow down. My job now is to gather everyone together and tell them we have to let her go. I won't tell anyone over the phone, because I didn't like hearing the news from the doctor that way. I have maybe a week to handle the arrangements, as the doctor said, but the arrangements are overwhelming. How do I learn how to run a family? How do I say goodbye to someone I love so much that I've forgotten just how much I love her? — Kaui Hart Hemmings

The beauty of cinema is that it can do some things that novels just can't. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I've never gone back to the stacks after my book's expiration at the front of the store. Not because I'm above it or anything, but I'd be mortified if someone caught me looking for my own book. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I loved 'Belzhar' by Meg Wolitzer. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I'll never be ready. Yet at the same time, you always want to reach the end. You can't fly to a destination and linger in the air. I want to reach the end of this thing, and I feel terrible about it. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

That's how you know you love someone, I guess, when you can't experience anything without wishing the other person were there to see it, too. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I just try to write what I think would really happen, and with grief and tragedy, there are these naturally occurring moments of levity and humor and absurdity. I think that's what life is really like. Sadness gets interrupted, and happiness gets interrupted. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

You're a dad-ass. Like a badass but older. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I felt like I haven't had the typical experience of a novelist whose book becomes a movie. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Scottie and I walk down the hall. Her T-shirt says MRS. CLOONEY, — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I picture Cully tromping through that high, deep snow. That's how I feel physically from all of this. Moving through grief like it's a thick drift, exhausting but enlivening. It makes your muscles ache. It makes you feel you've inhabited your body completely. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Two days a week, I go to my office at The Grotto, a writer's collective in San Francisco. I get there at 8:15 and write until around 1 or 2 P.M. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I always felt a little bit of an outsider, especially because I grew up on Oahu. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

We walk until there aren't more houses, all the way to the part of the beach where the current makes the waves come in then rush back out so that the two waves clash, water casting up like a geyser. We watch that for a while and then Scottie says, "I wish Mom was here." I'm thinking the exact same thought. That's how you know you love someone, I guess, when you can't experience anything without wishing the other person were there to see it, too. Every day I kept track of anecdotes, occurrences, and gossip, bullet-pointing the news in my head and even rehearsing my stories before telling them to Joanie in bed at night. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Where are their mothers? Kids are so free here. It makes them seem older, more capable, coordinated, but wild. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

In putting setting to work, I like to think about long shots and close-ups. The long shot is the overall view of the place in which the characters live - the island, the town, the wide sweep of place. Then we narrow in. The close-up, the tight focus, makes the place different from anywhere else. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I see Dr. Johnston at the end of the hall, walking toward us. He stops talking to the other doctors and gestures for me to wait. He holds up his hand: Stop. His face is eager yet unsmiling. I look in the other direction then back at him. His steps quicken, and I squint, for some reason pretending I don't recognize him. And I think: What if I'm wrong? What if Joanie doesn't make it out of this?
"Scottie," I say. "This way."
I walk in the other direction, away from Dr. Johnston, and she turns and follows me.
"Walk quickly," I tell her.
"Why?"
"It's a game. Let's race. Walk fast. Run."She takes off, her backpack jiggling on her back, and I follow her, walking quickly then breaking into a slow jog, and because Dr. Johnston is my friend's dad and was a friend of my father's, I feel like I'm fourteen again, running from the patriarchs. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Where's Sid?" I ask. "Why do I always — Kaui Hart Hemmings

What's great about teen fiction is that it's all mixed up - there's highbrow and lowbrow! — Kaui Hart Hemmings

With families, no matter what kind you inherit, at some point you want to announce that you belong to it. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

The sun is getting warmer on my back, and I wish the air could stay the way it was moments before: the air of promise, the elements brewing but not quite cooked. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I wasn't creative enough to imagine my first novel becoming a film directed by Alexander Payne. Nor did I consider the possibility of seeing Hollywood stars moving through my personal version of Hanalei town: going to Tahiti Nui, rehearsing a scene in front of my cousin's cottages, driving the snaky roads. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

The entire island knows our father, Fred Hemmings, Jr. - kids, adults, surfers, the governor, grocery clerks, gang members who call our house at night and threaten to kill us as soon as they get out of jail. Fred was a world-champion surfer and is now a well-known, controversial politician. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I let her go on with this fantasy, this belief in magical endings, this belief that love can bring someone to life. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Setting shouldn't just consist of describing nature or a landscape, or of saying where something takes place. It is the world of specific people. It's not enough for it to feel vivid or credible; it should feel necessary. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Don't pull out." "That's what she said, — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I can still love feeling so close to the sun and peaks of mountains, still love life at this altitude - it makes me feel like every breath counts. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

After college, I moved to Breckenridge, Colorado, and went snowboarding every day. I didn't know what I wanted to do, but I knew what I didn't want to do. So I applied to grad school for writing, and I just gave it a shot and took it from there. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

When you're a child, you crave formal recognition; you crave ceremony, celebration, certification of proof. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Why is it so hard to articulate love yet so easy to express disappointment? — Kaui Hart Hemmings

My seven-year-old daughter knows old songs and how the neighborhoods got their names. There are little things: Businesses receive blessings from Hawaiian priests before opening, and everyone's kids have their debut luau. You can't really get through a day without doing something Hawaiian. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I'd always dread this part of being a guest in the morning - the tentative yielding into the house's normal traffic. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

We're just kids growing up on an island, doing bad things in pretty places. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

We continue to eat, the conversation easy and flowing. I listen to everything everyone says, an urgency to pay attention, to not miss these moments you don't know are moments until they're gone. I narrow in, trying to hold it all in place, even though I think that if you document life this way, the moments will never set. We don't need to remember. Everything just becomes a part of you. And then it's over. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I drift off for a while. I don't know how long, but when I open my eyes, the Oscars are still on and Alex tells me that Sid has gone and this makes me a little sad. Whatever the four of us had is over. He is my daughter's boyfriend now, and I am a father. A widower. No pot, no cigarettes, no sleeping over. They'll have to find inventive ways to conduct their business, most likely in uncomfortable places, just like the rest of them. I let him and my old ways go. We all let him go, as well as who we were before this, and now it's really just the three of us. I glance over at the girls, taking a good look at what's left. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I'm sorry," I say. "I didn't give you everything you wanted. I wasn't everything you wanted. You were everything I wanted. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Jonathan Franzen seems like the grumpiest guy, and he doesn't seem to like much of anything, so I really don't care what he has to say. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I like the way men cry. They're efficient. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

your business," I say. "And you're not sleeping in — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I tilt my face up and inhale, willing my surroundings to enter me somehow and to remind me how small I am. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Disney's Aulani Resort has really developed the southwest coast of Oahu and led to it getting more attention. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I try to think of it not as writer's block, but a time where you just need to live life and experience things so you have something to write about. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

People go surfing before work and paddling afterward. My husband is from Wisconsin, and he goes to work in his Hawaiian shirt. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

One day during filming, George Clooney was wearing his surf shirt and board shorts, and my six-year-old daughter was in the background as an extra, playing in the sand - playing herself. She and Clooney suddenly looked equally Hawaiian, equally related to the place I call home. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Tragedy brings change, and that's what I'm interested in most - how people plunge into change and try to fight, then eventually move with it with grace. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

The best thing about being a fiction writer is that where the truth is inconvenient, I could veer away. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

We need to get home and put some ointments and ice on the stings. Vinegar will make it worse, so if you thought Giraffe Boy could pee on you, you're shit out of luck."
She agrees as if prepared for this - the punishment, the medication, the swelling, the pain that hurts her now and the pain that will hurt her later. She seems okay with my disapproval. She's gotten her story, after all, and she's beginning to see how much easier physical pain is to tolerate than emotional pain. I'm unhappy that she's learning this at such a young age.
"The hospital will have ointments and ice," she says. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I can't speak for all Hawaiians, but the reality is that we depend on tourism. Locals might not want to go to the spots like Waikiki, but we do want tourists to experience more of the islands. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Do you guys have sunscreen?" I ask.
"No," Scottie says. "Do we have water?"
"Did you bring any?" Alex asks.
"No," I say.
Alex pops her head up. "Did you bring snacks for us?"
"We can walk to town."
How do mothers manage to bring everything a child could need? — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I was useless, that I leave my socks hanging on every doorknob in the house. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Fuck', I think. What a beautiful word. If I could say only one thing for the rest of my life, that would be it. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Adults appreciate the flavor of wine, its nuances and such. And we have major problems and stress. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

For my 11th birthday, I asked to be adopted. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I lean down so that my face is right in front of hers and whisper, 'He doesn't love you. I love you. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Especially when I write, I want to get out of people's heads and have them speak and have them get dressed and have them go to work. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Say goodbye to your mom."
Scottie pauses, then keeps going.
"Scottie."
"Bye!" she yells.
I grab her arm. I could yell at her for wanting to leave, but I don't. She pulls her arm out of my grasp. I look up to see if anyone is watching us, because I don't think you're supposed to aggressively hold children these days. Gone are the days of spanking, threats, and sugar. Now there are therapy, antidepressants, and Splenda. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I hope she can't tell that I'm appraising her and that I'm completely worried by what I see. She's excitable and strange. She's ten. What do people do during the day when they're ten? She runs her fingers along the window and mumbles, "This could give me bird flu," and then she forms a circle around her mouth with her hand and makes trumpet noises. She's nuts. Who knows what's going on in that head of hers, and speaking of her head, she most definitely could use a haircut or a brushing. There are small tumbleweeds of hair resting on the top of her head. Where does she get haircuts? I wonder. Has she ever had one before? She scratches her scalp, then looks at her nails. She wears a shirt that says I'M NOT THAT KIND OF GIRL. BUT I CAN BE! I'm grateful that she isn't too pretty, but I realize this could change. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

She looks at the Dictaphone in my hand.
"Are you recording this?"
"No, Alex, I was summarizing a deposition."
"How can you work?"
"How can you see a movie? How can you have a friend over?"
She looks away. Half of the room is bright from my lamp. The other side is dark, the sharp silhouette of the mountain framed by the window running across the room. The image always reminds me of a panoramic picture. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I wouldn't know what to do with daughters,' he says. 'Exchange them for sons?'
'But then I could wind up with something like you.'
'I'm not so bad,' he says. 'I'm smart.'
'You're about a hundred miles away from the town of Smart, my friend.'
'You're mistaken, counselor,' he says. 'I'm smart, I can take care of myself. I'm an awesome tennis player, a keen observer of life around me. I'm a good cook. I always have weed.'
'I'm sure your parents are proud.'
'It's possible.' He looks at his knees and I wonder if I've offended him. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I bet in big cities you can walk down the street scrowling and no one will ask you what's wrong or encourage you to smile, but everyone here has the attitude that we're lucky to live in Hawaii; paradise reigns supreme. I think paradise can go fuck itself. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

We've visited a lot, but being a visitor is very different from living in Hawaii, especially when you're going to high school. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Hawaii is so complex; there are so many points of view, and there are so many experiences to see and to find. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I love film and have taken a stab at a screenplay. I love writing dialogue and found it highly enjoyable. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I like to work out every day, so that takes up some time. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I'm proud of being from Hawaii, and I'm proud of being Hawaiian, but I'm more than that, too. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Nothing has changed that much, even during filmmaking for 'The Descendants.' I wrote. I took the kids to school. I cleaned the house. And I had dinner with George Clooney. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

We walk up the sandy slope toward the dining terrace. I see Troy sitting at a table with some people I know. I look at Scottie to see if she sees him, and she is giving him the middle finger. The dining terrace gasps, but I realize it's because of the sunset and the green flash. We missed it. The flash flashed. The sun is gone, and the sky is pink. I reach to grab the offending hand, but instead, I correct her gesture.
"Here, Scottie. Don't let that finger stand by itself like that. Bring up the other fingers just a little bit. There you go. That's the cool way to do it."
Troy stares at us and smiles a bit. He's completely confused.
"All right, that's enough." I suddenly feel sorry for Troy. He must feel awful. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

I like to add props to render the specificities of place - paintings, food, clothing, signs, infrastructure, music, sayings and slang particular to the region and particular to the character. And props shouldn't just sit there; they should get used. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

The sun is shining, mynah birds are chattering, palm trees are swaying, so what. I'm in the hospital and I'm healthy. My heart is beating as it should. My brain is firing off messages that are loud and clear. My wife is on the upright hospital bed, positioned the way people sleep on airplanes, her body stiff, head cocked to the side. Her hands on her lap. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

You can't compare and rank heartache. Pain is pain is pain. There is no precise measurement. No quarter cup. — Kaui Hart Hemmings

Get used to it. She'll be there for the rest of your life. She'll be there on birthdays, at Christmastime, when you get your period, when you graduate, have sex, when you marry, have children, when you die. She'll be there and she won't be there. — Kaui Hart Hemmings