Only when a tree has fallen can you take the measure of it. It is the same with a man. Anne Morrow Lindbergh More Quotes by Anne Morrow Lindbergh More Quotes From Anne Morrow Lindbergh How inexplicable it seems. Anything else will be accepted as a better excuse. If one sets aside time for a business appointment, a trip to the hairdresser, a social engagement or a shopping expedition, that time is accepted as inviolable. But if one says: I cannot come because that is my hour to be alone, one is considered rude, egotistical or strange. Anne Morrow Lindbergh engagement shopping rude The ball of rumor and criticism, once it starts rolling, is difficult to stop. Anne Morrow Lindbergh rumor gossip criticism It was a magic caused by the collision of modern methods and old ones; modern history and ancient; accessibility and isolation. And it was a magic which could only strike spark about that time. A few years earlier, from the point of view of aircraft alone, it would have been impossible to reach these places; a few later, and there will be no such isolation. Anne Morrow Lindbergh magic views years Duration is not a test of truth or falsehood. Anne Morrow Lindbergh duration tests truth It is only framed in space that beauty blooms; only in space are events, and objects and people unique and significant and therefore beautiful. Anne Morrow Lindbergh space unique beautiful There comes a moment when the things one has written, even a traveler's memories, stand up and demand a justification. They require an explanation. They query, 'Who am I? What is my name? Why am I here? Anne Morrow Lindbergh demand names memories Why do progress and beauty have to be so opposed? Anne Morrow Lindbergh progress For it is not merely the trivial which clutters our lives but the important as well Anne Morrow Lindbergh clutter wells important Fame separates you from life. Anne Morrow Lindbergh fame Fame is a kind of death because it arrests life around the person in the public eye. Anne Morrow Lindbergh eye kind fame Frenchwomen just never look ungroomed, do they? Anne Morrow Lindbergh france looks Geniuses were like storms or cyclones, pulling everything into their path, sticks and stones and dust. Anne Morrow Lindbergh storm cyclones dust For the most part, we, who could choose simplicity, choose complication. Anne Morrow Lindbergh clutter simplicity life I should like to be a full-time Mother and a full-time Artist and a full-time Wife-Companion and also a 'Charming Woman' on the side! And to be aware and record it all. I cannot do it all. Something must go - several things probably. The 'charming woman' first! Anne Morrow Lindbergh wife artist mother The wave of the future is coming and there is no fighting it. Anne Morrow Lindbergh wave fighting I can conceive of 'falling in love' over and over again. But 'marriage,' this richness of life itself, I cannot conceive of having again - or with anyone else. In this sense 'marriage' seems to me indissoluble. Anne Morrow Lindbergh richness-of-life falling-in-love seems Woman must be the pioneer in this turning inward for strength. In a sense, she has always been the pioneer. Anne Morrow Lindbergh pioneers inward inspirational Woman's normal occupations in general run counter to creative life, or contemplative life, or saintly life. Anne Morrow Lindbergh contemplative-life women running people talk about 'sex' as though it hopped about by itself, like a frog! Anne Morrow Lindbergh frogs sex people I feel I should not be ... so at the mercy of people's regard. And yet - it is the artist's desire for communication too; without the answering voice you get so numb; you lose faith in your powers to communicate. Anne Morrow Lindbergh communication voice artist