Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

“Remember if people talk behind your back, it only means you are two steps ahead.”

“I wonder how many people don't get the one they want, but end up with the one they're supposed to be with.”

“You know, a heart can be broken, but it keeps on beating, just the same.”

“The ones that hurt the most always say the least.”

“It's funny, when you're a child you think time will never go by, but when you hit about twenty, time passes like you're on the fast train to Memphis. I guess life just slips up on everybody. It sure did on me.”

“Face it girls. I'm older and I have more insurance.”

“Are you a politician or does lying just run in your family?”

“You never know what's in a person's heart until they're tested, do you?”

“It's funny, most people can be around someone and they gradually begin to love them and never know exactly when it happened; but Ruth knew the very second it happened to her. When Idgie had grinned at her and tried to hand her that jar of honey, all these feelings that she had been trying to hold back came flooding through her, and it was at that second in time that she knew she loved Idgie with all her heart.”

“You're just a bee charmer, Idgie Threadgoode. That's what you are, a bee charmer.”

“People cain't help being what they are any more than a skunk can help being a skunk. Don't you think if they had their choice they would rather be something else? Sure they would. People are just weak.”

“I believe in God, but I don't think you have to go crazy to prove it.”

“What was this power, this insidious threat, this invisible gun to her head that controlled her life . . . this terror of being called names?She had stayed a virgin so she wouldn't be called a tramp or a slut; had married so she wouldn't be called an old maid; faked orgasms so she wouldn't be called frigid; had children so she wouldn't be called barren; had not been a feminist because she didn't want to be called queer and a man hater; never nagged or raised her voice so she wouldn't be called a bitch . . .She had done all that and yet, still, this stranger had dragged her into the gutter with the names that men call women when they are angry.”

“No matter what you look like, there's somebody who's gonna think you're the handsomest man in the world.”

“That's what I'm living on now, honey, dreams, dreams of what I used to do.”

“Oh it don't make no kind of sense. Big ol' ox like Grady won't sit next to a colored child. But he eats eggs- shoot right outta chicken's ass!”

“You know, a heart can be broken, but it still keeps a-beating just the same.”

“By the way, is there anything sadder than toys on a grave?”

“There are magnificent beings on this earth, son, that are walking around posing as humans.”

“...nobody was ever really ready to turn off their mother's machine, no matter what they thought; to turn off the light of their childhood and walk away, just as if they were turning out a light and leaving a room.”

“And so, as quietly as he had lived, he slipped out of town, leaving only a note behind:Well, that's that. I'm off, and if you don't believe I'm leaving, just count the days I'm gone. When you hear the phone not ringing, it'll be me that's not calling. Goodbye, old girl, and good luck.Yours truly,Earl AdcockP.S. I'm not deaf.”

“Lately, it had been an endless procession of long, black nights and gray mornings, when her sense of failure swept over her like a five-hundred-pound wave; and she was scared. But it wasn't death that she feared. She had looked down into that black pit of death and had wanted to jump in, once too often. As a matter of fact, the thought began to appeal to her more and more.She even knew how she would kill herself. It would be with a silver bullet. As round and as smooth as an ice-cold blue martini. She would place the gun in the freezer for a few hours before she did it, so it would feel frosty and cold against her head. She could almost feel the ice-cold bullet shooting through her hot, troubled brain, freezing the pain for good. The sound of the gun blast would be the last sound she would ever hear. And then... nothing. Maybe just the silent sound that a bird might hear, flying in the clean, cool air, high above the earth. The sweet, pure air of freedom.No, it wasn't death she was afraid of. It was this life of hers that was beginning to remind her of that gray intensive care waiting room.”

“All those calm, adult discussions. When all she really wanted to do was scream for her momma, her sweet momma, the one person in the world who loved her better than anyone ever would or ever could.”

“One gal drank a can of floor wax and topped it off with a cup of Clorox, trying to separate herself from the same world he was in.”

“I believe poor people are good people, except the ones that are mean . . .”

“It’s funny, when you’re a child you think time will never go by, but when you hit about twenty, time passes like you’re on the fast train to Memphis.”

“If there is such a thing as complete happiness, it is knowing that you are in the right place.”

“I brought a picture with me that I had at home, of a girl in a swing with a castle and pretty blue bubbles in the background, to hang in my room, but that nurse here said the girl was naked from the waist up and not appropriate. You know, I've had that picture for fifty years and I never knew she was naked. If you ask me, I don't think the old men they've got here can see well enough to notice that she's bare-breasted. But, this is a Methodist home, so she's in the closet with my gallstones.”

“Albert and I would spend hours and hours looking at them. Cleo had this big magnifying glass on his desk, and we'd find centipedes and grasshoppers and beetles and potato bugs, ants . . . and put them in a jar and look at them. They have the sweetest little faces and the cutest expressions. After we'd looked at them all we wanted to, we'd put them in the yard and let them go on about their business.”

“Idgie smiled back at her and looked up into the clear blue sky that reflected in her eyes and she was as happy as anybody who is in love in the summertime can be.”