Don’t you feel you’ve come across a ruby in the grass when you find particularly fine passages in your reading? This is one of my favorites from The Empty Copper Sea by John D. MacDonald. It’s a Travis McGee mystery. A piece of newsprint has blown around an ankle as Travis walks, thinking of Gretel, with whom he’s newly smitten: “I wadded it to walnut size and threw it some fifteen feet at a trash container. The swing lid of the trash container was open about an inch and a half. If it went in, I would live forever. It didn’t even touch the edges as it disappeared inside. I wished it was all a sound stage, that the orchestra was out of sight. I wished I was Gene Kelly. I wished I could Dance.”

At the risk of English-teachering it to death, I’ll mention a few of the perfections in the quote. I love “walnut size.” Concise, visual, useful phrase. “Trash container” is used twice in close proximity, a writing-book no no, but it works and I like that MacDonald doesn’t fret over such trivialities. “If it went in, I would live forever.” Wow. Such a recognizable feeling over-stated without apology or explanation. The last two sentences of elaboration are pitch-perfect – all bringing to mind the magic of a Gene Kelly movie dance, maybe Singin in the Rain.

It’s been ten years since I read that book, but I haven’t forgotten this image. (I have a Bits I Admire book I write quotes in, but I don’t think I’ll forget this one.)