How we cite our quotes: (Section Break.Paragraph)
Quote #1
You were beautiful in a rough sort of way, but you were older than I'd realized […] From a distance, when I'd seen you at the check-in line, your body had looked thin and small, like the eighteen-year-olds at my school, but up close, really looking, I could see that your arms were hard and tanned, and the skin on your face was weathered. You were as brown as a stretch of dirt. (1.23)
Clearly Ty isn't someone who spends a lot of time in conventional society. We eventually learn this, but from the point when we first meet him, it's pretty obvious from his appearance that nature is his primary environment.
Quote #2
I glanced at you. "How did you get here?"
"Walked. It took about a week. When I got here, I collapsed."
"All by yourself?"
"Just me. The rocks gave me dreams … and water, of course. It's special, this place. I stayed here about two weeks, camping in the middle, living off those rocks. When I got home, everything had changed." (7.40-43)
From the time he was a child, Ty has learned to rely on the land as his primary source of pretty much everything. His connection to it is almost mystical—he connects dreams with physical resources like water and sees rocks as something off which he can live.
Quote #3
"You're a new person now, Gem," you murmured. "That old you's been left behind. There's a chance out here to start again." (8.55)
Ty sees nature as more than just his habitat; it's a place where someone can shed his skin, let go of the past, and become a new person. We imagine this is what it must have felt like when Ty returned to Australia after being taken to the children's home in the city.