Bill Konigsberg > Quotes

“It’s hard to be different,” Scarborough said. “And perhaps the best answer is not to tolerate differences, not even to accept them. But to celebrate them. Maybe then those who are different would feel more loved, and less, well, tolerated.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“The world needs people who are more comfortable standing still. We keep the earth on it axis when everybody else is bouncing around.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“The hole in my heart, I can’t even begin to describe. It’s hard when you open your heart and let someone in and then suddenly they’re not in it anymore. It doesn’t matter whose fault it is; that empty spot stings so bad that you want to find any kind of relief, or wrap yourself up so tight you can’t feel it anymore. I knew it might be there a little while. Or maybe even a long while. For both of us.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“You can be anything you want, but when you go against who you are inside, it doesn’t feel good.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Guilt is about something you do. Shame is about who you are.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Writing is an exploration. You start from nothing and learn as you go.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Straight people have it so much easier. They don’t understand. They can’t. There’s no such thing as openly straight.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“We were dancers and drummers and standers and jugglers, and there was nothing anyone needed to accept or tolerate. We celebrated.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Do you know how you get the urge to clean your room, and it’s no big deal? But when your mom tells you that you have to clean your room, you don't want to? That's me, anyway.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Wouldn't it be nice if we lived in a world where no one thought being gay was even something to ride someone about?”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Is this your boyfriend?" the first nun asked.
Clair Olivia looked me up and down. “No. This is my gay friend who decided he was straight and single-handedly wrecked havoc at an all-boys school in Massachusetts this fall. He’s gay again and home for Christmas, so yay!”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Why can’t I just be bad?” I asked, figuring my mom would have no idea what I was talking about.
“Well, that’s easy, sweetie. You can be anything you want, but when you go against who you are inside, it doesn’t feel good.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“I don't know. I mean, it's not all beautifully harmonic, this world we find ourselves in. Clearly. There's shit music, and sometimes the melody goes away completely. There's silence and dissonant chord that cringe your ears. But the synchronicity of a perfectly created chorus? And the fact that you never know when one is coming? And that amazing feeling, the first time you hear a song and now it's going to be with you forever?
I have to think that's worth everything.”
― Bill Konigsberg, The Music of What Happens

“Straight people don't have to think every time they talk, about whether they are coming out. We do. That might be hard, but that's also why we have to come out. if we don't, it's pretty much impossible to have a conversation about anything beyond the weather without lying. we really have no choice, do we ?”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“What do you call it when a straight person comes out? ... A conversation”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“The world will make you vulnerable. If you're acting like you're not, that's what you're doing. Acting”
― Bill Konigsberg, The Music of What Happens

“When trust is violated, it's like you're left with an empty piggy bank. Building trust again, she said, is like putting big, fat nickels into the slot. They clank against the bottom, and that sound is jarring. But in order to heal, you have to keep adding those nickels, and soon enough, there will be coins to cushion the nickel's fall and make the sound not so grating.”
― Bill Konigsberg, The Music of What Happens

“I had the strong sensation that I'd underestimated my parents and their devotion to me. Of course they'd be on my side, whether they understood or not. That was just the kind of parents they were.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“That was the thing about Ben. He could get away with saying shit like that. I totally couldn’t. I wasn’t big or masculine enough. In my mind, anyway. But Ben could get all agape on your ass, and you’d just sit there like, huh. Agape. Interesting.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Wow. Did I just write that? I didn't want who I am to come between us? How could I not have seen that?”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Acceptance is an affirmation that you’re good enough.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“With my white friends, I’m always half Mexican. They never say I’m half Irish. Never say I’m half white. Like I’m tainted halfway from the standard. It’s like when I was a kid and I thought vanilla ice cream meant no flavor, like it was the base of all of the flavors. But vanilla is a bean. Like chocolate is a bean. Like cinnamon is a root. All roots and beans. All flavors. There is no base. No ice cream without a flavor.”
― Bill Konigsberg, The Music of What Happens

“Then I wondered if that was what this was, like a Brokeback Mountain thing. We’d sleep in the same bed for a year, and finally we’d do it, but we’d never talk about it, ever, and then Ben would get married and I’d be killed in Texas.
Probably not, but you can never be too careful with these things.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“We were at a swap meet in Cochituate last year, and there was this Boy Scout troop with a sign that read, 'Help Boy Scouts, Blind Kids.' Toby saw it, and he grabbed my shirt collar and pulled me away. I asked what was wrong, and with this scared expression on his face, he said, "That's not right. They need to be stopped.'

I cracked up. 'Oh, no,' I said.

'When I asked him why helping blind kids and Boy Scouts was bad, Toby's whole face went white. He said, 'Forget it. Let's go.' But I had to know what the hell he was talking about, so I made him walk back over with me. We looked at the sign together, and finally he mumbled, 'I didn't see the comma.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“It needs to be said that sometimes my mom forgets important details when she talks. Like the time she told us she was considering leather (couches, it turns out), or when I was little and she said, "Here's a napkin to put your balls in" (the Atomic Fireballs that I was eating, she meant).”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Then Albie reached into his pocket and pulled out one shiny Jonathan apple.
“Hungry?” he asked us.
“How’d you do that?” I asked, wondering when he’d had time to pocket an apple.
“Oh, I have four of them,” he said, patting his megalarge pockets. “Next time you won’t laugh when I tell you to watch Survival Planet.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“Man, I could get used to this thing where I don’t think I’m a total piece of shit all the time.”
― Bill Konigsberg, The Music of What Happens

“As I said, it wasn't even a gay thing. But it made me think how hard some kids have it with their families. Me, I could show up as Lady GaGa dressed as Little Red Riding Hood, and Mom would be like, "How was your day, honey?" That's just not the case for most kids.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“I could see he didn’t understand that knowing a person is about more than knowing whom they fantasize about. That’s the small stuff, actually. Not the big stuff. The big stuff is lying next to a guy on the floor and locking eyes and having deep conversations about philosophy. The big stuff is letting a friend know your hopes and your fears and not having to make a joke about it. That’s what matters.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight

“I knew that she was right, obviously. But part of me didn't want to. I wanted to have someone to call my own so badly that I just couldn't let it go.”
― Bill Konigsberg, Openly Straight