Alida Nugent > Quotes

“When you get older, you notice your sheets are dirty. Sometimes, you do something about it. And sometimes, you read the front page of the newspaper and sometimes you floss and sometimes you stop biting your nails and sometimes you meet a friend for lunch. You still crave lemonade, but the taste doesn’t satisfy you as much as it used to. You still crave summer, but sometimes you mean summer, five years ago.

You remember your umbrella, you check up on people to see if they got home, you leave places early to go home and make toast. You stand by the toaster in your underwear and a big t-shirt, wondering if you should just turn in or watch one more hour of television. You laugh at different things. You stop laughing at other things. You think about old loves almost like they are in a museum. The socks, you notice, aren’t organized into pairs and you mentally make a note of it. You cover your mouth when you sneeze, reaching for the box of tissues you bought, contains aloe.

When you get older, you try different shampoos. You find one you like. You try sleeping early and spin class and jogging again. You try a book you almost read but couldn’t finish. You wrap yourself in the blankets of: familiar t-shirts, caffe au lait, dim tv light, texts with old friends or new people you really want to like and love you. You lose contact with friends from college, and only sometimes you think about it. When you do, it feels bad and almost bitter. You lose people, and when other people bring them up, you almost pretend like you know what they are doing. You try to stop touching your face and become invested in things like expensive salads and trying parsnips and saving up for a vacation you really want. You keep a spare pen in a drawer. You look at old pictures of yourself and they feel foreign and misleading. You forget things like: purchasing stamps, buying more butter, putting lotion on your elbows, calling your mother back. You learn things like balance: checkbooks, social life, work life, time to work out and time to enjoy yourself.

When you get older, you find yourself more in control. You find your convictions appealing, you find you like your body more, you learn to take things in stride. You begin to crave respect and comfort and adventure, all at the same time. You lay in your bed, fearing death, just like you did. You pull lint off your shirt. You smile less and feel content more. You think about changing and then often, you do.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“If you want to keep your dignity intact, stay away from tequila.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“We're romantic. We're hopeful. We're done for. The worst part of this all? The idea of struggle and compromise seems exciting to us-that's how stupid we are. There's no stopping fools, I say. We're still kids at heart. Those dreams are still there. Now we just have to go chase them.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“A few years ago, I graduated college, diploma in one hand, margarita in the other, completely oblivious to the shit storm that was coming my way. Here's a preview: becoming a living, breathing, job-having, bill-paying, responsible adult? Really fucking difficult.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Well. If you are worried about the effects of feminism and you are a man, it's probably because you are worried that men will start to be treated like women have been treated since the dawn of time. By this I mean worse, which makes you nervous, no doubt.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“WANTING to be anything is the whole point of feminism. HAVING TO BE SOMETHING is what feminists fight against, or at least the ones I know.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“There is plenty of suffering before the good happens. This is something that I have taken stock in, because I’ve dealt with plenty of bullshit for somebody so fresh out of the womb.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“When I god older and realized my life was built around the idea my career would be something I wanted to love, to strive for, to be proud of, I was scared.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“My lofty ambitions are partially due to the fact that I'm part of generation, "Yes You Can, I Guess: How about I throw a combination of money, attention, and prescription medication at the problem?”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Really, I want you to finish this book feeling like we could become friends, if the timing was right. That's it. Oh, and by the way, you should drink while you're reading this book. If you want to play a drinking game, I suggest you take a shot when you feel like I am abusing commas.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Life is not a movie. No happy ending is guaranteed. No wound is closed by magic. There had been lessons I had been refusing to learn. How if you aren’t letting somebody know they’re hurting you, they’ll keep doing it. How if you aren’t letting yourself know you’re hurting yourself, you’ll keep dating assholes.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Fitting in" is one of those horrible diseases that turn reasonable minds into sheep-gelatin hive minds.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“And then there’s me, terribly afraid to step out of the box and date someone different. Afraid to get hurt in a different, more complex way—by somebody who I actually trust and care about. My biggest fear. Nice guy was a bad word to me because I feared that lurching-stomach feeling of losing someone I love. Nice meant future, and the future was always uncertain.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“In hindsight, I know that high school is a festering pit of boredom and hormones, not to be taken as seriously as it seemed while I was there. It is earthly purgatory before you enter the better parts of your life: you've got one foot in heaven and the other in hell.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“I wish this were the kind if things kids learned early on. Gender doesn't determine the things you like, your hobbies, or your personality.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“Being at home was like a mattress to fall back on with the smallest of peas on the bottom, just large enough to bother the princess. I was damn lucky that I had a place to call home, but I didn't like the feeling of stealing my parents food and being unable to tell them when I could ever afford my own.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Not every girl has a bad-boy problem. Some of my friends get into relationships constantly. Others cheat all the time, or run away. Some get jealous. Some think they are too undateable to even try. Our dating pool is a circus of fuckups, misfits, and past mistakes that we keep on making. The brand of baggage you’re carrying on your back is the issue. But most of all, I think we fear the same thing. I think that thing is love. Real love. Think of your first love. Think of how Bambi-like you were, prancing around all excited and in love with everything. Then think of how that happiness was beaten to death with a hatchet, spit on, shit on, leaving you cold. If you watch something you care about get destroyed, you’re not going to want to go back to that place, no matter how pleasant it ever was.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“You still crave summer, but sometimes you mean summer, five years ago.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“After all, the way I see it, it takes only one person to murder you. It also takes only one person to fill your heart with the kind of joy that slaps you straight off your high horse. For the first time in a long time, I found myself believing in the possibility of both.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Whenever someone brings up the traits associated with being a functional human otherwise known as an "adult," I think, is this even possible for me? Probably not, is what I conclude. I mean, I'll eventually pay off my college loans at the age of forty-five by selling what's left of my liver, and I'll probably manage to find sustenance and remember to breathe oxygen constantly. I'll survive. However, for people like me...There will be years of struggle to keep myself afloat.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Here’s a preview: becoming a living, breathing, job-having, bill-paying, responsible adult? Really fucking difficult.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“And if you looking for a surefire way to turn a comfortable party into a very alcohol-fueled romp through gender politics, bring up feminism.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“Nobody wants to say, “I’m trying to get my feet on the ground” when they’re in their twenties. They want you to think they’re about to do something dangerous, or exciting, or different. We’re not “living at home,” we’re “crashing until we can afford a pad in Brooklyn.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“Let me tell you something—staying up all night working on a paper about Malcolm X ain’t got shit on staying up all night wondering if you will run out of money.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“You are too smart and too bright to get stuck. Do better. Become a mental athlete. Push yourself so much it's sickening, Stagnant water is full of mosquitos, remember that.”
― Alida Nugent

“BEST ADVICE: Bring a jacket with you. Who knows where the day will end up?”
― Alida Nugent

“There isn’t a bottle of sunscreen large enough or SPF high enough to save my father from sunburn. He has to wear baseball hats and T-shirts to the beach, or else he would turn so red people would draw butter and try to crack his claws off.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism

“You will lose touch with people you thought you wouldn’t, watch from a distance while these people get married, gain weight, lose weight, move across the country, and get new sets of friends you will never meet. But you will look at your pictures of them and remember the nights you drank too much rum with them and you will enjoy those moments immensely. You will know what it is like to experience true nostalgia—the feelings a Hot Pocket can elicit will be astounding. It will not be a bittersweet kind of thing, because you know that it’s not as much growing apart as it is growing up.
There will be successes, and failures, and a lot of good and bad things. You will watch yourself and the people you choose to be with fall in love and get married, get jobs, get fired, get a terrible tattoo, have babies, get sick, get better, get worse, lose parents, grow older, grow smarter. Things will flash forward, pass before your eyes like the lights at a terrible nightclub.”
― Alida Nugent

“Even the toughest of brothers can’t make their sister change the things they think they are entitled to. They can’t move you away from the jerks. They can simply hold their breath and their baseball bat.”
― Alida Nugent, Don't Worry, It Gets Worse: One Twentysomething's (Mostly Failed) Attempts at Adulthood

“And, most important, if you like shaving your entire region, and somebody tells you that it's wrong because it makes you look like a baby, that person is a lunatic. You are an adult woman who happens to have no pubic hair. You are not a Lolita. You are an adult woman.”
― Alida Nugent, You Don't Have to Like Me: Essays on Growing Up, Speaking Out, and Finding Feminism