Dawn O'Porter > Quotes

“I feel like a waste of space. Like my whole life has been building up to the moment I failed. Like I don't have the energy to make up for what I've done, or to start again, or for anything. I feel like I want to be someone else.'
Miss Anthony moves to Margaret's old seat and puts her arm around me.
'You're not the tough little cookie everyone thinks you are, are you?”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“The importance of friends and family in times of need By Renée Sargent
When people feel sad, what they need is attention. Not the kind of attention where they have to be told how amazing they all the time. Just kind of attention where they know that should they need you, you are there. I would like that kind of attention. I don't care about the other kind, even though everyone thinks I do.
When something horrible happens to someone the worst thing anyone can do is tell them off, or accuse them of being mean, or make them feel guilty about stuff they did that they are sorry about, because you can do bad things and be really sorry. They should just listen to them, and talk about things, because when you don't talk about things everything builds up inside you like boiling pan with a lid on. All the water dribbles out the sides but the lid won't come off. It's like that. Life just feels like little dribbles down the side of a pan.
I think friends and families are the ones who can lift the lid off in a good way.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“I have two choices in life: I either try to do the right thing and get accused of being selfish, or I just do what is right for me and get called selfish anyway. This time, it's all about me.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“What's the point in worrying about the future? Who says there will even be a future? What happens if you die tomorrow and all you ever did was sit in maths classes and play the clarinet and moan about your family? What good is the future to you then?”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“Yes, it’s unfortunate that we have been conditioned to see an alternative to motherhood as not normal. But you do all realise that some of the most brilliant women in the world don’t have kids, right? Oprah, Gloria Steinem, Helen Mirren, Dolly Parton? Do you think their lives carry an air of tragedy because they never had children? I don’t. I’m sure they all had different reasons for not doing it, some maybe couldn’t, some didn’t want to, but these women’s lives are not empty because of that. I think it’s important we take the lead from our heroes and for everyone to stop valuing women on whether they do, or do not, become mothers. The irony of yours and your listeners’ opinions is that it is you boxing women in to these roles, not men. It’s highly un-feminist of you.’ She”
― Dawn O'Porter, The Cows

“You have the power to shape your own destiny, you have the power to dictate how people treat you. You have the power not to be made to feel small, put down, or intimidated. As Ghandi said, ‘Be the change that you wish to see in the world’. Everything that happens to you is in your control, because you control how you respond. Don’t apologise for who you are, and don’t take shit. Don’t be a victim. Feminism needs you to step up. Get what you want. Just go out there, and take it.”
― Dawn O'Porter, The Cows

“People who hate cats are like atheists, they cannot get through a conversation without telling you their views. There is such a righteousness that comes with it. You tell someone you have a cat, and they tell you, to your face, that they hate the thing you love. There are so few instances in life where this is acceptable. But cat haters can't wait to unleash their claws. They like to make you sound strange for loving an animal they don't understand. They tell you cats are not loyal. They shake their heads while you explain the loyalty you have experienced from your own. The madder they can make you look, the more satisfaction they seem to gain. People who don't like cats are scared of them because they don't know how to touch them, and therefore they question themselves and their abilities to feel safe. Or they are dead on the inside. It's one or the other.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Cat Lady

“My arm is weighted by the huge pile of clothing she’s hung over it. A moment of clarity comes over me. This isn’t what friendship is about, I know that now.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“You don't have to tell me you're fine. I'm not fine. You're not fine either. We can be honest with each other about that, can't we?' I say. The sides of her face tense as tries to stop herself from crying, but she can't.
There is something about her grief that makes mine less exclusive. Less like my world isn’t the only one falling apart.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“This one is OK,' I say quietly.
‘OK, OK, OK. Everything is always just ‘OK’. It’s so boring. Who wants to be ‘OK’?
I sit for a moment and think about what she said. It doesn’t take me long to realise that I, quite genuinely, just want to be OK.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“Some of the most successful women in the world have kids. Women can have it all … I just don’t want it all”
― Dawn O'Porter, The Cows

“Because as much as I dislike her, I would prefer not to have an enemy.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“You need to realise how gorgeous you are.'
She laughs, but I’m not trying to be funny. ‘I mean it Flo, you really are. Somewhere under all that disbelief.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“If you're not dressing for yourself by forty-five then you need to have a major rethink.”
― Dawn O'Porter, So Lucky

“Women can't keep complaining about how society treats them if they just take being told they're wrong all the time and don't react”
― Dawn O'Porter, The Cows

“I just sit there where she tells me to and don’t make a fuss. If I answer back she gets loud and shouty. I don’t want everyone seeing how badly she pushes me around.
It’s best just to take it.
God knows what people mus think of me - some nervous, quiet drip with no opinion probably. It wouldn’t be far off the truth I should have stood up to Sally years ago, but she’d make my life I did...”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“I scan the room for objects to hit her with. I want to hammer over the head with something, or stab her. I don’t know what stops me, but I guess that’s the difference between a good person and a murderer. The murderer doesn’t stop themselves, but that doesn’t mean good people, like me, don’t have the same thoughts sometimes.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“So much of feminism leans towards breaking down the patriarchy. But every day I see that it is women who are damaging other women.”
― Dawn O'Porter, So Lucky

“Can Flo come? She has so many clothes I really want her to get rid of.' I laugh. Flo's clothes are so funny. She buys one top and wears it every time we go out for six months, then buys another one and does the same. And the kinds of things she buys for school are boring. She gets things that look as close to school uniform as possible because she finds having to wear our own clothes every day so hard.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Goose

“My belly does a flip and I get goosebumps on my arms. I’m so used to people translating every nice thing I ever do as me trying to get something for myself that I just presume people think the worst of me the whole time.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“If you can’t scratch your itchy bush in a doctor’s waiting room, then where can you scratch it?”
― Dawn O'Porter, Cat Lady

“Nothing. That's why it's funny. It's so bad I just think it's funny,' Renee says, tilting her head back so the chips don't fall out of her mouth.
‘Do you really?’
‘If I don’t laugh about it what else will I do?’
She doesn’t actually laugh though. She falls back, throws chips into the air and tries to catch them in her mouth”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“There is no such thing as ‘just’ a pet. They are family, our heart and soul. It’s not fair that their lives are so short, and even worse when their lives are cut shorter than they should be. I wrote this book because pet grief is real, and it deserves to be written about. Be there for your friends when this happens, they really need you.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Cat Lady

“I’m hoping for an apology. An acknowledgement that she’s made me feel like crap about myself again, but obviously I don’t get anything like that out of her. She just sits in front of my mirror, rearranging her cleavage.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“I used to feel like this all the time and it didn’t bother me, but it’s different now. (…)
…and besides, I want to test them. I have been the third wheel in this friendship for around ten years. They have no idea who I really am. It’s the exact opposite to my friendship with Flo. All these years I’ve passed off their lack of interest in me as an innocent vacancy, but it’s now feeling more like selfishness. I don’t belong here.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“For a spilt second we stare at each other. I feel an off sense of relief in making that statement. My breath is broken, his face is still. I want to apologise but the words won’t come.
Instead I turn round and keep running home.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“Well, people who acknowledge their faults aren't so angry about them. Oh to be selfish, eh?'
‘I think life would be easier if I was selfish.’
‘No, it wouldn’t. Not really. Those people aren’t happy, they’ll be on their death beds with little more than a life time of guilt and regret to think about. People like us die with a clear conscience, Flo. That’s the best way to be. If you admit to where you go wrong at least you stand a chance of making it better.’
I still wish I was selfish.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“I just hug her, tell everything is fine, and walk with her to her house. It will be all OK in the end.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Paper Aeroplanes

“Mental health is the latest zeitgeist. Celebrities using it as currency. Getting on the depression bandwagon, hoping to be called ‘brave’ for admitting to not being happy, whilst showing us nothing but examples of the perfect life.”
― Dawn O'Porter, So Lucky

“It’s bizarre how you can think someone is the coolest person ever, then you get a glimpse of their reality and realise they are actually quite tragic.”
― Dawn O'Porter, Goose: the second novel about Honey Bee's Renée and Flo