Odette

“But there was that one night when we all lay around in the dark and felt—something. I think it only happens when you’re young. This weird sense of possibility; a kind of knowledge. You know there’s a door, and even if you can’t see it, you can sense it opening, and if you’re quick enough, you can slip inside.”
― Elizabeth Hand, Wylding Hall

“Children going to school, a congregation in a synagogue, shoppers in a supermarket, a man on the stage of an amphitheater are all, so to speak, inhabiting a stable picture of the world. A school is a place of education. A synagogue is a place of worship. A supermarket is a place to shop. A stage is a performance space. That’s the frame in which they see themselves. Violence smashes that picture. Suddenly they don’t know the rules—what to say, how to behave, what choices to make. They no longer know the shape of things. Reality dissolves and is replaced by the incomprehensible”
― Salman Rushdie, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder

“It struck me that family, work, friendships, engagements - all of these were like spiderwebs placed to protect people from the more distressing colors that lurked within themselves. The more safety nets you had under you, the less far you had to fall, and if you were lucky you might live your entire life without even noticing what was below.
Didn't every parent want to protect their child from finding out how far down the bottom was? . . .That's why humans developed ways of working together; to survive, to make sure nobody falls between the cracks.”
― Banana Yoshimoto, Dead-End Memories: Stories

“Consider the last war.
Austria (to Servia): Stop it, or I'll make you.
Russia (to Austria): Stop it, or I'll make you.
Germany (to Russia): Stop it, or I'll make you.
France (to Germany): Stop it, or I'll make you.
Germany (to France): Stop saying stop it, or I'll make you.
England (to Germany): Stop it, or I'll make you.
This reads like something from a comic opera, but it is exactly what happened.”
― A.A. Milne, HAPPY HALF-HOURS: Selected Writings of A. A. Milne