William Morrow

“Better was largely irrelevant when it came to mothering because the entire enterprise relied on the presumption that one day, sooner than you thought, your child would become an entirely self-reliant, independent person who made her own decisions. That child wouldn't necessarily remember the Halloween costumes you made from hand six years running. Or maybe she did, but she resented you for it because she'd wanted store-bought costumes just like all her friends. It didn't matter how great a mother you tried to be; eventually every child waled off in to the world alone.”
― Tara Conklin, The Last Romantics

“Sometime after Chris died, one of his friends said something offhanded about us having to leave our house. I was shocked, and demanded to know why.
“Because a ghost lives there,” he said.
He was speaking metaphorically about all of our memories. But that was exactly why I did not want to leave. I still felt Chris very strongly there, and I didn’t want to lose that.
By the fall of 2014, I realized that I feel Chris strongly everywhere I go. He’s so much a part of me that I can’t lose him. Physical places may suggest memories, but that’s all they do: suggest. The experiences are already deeply embedded in my brain and soul.”
― Taya Kyle, American Wife: Love, War, Faith, and Renewal

“The living stayed home, haunting the world of the dead like ghosts.”
― Neal Stephenson, Fall; or, Dodge in Hell

“The greatest works of poetry are the stories we tell about ourselves.”
― Tara Conklin, The Last Romantics