carol.

“Some day this pain will be useful to you.”
― Elif Shafak, The Island of Missing Trees

“In grandiose moments, high on fresh air and freedom on the hill, I study my personal geology.

My body is a continent. Forces are at work in the night. A bruxist, I grind my teeth in my sleep, like tectonic plates. When I blink the sun flickers, my breath pushes the clouds across the sky and the waves roll into the shore in time with my beating heart. Lightning strikes every time I sneeze, and when I orgasm, there's an earthquake. The islands' headlands rise above the sea, like my limbs in the bathtub, my freckles are famous landmarks and my tears rivers. My lovers are tectonic plates and stone cathedrals.”
― Amy Liptrot, The Outrun

“She has no name for that feeling of utter abandonment, nor the feeling that comes over her on fair days, when she stands in the courtyard from the photo, and the voice of the loudspeaker booms front behind the trees, and the music and commercials run together in an unintelligible blur. It is as if she were standing outside the fete, separated from some earlier thing.”
― Annie Ernaux, Les Années

“I'm filling the void with new knowledge and moments of beauty. The dangerous thoughts will happen - and while I'm experiencing them I feel like that's the way I will feel for ever - but I just have to let the cravings pass lightly.”
― Amy Liptrot, The Outrun