Jj

“Slowly, over many months, as my head came out of the sand, a form of joy set in —joy born of replacing the not knowing with knowing, the nub of worry with clarity, the lack of control with control...I thought, 'this is better than everything I lost. This is better than the life I thought I wanted.”
― Belle Burden, Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage

“The heart wants what the heart wants. This is true, and Bob’s heart still wanted Lucy. But there is another thing to consider, which is that the heart is only one part of an organism, and the organism’s job is to survive. This desire to survive was already in ascendance with Bob, and this desire grew, and the desire of his heart— It did not shrink, but it did not continue to grow.”
― Elizabeth Strout, Tell Me Everything

“She seemed to be reminding me of what we’d discussed many times, Everyone has something. This is yours. Each life has a defining crisis.”
― Belle Burden, Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage

“And I could see that the cost for feeling safe was being controlled. They were two sides of the same coin—protection and control.”
― Belle Burden, Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage