Cassie

“Perhaps you, too, have children, in which case you'll know that you're frightened the whole time, frightened of not knowing everything and of not having the energy to do everything and of not coping with everything. In the end we actually get so used to the feeling of failure that every time we *don't* disappoint our children it leaves us feeling secretly shocked. It's possible that some children realize this. So every so often they do tiny, tiny things at the most peculiar times, to buoy us up a little. Just enough to stop us from drowning.”
― Fredrik Backman, Anxious People

“Sweetie, it all looks so black and white right now, I know. But that's not how life ends up being. There's... It's mostly gray areas. It's not
this versus that. It's just... Things come at you, and you twitch in one direction or the other, and suddenly you're graduating from medical school." She drummed her fingers on the kitchen table. "Or you're an exhausted mother of four trying not to burn the pork chops while your teenage daughter grills you about your lack of tutelage.”
― Claire Lombardo, The Most Fun We Ever Had

“That's the power of literature, you know, it can act like little love letters between two people who can only explain their feelings by pointing at other people's.”
― Fredrik Backman, Anxious People

“I think we allow ourselves to hurt the people we love the most because we know they won’t abandon us.”
― Claire Lombardo, The Most Fun We Ever Had