Peter Gehred

“Now, I am not a stupid person. I’m a fairly intelligent person who does stupid things. Incredibly stupid things. I can’t defend it. I can explain it until the end of time, but that still doesn’t make it in any way excusable, especially when you factor in the impact it had on my daughter (along with anyone else in my bonkers life who gave a shit about me). And I did it knowing full well how painful it was to have a parent who was unable to resist the impulse to resort to getting consistently altered. Altered and unavailable.”
― Carrie Fisher, Shockaholic

“I wish I could explain - and armed with that explanation, somehow excuse, - the seemingly unending, ongoing, relentless, inordinately intense, pathetic fixation I have with my feelings. That wilderness lurking somewhere down south in my bi-solar plexus and, simultaneously, right there in back of my eyes, demanding my attention and eternally taking my emotional temperature. How do I feel? No, really how do I feel? How could I feel? Some other way, surely. By the end of this endless archaeological self-examination, the observer part of your mind doesn't know what it's looking at anymore. Because being both archaeologist and pit is, essentially...don't make me say it...oh fuck. Okay...The pits.”
― Carrie Fisher, Shockaholic

“Martha,” he said afterwards, lying next to me. “Everything is broken and messed up and completely fine. That is what life is. It’s only the ratios that change. Usually on their own. As soon as you think that’s it, it’s going to be like this forever, they change again.” That is what life was, and how it continued for three years after that. The ratios changing on their own, broken, completely fine, a holiday, a leaking pipe, new sheets, happy birthday, a technician between nine and three, a bird flew into the window, I want to die, please, I can’t breathe, I think it’s a lunch thing, I love you, I can’t do this anymore, both of us thinking it would be like that forever.”
― Meg Mason, Sorrow and Bliss

“There are two choices post forty-five: letting ourselves go or making ourselves sit like good, well-groomed, obliging pets, coats smooth and wrinkle-free, stomachs flat, muscles taut, teeth clean, hair dyed, nails manicured—everything just so. The thing is, though, not only is this completely unnatural, requiring warehouses full of self-control and perseverance, but it demands a level of discomfort you have to be willing to live with ’til death by lap band or liposuction.”
― Carrie Fisher, Shockaholic