Gaelen

“The desire to describe voice, gesture, skin color, is a desire to eat, take over, make into part of the pattern. I am happy every time to see a writer fail at this. I am happy every time to see real personhood resist our tricks. I am happy to see bodies insist that they are not shut up in this book, they are elsewhere. The tomb is empty, rejoice, he is not here. •”
― Patricia Lockwood, Priestdaddy: A Memoir

“At home, she toed the party line: “The greatest calling for a woman is to be a Catholic wife and mother.” But I sensed that she hated the 1960s convention of stay-at-home motherhood. In my thirties, when my father shipped me my old Barbie-doll cases that had been sealed in storage since my mother’s death, I found evidence of her unhappiness. My Barbie stuff was a mirror of her values. She never told me that marriage could be a trap, but she refused to buy my Barbie doll a wedding dress. She didn’t say, “I loathe housework,” but she refused to buy Barbie pots and pans. What she often said, however, was “Education is power.” And in case I was too thick to grasp this, she bought graduation robes for Barbie, Ken, and Midge.”
― M.G. Lord, Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on The Decision Not To Have Kids

“You won’t understand what I mean now, but someday you will: the only trick of friendship, I think, is to find people who are better than you are—not smarter, not cooler, but kinder, and more generous, and more forgiving—and then to appreciate them for what they can teach you, and to try to listen to them when they tell you something about yourself, no matter how bad—or good—it might be, and to trust them, which is the hardest thing of all. But the best, as well.”
― Hanya Yanagihara, A Little Life

“Chapter One of My Life. I walk down the street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in.
I am lost. I am helpless. It isn't my fault. It still takes forever to find a way out.

Chapter Two. I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don't see it. I fall in again. I can't believe I'm in the same place! But it isn't my fault. And it still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter Three. I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it there. I still fall in. It's a habit! My eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault. I get out immediately.

Chapter Four. I walk down the same street. There's a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.

Chapter Five. I walk down a different street.”
― Portia Nelson, There's a Hole in My Sidewalk: The Romance of Self-Discovery