Gina

“Because to remember is to fill the present with the past, which meant that the cost of remembering anything, anything at all, is life itself. We murder ourselves, he thought, by remembering”
― Ocean Vuong, The Emperor of Gladness

“You can be proud of where you come from and not proud of everything that history entails. That’s what so many of these people don’t seem to be able to wrap their heads around.”
― David Joy, Those We Thought We Knew

“Eight of the ten commandments are about what thou shalt not. But you can live a whole life not doing any of that stuff and still avoid doing any good. That’s the whole crisis. The rot at the root of everything. The belief that goodness is built on a constructed absence, not-doing. That belief corrupts everything, has everyone with any power sitting on their hands.”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!

“We don’t deserve anything—not the suffering and not the golden light. It just comes.”
― Ann Patchett, These Precious Days: Essays