Ominousbird

“The answer: Assimilation. Always, the pressure is there. Assimilate, assimilate... Dissolve yourself into the melting pot. And then flow out, pour into the mould. Bend your bones until they splinter and crack and you fit. Force yourself into their form. Assimilate, they say it, encouraging. Then frowning. Then again and again. And always there, quiet, beneath the urging language of tolerance and cohesion - disappear!”
― Natasha Brown

“I run thinking I will outpace it all, my will to change being stronger than my fear of living. My chest wet and leaf-raked, the day smoldering up at its edges, I push through so fast I feel like I've finally broken out of my body, left it behind. But when I turn around to see the panting boy, to forgive him, at last, for trying and failing to be good, there's no one there - only the full elms windless at the field's edge. Then, for no reason, I keep going. (...)
I race through the field as if my cliff was never written into this story, as if I was no heavier than the words in my name. And like a word, I hold no weight in this world yet still carry my own life. And I throw it ahead of me until what I left behind becomes exactly what I'm running toward - like I'm part of a family.”
― Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

“Someone screamed and Terry said, "I'm having a heart attack." "You're not," Kitty said. Knowing better. The pigeon, on the other hand, was already perched hopefully atop the pearly gates, wondering why there was nothing beyond but a featureless desert.”
― Kate Atkinson, Normal Rules Don't Apply: Stories

“To have a child is like being a city with a mountain in the middle. Everyone sees the mountain. Everyone in the city is proud of the mountain. The city is built around it. A mountain, like a child, displays something real about the value of that town.
In a life in which there is no child, no one knows anything about your life's meaning. They might suspect it doesn't have one - no centre it is built around. Your life's value is invisible, like the contexts of that young driver's friends.
How wonderful to tread an invisible path, where what matters most can hardly be seen.”
― Sheila Heti, Motherhood