em (sparkles)’s Reviews > Martyr! > Status Update

"Underneath being-startled is the expectation of calm," Zee said, then paused. "I mean, a person gasps because the ease they were expecting was interrupted. I think probably your life hasn't taught you to expect ease.“

"All those severe poets talking big about the wages of sin all the time," Zee added, "but nobody ever brought up the wages of virtue.
The toll of trying really really hard to be good in a game that's totally rigged against goodness."

How when he saw a bird or a tree or a bug, Zee really saw that bird or tree or bug, not the idea of it.

I demand the same leniencies, rationalizations, granted to
mediocre men for centuries.

I am flatterable, and obnoxiously disarmed by praise.

When I say "nations," I mean "armed marketplaces."
Always. That understanding made the world a little bit easier to comprehend, if not tolerate.

"You're a human being, Cyrus," Sang said, gently. "So was your mother. So am I. Not cartoon characters. There's no pressure for us to be ethically pure, noble. Or, God forbid, aspirational. We're people. We get mad, we get cowardly. Ugly. We self-obsess."

and who knows how many people we've all helped ourselves, who everyone we've helped has helped. You know?

"She resented ever needing anything from anyone. The whole thing was an elaborate self-loathing, I think."
"That sounds exhausting," Cyrus said.

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.

"The pain we feel comes from them, not ourselves," said the banners, and people cheered, certain of all the certainty. But the next day they'd wake up and find that what had hurt in them still hurt.