“I think the important thing to remember is that all relationships benefit from a bit of breathing room. Especially friendships. It's only when you find yourself without the women who understand you that you realize there are very few women who will.”
“The truth was that I'd been spending years running away from myself. I hid myself in drama, silliness, stupidity, banality. So afraid to grow up. So afraid to involve myself in relationships where I might be expected to give the same love I got - instead of sixth-grade shenanigans. I bored myself with all the when I grow up nonsense, but I was worried it would never happen even as I longed for it.”
“I had a rule about stilettos, and it was this: I didn't wear them unless I planned to kick ass in them. Stilettos were for striding and sauntering, never sulking.”
“I was fuzzy on the details, but I knew the basic outline. I knew how I wanted to be, it was simply a question of being who I wanted to be.
I thought I had had it all figured out before. I'd had the plan perfectly clear in my head. I wasn't going to cross into thirty without the triple crown in hand: serious boyfriend, career, and great friends..
It was time to accept that maybe, just maybe, I didn't have to have it all figured out by the time I turned thirty. Maybe I could just work on me, and see what else fell into place.
I was pretty sure that was otherwise known as living.”
“Maybe being an adult wasn't crossing some arbitrary age line into wisdom. Maybe it was like anything else - training wheels and mistakes, trial and error, and now and again that feeling that you might have wings.”
“It had seemed so foreign to me - the idea that you could move forward without a painful airing of grievances on both sides. But maybe - maybe it wasn't necessary to pick apart pain. Maybe some things just weren't worth fighting about. Some friends weren't friends anymore, but family - and there were different rules for family. It didn't make sense to sit down with family and detail all the reasons they'd upset you - for many reasons, not least among them the fact that they could whip out a checklist of your transgressions themselves. And after you'd both picked apart the carcasses, why would you want to be friends again? Maybe the important thing was to recognize that everyone felt wronged and slighted - but the point worth concentrating on was that everyone loved each other. If we worked from that premise, we should be fine. Or anyway, I hoped we would.”
“Aside from the posters, wherever there was room, there were books. Stacks and stacks of books. Books crammed into mismatched shelves and towers of books up to the ceiling. I liked my books.”
“Some people lusted after cars, which had never made sense to me. For me, bookshelves could inspire whole spontaneous sonnets, so maybe it was an each to her own scenario.”
“I had great plans to surgically excise the quaking, complaining teenager within someday. If I could just get rid of her and her thousands upon thousands of issues - Do I look fat? Am I ugly? Will anyone ever love me? Will I always be alone? Is she fatter than me? How ugly am I? Are they making fun of me? - I was convinced I would immediately become the sort of casual and laid back adult person who was forever smiling and was genuinely unconcerned with the size and/or shape of her body.
I wasn't holding my breath.”
“Forgiveness and acceptance, I thought as we found a spot near the largest tree in the lobby. Although I'd been kidding with Georgia, I was pretty sure those were the keys to relationships. Everything else was just ego and hurt feelings.”
“I felt something swell in me then. It wasn't desparate, or triumphant, or any of the things I was used to feeling around men. This was quiet and thrilling, and new. It felt like it might spill out from me, and fill whole rooms.
It felt like gladness.”
“We didn't have wings, but we could dance.”
“For me, without question and despite certain Oracle of Delphi moments concerning my own thighs, it was my belly. The belly that refused to turn into abs no matter how many crunches I performed or how few carbs I ate. (This obviously led to alternating phases wherin there were no crunches and only carbs, to soothe the pain.) Either way, the belly hung there over the edge of my otherwise fabulous low-slung jeans, rounded and spiteful, despite my best efforts. I was convinced the belly made me a troll. That it was disfiguring. That it was the outward evidence of my true inner unlovableness. No one could convince me otherwise.”
“I thought that probably meant something - that we could only really look at each other through a looking glass. Literally.
I didn't know where that thought came from, but I could feel that it was true. It had something to do with the two of us, seemingly so different, standing there side by side. There was no wall between us. But we both wanted to think there was.”
“I have become a collapsing star, pulling everything around it, even the light, into an ever-expanding void.”
“I want you to remember that in life you will encounter some very tough times, but you can find your strength in God. If there is something missing in your life, seek the Lord. If you once had Him in your life and now He seems far away, guess who moved? He is still there; just go to Him. He loves you with an everlasting love, and through obedience to Him all commitments will endure.”
“Hello, everyone and Probies,” Jeff said. “Especially a very healthy Merit.” “Hello, my knight in shining armor,” I said, taking a seat. “Or at least my knight with a very shiny reflective blanket.”
“Darth Maultini, please.” They stopped and stared. “A what?” He shot them a suffering expression. “One ounce sweet vermouth, one ounce vodka, one ounce whiskey, two ounces pomegranate cherry, and two lemon wedges cut up and spread around the glass.”
“For most who had gone through what she had, there’d be no healing, no freedom. But Bailey had found the answer. She’d found Jesus and, in Him, redemption and rebirth. It was time she started embracing the life He had for her, rather than drowning in regret over the sins of her past. Sins Jesus had already nailed to the cross.”
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