Quotes from God-Shaped Hole

“We’re all searching for something to fill up what I like to call that big, God-shaped hole in our souls. Some people use alcohol, or sex, or their children, or food, or money, or music, or heroin. A lot of people even use the concept of God itself. I could go on and on. I used to know a girl who used shoes. She had over two-hundred pairs. But it’s all the same thing, really. People, for some stupid reason, think they can escape their sorrows.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“Don't waste your time with fear.. Fear won't keep you safe from being hurt.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“Just knowing you exist changed the world for me.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“The days will always be brighter because he existed.
The nights will always be darker because he's gone.
And no matter what anybody says about grief, and about time healing all wounds, the truth is, there are certain sorrows that never fade away until the heart stops beating and the last breath is taken.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“Everyone feels that void. Everyone who has the balls to look inside themselves, anyway. It's what life's all about.. A search.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“It seemed cruelly unfair to me, even then, how fast your life can change before you have an opportunity to rethink your choices. We should get second chances on the big stuff. We should come equipped with erasers attached to the tops of our heads. Like pencils. We should be able to flip over and scribble away mistakes, at least once or twice during the duration of our existence, especially in matters of life and death.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“I try to find meaning anywhere I can. It's the only way I know how to validate my existence.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“I’m afraid of everything. Fear of being alone, fear of being hurt, fear of being made a fool of, fear of failure... Still, I think all my fears bleed from one big one...”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“He isn’t like most guys, you know?'

I know.'

No, but do you really know? I mean here’s the deal, what do most guys want from a woman? I’ll tell you what we want. We want a warm body to sleep next to, preferably one with a nice pair of tits, maybe someone who’ll cook for us and fuck us on a regular basis. Pretty simple, huh? Now, what we don’t want is someone who’s going to come in and disrupt our lives and steal our souls. That’s what we fear most. We call it our freedom, but it’s our souls we’re talking about. You following me?'

I nodded.

Okay, good. Now forget it. Forget all that,' Pete said. 'Because Jacob’s not like that. He’s never been like that. He’s a damn fool and he wants the exact opposite of all that. He wants someone to obsess over, someone to possess his soul, and those are his corny words, by the way, not mine. It’s what he lives for. It’s what he thinks life’s all about. Do you get what I’m saying?'

I nodded again.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“We had pathetically simple dreams:
to do meaningful work that we could be proud of, to be together, and to be happy.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“When I was twelve, a fortune teller told me that my one true love would die young and leave me all alone.. Everyone said she was a fraud, that she was just making it up.. I’d really like to know why the hell a person would make up a thing like that.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“It’s easy to plant a seed and sprinkle it with water, but once the sun scorches the ground, and the earth soaks up all the moisture, you’re left with nothing but a thirsty little flower trying desperately to make it out of the dirt.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“You try and act so tough, you think you're so damn hopeless and godless and faithless, but you don't fool me. People without hope aren't tormented by the world the way you are. People without hope don't give a shit. but I see it in you, in the way you look at things, even in the way you look at me sometimes, like I'm the coolest fucking guy in the universe, and I know it's in there. Reverence. Belief. Something. You have a lot more faith than you own up to. You just don't want to be let down. But I'm not going to let you down again. Not if I can help it.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“If your intentions are pure, I'm seeking a friend for the end of the world.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“I'm tempted to tell you that you think too much, but I'm not really one to talk,' Jacob said. 'Henry Miller wrote something about fear making you fearless. It's a very powerful emotion. Use it to get what you want. I mean if it's going to rule our life, it might as well rule you to freedom, right?”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“Tell me what you're afraid of,' Jacob said.

Shit, I thought, this could take all day. My life was ruled by my fears.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“Dawn makes a sound. If you listen closely right as the sun starts to come up, you’ll hear it. It’s like the echo of birth; silence, followed by a gentle push, moans, and then the sloppy deluge of life. On good days I like it because it reminds me that I am alive. On bad days it makes me feel like dust.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“The days will always be brighter because he existed.
The nights will always be darker because he's gone.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“People have reasons for what they do, Beatrice. And even if those reasons can't be justified, that doesn't make them bad people, just flawed. You have to remember," she said, "someone or something has hurt them too.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“But I guessed that no matter how strong it was, love alone couldn't turn a speck of dust into a galaxy of stars.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“We didn't want to be presidents, or astronouts, or Bill Gates. We had pathetically simple dreams: to do meaningful work that we could be proud of, to be together, and to be happy. That certainly wasn't too much to ask. Or was it?”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“Dear Trixie,
Will you come to Memphis with me?
A) Yes
B) No
C) I'd go anywhere with you because you fuck like a goddamn fire hose.
D) You're an asshole and I never want to see you again.
Circle ONLY ONE and give it back to me when you're done eating.
Love, J”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“...it's what life's all about."
"what?"
"a search. we're all searching for something to fill up what I like to call that big, God-shaped hole in our souls. some people use alcohol, or sex, or their children, or food, or money, or music, or heroin. a lot of people even use the concept of God itself. I could go on and on. I used to know a girl who used shoes. she had over two-hundred pairs. but it's all the same thing, really. people, for some stupid reason, think they can escape their sorrows.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“I feel like we grew in the same womb or something. Like we've been connected from the beginning by blood and veins. Siamese soul lovers, if there could ever be such a thing.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“I'd never seen that look on another face before, had never identified it in another person. I'd only met with it in fiction. But everyone falls in love with Holden Caulfield when they're sixteen. They read Catcher in the Rye and don't feel so alone.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“I like to say I don’t believe in mystics . I don’t believe in fate. I don’t believe in destiny or kismet. I don’t believe in God. I don’t believe in anything. But I believe in the possibility of everything.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“To Jacob the act of critiquing art was essentially imprecise. That's why he didn't read reviews on anything he liked, be it a book, a movie, or a record. He believed that any work an artist puts forth which contains the truth as he or she sees it is worthy of consideration, and any commentary of the work beyond that is nothing more than pure individual opinion and should not be considered relevant to the work itself.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

“Kat and I talked about Jacob in our own private code.
"Are you baking cookies yet?" she said. That was standard for : have you fucked?
"Oh yeah. We've made a couple dozen by now."
"What kind?" In other words, was Jacob any good.
"Chocolate-chip," I said. "And he not only likes to bake them, he likes to eat them, too."
"Congratulations.”
― Tiffanie DeBartolo, quote from God-Shaped Hole

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“I am cold, even though the heat of early summer is adequate. I am cold because I cannot find my heart.”
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“So Lisa as your matron of honor and Stephanie as bridesmaid,” Cat was saying. “Do you know who Sean wants as best man?”
“No. We haven’t gotten that far yet.” He didn’t hear any tension in Emma’s voice, but he guessed she was feeling it. Planning a wedding that wasn’t going to happen was weird, to say the least.
“Maybe we could ask Mike’s oldest son—Joey, right?—to be a groomsman so he can escort Stephanie.”
“I don’t know,” Emma said. “I don’t think it’s very fair to ask one of the boys and not the others.”
“True. Maybe they could be ushers and then join their parents once everybody’s seated.”
Sean had just decided to beat a fast retreat back to the living room, when he heard a chair scrape back.
“We can talk about that later, Gram. Right now I should go wake Sean so he’s not still groggy when we ask him to fire up the grill.”
He didn’t have time to escape, so he leaned against the counter and twisted the top of his beer. Emma paused when she saw him, and then grabbed his hand and dragged him down the hall to the living room.
“Where did you disappear to?” he asked.
“What? Oh, a client had an emergency. But—”
“There are gardening emergencies?”
She blew out an exasperated breath. “Yes. When you’re rich, everything’s an emergency. But did you hear what Gram was saying?”
“Yeah. How the hell are guys supposed to pick a best man, anyway? I’ve got three brothers and I like them all. And what about Mikey? Or Kevin or Joe? It seems easier to pick a stranger off the street so you don’t have to play favorites. I guess maybe I’d ask Mitch. He’s the oldest, so most of what the rest of us know about catching a woman we learned from him.”
“In case you’ve forgotten, you haven’t actually caught a woman yet. And it doesn’t really matter who you choose, because there is no wedding.”
She was wound up like an eight-day clock, so he didn’t dare laugh at her. Her cheeks were bright and she kept spinning her ring around and around on her finger. Since there was nothing he could say to make her feel better about Cat wanting to plan their fake wedding, he slid the hand not holding his beer around her waist and hauled her close.
“You worry too much,” he told her.
“And you—”
He kissed her to shut her up. And because all he’d been able to think about since the last time he’d had his hands on her was getting his hands on her again. And, most of all, because he liked kissing her. A lot. Maybe too much, if he thought about it.
So he didn’t think about it. Instead, he lost himself in the taste of her mouth and the softness of her lips and the way her hands slid over his lower back, holding him close.
“Oh,” Cat said from behind him. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“No,” Emma said. “We were just…talking.”
“I can see that.”
― Shannon Stacey, quote from Yours to Keep

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