“And how do you undo damage that’s been built into the foundations? With houses, it’s easier to pull the whole thing down and start again. You can’t do that with people.”
― Nicci French, quote from Secret Smile
“it was like glass sandpaper being rubbed on my skin.”
― Nicci French, quote from Secret Smile
“Better to start too slowly and build up,” said a piece of text in italics, “than start too quickly and give up.”
― Nicci French, quote from Secret Smile
“If you call the day after, you’re maybe a bit desperate because, since the first day is out of the question, the second day is really the first day, so you’re calling on the first day. If they’re going to call, people call on the third day.”
― Nicci French, quote from Secret Smile
“Within families, you’re stuck with the character they think you are, whatever you do. You become a war hero and all that your parents ever talk about is something supposedly funny you used to do when you were in nursery school.”
― Nicci French, quote from Secret Smile
“Creo que la verdad está bien en las matemáticas, en la química, en la filosofía. No en la vida. En la vida es más importante la ilusión, la imaginación, el deseo, la esperanza. Además, ¿sabemos acaso lo que es la verdad? Si yo lo digo que aquel trozo de ventana azul, digo una verdad. Pero es una verdad parcial, y por lo tanto una especie de mentira. Porque el trozo de ventana no está solo, está en una casa, en una cuidad, en un paisaje. Está rodeado del gris de ese muro de cemento, del azul claro del cielo, de aquellas nubes alargadas, de infinitas cosas más. Y si no digo todo absolutamente todo, estoy mintiendo. Pero decir todo es imposible, aun en este caso de la ventana, de un siempre trozo de la realidad física. La realidad es infinita y además infinitamente matizada, y si me olvido de un solo matiz, ya estoy mintiendo. Ahora imagínese lo que es la realidad de los seres humanos con sus complicaciones y recovecos, contradicciones y además cambiantes. Porque cambia a cada instante que pasa, y lo que éramos hace un momento no lo somos más. ¿Somos, acaso, siempre la misma persona? ¿Tenemos acaso siempre los mismos sentimientos? Se puede querer a alguien y de pronto desestimarlo y hasta detestarlo. Y si cuando lo desestimamos cometemos el error de decírselo, eso es una verdad, pero una verdad momentánea, que no será más verdad dentro de una hora o al otro día, o en otras circunstancias. Y en cambio el ser a quien se la decimos creerá que ésa es la verdad, la verdad para siempre y desde siempre. Y se hundirá en la desesperación.”
― Ernesto Sabato, quote from On Heroes and Tombs
“The Internet is a place that’s full of judgment because the Internet is full of people. People”
― Hannah Hart, quote from Buffering: Unshared Tales of a Life Fully Loaded
“Trout, incidentally, had written a book about a money tree. It had twenty-dollar bills for leaves. Its flowers were government bonds. Its fruit was diamonds. It attracted human beings who killed each other around the roots and made very good fertilizer.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, quote from Slaughterhouse-five: The Children's Crusade, A Duty-dance with Death
“Just thugs only ever got so far. The best thugs were all psychologists.”
― China Miéville, quote from Kraken
“What is going on with you, Rev?”
He rubs his eyes. “I don’t know. I’m just tired.”
I think of how he sat in the hospital with me, saying nothing. His silence was more supportive than anything he could have said.
I don’t know how to do that in return. Maybe I can offer something else, though. I pull out my phone and do a quick search, then turn it around and slide it across the bed.
He doesn’t reach for it. “Did she send more?”
“No. It’s a poem I had to read for English. Read it.”
He looks up, and the expression on his face is exactly the one I’d wear if he suddenly said, Hey bro, read this poem. “What?”
“Just read it. I think you’ll like it.”
― Brigid Kemmerer, quote from Letters to the Lost
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