“She was so much better at being alone; being alone came more naturally to her. She led a life of deliberate solitude, and if occasional loneliness crept in, she knew how to work her way out of that particular divot. Or even better, how to sink in and absorb its particular comforts.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Parents are temporary custodians, keeping watch and offering love and trying to leave the child better than they found him.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“She supposed she could Google, but she preferred to wonder.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“She was open to love, but she was best at managing her own happiness; it was other people’s happiness that sunk her.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Everyone’s always on the hunt for a mirror. It’s basic psychology. You want to see yourself reflected in others. Others—your sister, your parents—they want to look at you and see themselves. They want you to be a flattering reflection of them—and vice-versa. It’s normal. I suppose it’s really normal if you’re a twin. But being somebody else’s mirror? That is not your job.” Nora”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“She believed in second chances, sometimes more than first chances, which were wasted on youth and indiscretion.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“This was the part she hated, the part of a relationship that always nudged her to bail, the part where someone else’s misery or expectations or neediness crept into her carefully prescribed world. It was such a burden, other people’s lives.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Right now, it felt like there was nowhere for his thoughts to alight that wasn't rife with land mines of regret or anger or guilt.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“His love for her was quiet and constant, familiar and soothing; it was almost its own thing entirely, like a worn rock or a set of worry beads, something he’d pick up and weigh in his palm occasionally, more comforting than dispiriting.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“True patriotism, Jack believed, would have been for his fellow Americans to look inward after 9/11 and accept a little blame, admit the attacks had happened, in part, because of who they were in the world, not in spite of it.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“People abandoned one another constantly without performing the courtesy of of actually disappearing. They left, but didn't, lurking about, a constant reminder of what could or should have been.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“It's not your job to be anyone's mirror.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“People might not change but their incentives could.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Everyone’s always on the hunt for a mirror. It’s basic psychology. You want to see yourself reflected in others.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“I you want people to judge you based on the inside, don't distract them from the outside.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Nothing was a sure thing; every choice was just an educated guess, or a leap into a mysterious abyss. People might not change but their incentives could. So”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“a long, boozy evening when her ebullience was so uncorrupted that she could shift a room’s atmosphere”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“I hate wearing flats,” she said, tugging her fitted white blouse a little lower. “They make me feel flat all over.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“So the first time she and Leo combusted, she'd practically been poised for the breakup. In some inexplicable way, she'd been looking forward to it and all its attendant drama, because wasn't there something nearly lovely–when you were young enough–about guts churning and tear ducts being put to glorious overuse? She recognized the undeniable satisfaction of the first emotional fissure because an unraveling was still something grown-up and, therefore, life affirming. See? The broken heart signalled. I loved enough to lose; I felt enough to weep. Because when you were young enough, the stakes of love were so very small, nearly insignificant. How tragic could a breakup be when it was part of the fabric of expectation from the beginning? The hackneyed fights, the late-night phone calls, the indignant recounting for friends over multiple drinks and in earshot of an appropriately flirtatious bartender–it was theatre for a certain type of person . . . Until it wasn't.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“abundance proffered too soon led to lassitude and indolence, a wandering dissatisfaction.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Accommodation. A different and sturdier kind of nest. AS”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“They’d fallen into their old ways, accusatory and evasive, which was reassuring in a perverted way. Leo understood the nasty pull of the regrettable familiar, how the old grooves could be so much more satisfying than the looming unknown. It’s addicts stayed addicts.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Leo was the only one who had never petitioned Francie for a loan using The Nest as collateral. Jack and Melody and Bea had all asked at one time that she consider an earlier dispersal, but she stubbornly refused.Until Leo’s accident.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“I’m curious,” he said, “is telling someone to relax ever helpful? It’s like saying ‘breathe’ to someone who is hyperventilating or ‘swallow’ to a person who’s choking. It’s a completely useless admonition.” “I”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Right now, it felt like there was nowhere for his thoughts to alight that wasn’t rife with land mines of regret or anger or guilt. “You’re”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Sometimes a small change could make all the difference.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“She was so much better at being alone; being alone came more naturally to her. She led a life of deliberate solitude, and if occasional loneliness crept in, she knew how to work her way out … Or even better, how to sink in and absorb its particular comforts.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“If you want to predict a person’s behavior, identify his or her incentives. Leo”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“The shelf held nothing of value and it held everything of value. It was the past they’d both endured and escaped. It was despair and hope. It was life and death.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
“Being somebody's looking glass is not your job.”
― Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney, quote from The Nest
Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney
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“We have, in short, somehow become convinced that we need to tackle the whole problem, all at once. But the truth is that we don’t. We only need to find the stickiness Tipping Points,”
― Malcolm Gladwell, quote from The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
“That's why I didn't want to touch you I knew I'd go crazy if I touched you, and now, it tears me open to ask you to be with me when I know I'm just going to do something to hurt you again!
"Yes! Yes you probably are, you idiot! And it's going to be a damn skydive for me, and I'm going to hang on tight and just jump with you because that's what you do to me.”
― Katy Evans, quote from Real
“But there was not a police car in sight. Sure, Tracy thought in disgust. They’re never around when you need them.”
― Sidney Sheldon, quote from If Tomorrow Comes
“I don’t think you do. This” –he gestured impatiently at himself– “is just a fucking shell. You’re what drives me, Eva. Can you understand that? You’re my heart and soul. If something ever happened to you it would kill me, too. Keeping you safe is goddamned self-preservation! Tolerate it for me, if you won’t do it for yourself.”
I surged into him, knocking him off-balance and onto his back. I kissed him hard, my heart pounding and blood roaring in my ears.
“I hate to freak you out,” I murmured between desperate kisses, “but you’ve got it real bad for me.”
― Sylvia Day, quote from Entwined with You
“Boys look at us like we look at horses: color, height, eyes. tail. They can't help but have preferences.”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from Midwives
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