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There are some things that you can never truly escape. Not really. Maybe that’s why, even now, she’s stuck in the past, long after everyone else has moved on.
More than anything, he hated that everything in his life served as a reminder of his failures. I don’t blame him. Maybe because I know what it’s like, to live a life so defined by want. That’s why I was able to recognize it in him—it was what I had been feeling for so long.
I’M REPUBLICAN BECAUSE WE CAN’T ALL BE ON WELFARE.
Swearing on your mother’s life is something so American, so white, that neither of us can truly understand it. In our culture, swearing on your mother’s life is probably one of the worst sins you can commit. What is there that’s more important than your mother, your father, or your grandparents? It doesn’t sound like George has ever heard of filial piety.
I’m lost in the crypt that contains our family’s memories.
the danger of hearing only one perspective on a topic and the generalizations and assumptions that come from that.
Her tears dripped onto my hands, onto the carpet; I watched them fall and had the sudden realization that our roles had reversed. Somehow, I had become the mother and she the daughter.
Fate can bring you together, but it can just as easily tear you apart.
What is it like to live freely, to live a life untethered, without having to be responsible for everyone around you?
She looks hurt. I should feel bad, but I don’t. If anything, I feel better—like I’ve transferred some of my pain to her.
Some people are just like that, unable to not hurt others, they must share their misery.
The only power he has is the power you are willing to give him, and you’ve given him nothing. Not a scrap. By the time you’re done with him, he’ll be begging for mercy. Who is he if he can’t control you? Is he even a man anymore? It will seem like a relief when you give him a hand, even if that hand is holding a blade. And when you take everything from him, you can say what these men say about us: He was asking for it. He was begging for it. He must have wanted it, since he didn’t fight back.
“Didn’t Mom ever tell you that if you cry and then laugh right after, a bunch of hair will grow out of your butthole?”
😂 what?!?!
How do I explain to her that the home I miss isn’t a place? It’s a time when my life made sense. When things made sense.
“In Korea, there was a news story about a girl and a boy who went on a picnic and forgot to bring chopsticks. They used little branches from the oleander bush to eat their food instead, and they died from it. The poison from the plant killed them.”
I’ve heard this story growing up in California where they have this very plant. Although it was a little different that the couple was American 😂
“I know that the plant is pretty, but poison is everywhere, even in the places where you least expect it.”
A fool and his eyes are easily parted.
Umma allowed the men in her life to control her, to tell her what to do, to make all the big decisions for her. Without them, she’s lost, adrift at sea.
