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It is nearly always the most improbable things that really come to pass. —E.T.A. Hoffmann
she’s positive there’s not one person on earth who uses the term ironic accurately, and she can’t help herself from pointing it out any more than she can keep the sun from rising each day.
She often fancies her anti-Botox stance as part of her long-fought battle against the patriarchy—yet she dyes her hair and applies mascara daily and she’s not sure how to reconcile her hypocrisy, except to say that shooting poison into her face is a bridge too far.
The irony isn’t lost on her that the fact that she thinks this much about her aging appearance and Botox at all means the patriarchy has already won.
Or maybe it’s the trying to fix all the things for all the people in her family, when she can’t even fix herself.
There was a time—when her children turning eighteen seemed so far off it was another lifetime—that
it started to feel less like gaining freedom and more like a cavernous, overwhelming loss.
she can’t imagine not seeing her daughter every day, not knowing what she’s doing, whom she’s with—and more importantly, if she’s safe, alive, and well. The thought of her leaving is a mix of anxiety and grief so encompassing, she doesn’t understand how other mothers have survived it.
Never let the things you want make you forget the things you have.
and they could play it for years more, ’til death do them part. But Jane has gotten to the point where she thinks she might rather die.
Jane often thinks all of the difficulty with parenting can be summed up by one sentence: Am I overreacting? And how 99 percent of the time, the answer is yes, but how is one to know when it’s the 1 percent of the time worrying is warranted? Frankly, it’s exhausting.
Or maybe it’s realizing you’re a lesbian. That one sounds the happiest, to be honest.
You are my literal heart walking around outside my body. Please be careful. I love you. I love you. I love you.
It’s something Jane has worried about relentlessly, or maybe grieved is the more accurate term—the happy-go-lucky child Sissy once was, who wore all her emotions so plainly on her face.
it’s quite possible Jane has absolutely no idea who her daughter is.
The silver linings.
Jane would soon come to understand these were the three pillars of motherhood: guilt, anxiety, and love.
But in that moment she only knew, without a shadow of a doubt, she would do anything to protect her daughter.
But part of it, Jane feared, was that she’d stopped believing in things. She’d stopped believing in herself.
I have serious climate anxiety—I actually don’t know how anyone doesn’t. The world is literally on fire
“I mean, I love the kids, of course I do. They’re my lungs. I couldn’t breathe if anything ever happened to them, and I worry about it all the time, you know? What if something happens to them?”
I just thought I would do something that mattered. Something important. Do you know what I mean? But it feels like nothing I do matters.”
because what else is her job as a mother if not to make sure Sissy has more opportunities than Jane had, to be more?
The world is dying.”
There will be mass famine, wars over resources, flooding, displacement, death, and destruction. And no one cares! You know why? Because it’s mostly the poor who will suffer. The people who no one cares about anyway.
“Not everyone does want to be rich. Some of us just want to leave the earth a little better than we found it.”
Does she know she’s the goddamn air that I breathe?
Welcome to the world, my girl. It’s a cruel, horrible place and I’m so terrified for you to be here. It’s a wonderful, beautiful place and I’m so glad you’re here.
The truth is, most people are doing the best they can, given their situations.
