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I feel seasick at the thought of him. Nauseated and off-balance. Some small part of me always knew he wasn’t the kindest guy in the world,
Because I think it’s a good reminder that the passions of young girls are worth nurturing no matter how frivolous they may seem
It’s the scent of stale coffee and days-old takeout, and the way sleeplessness and anxiety are thick in the air. There’s nubby, ugly carpeting under my feet and buzzing fluorescents overhead, but still, my heart rate kicks up a notch, adrenaline spiking in anticipation. I’m not in the habit of quoting Hamilton, but this is one of the rooms where it happens. And this is the energy that’s kept me from leaving politics, even when staying starts to feel like self-sabotage.
“So many of the problems in this country stem from not being able to afford things. You can’t afford fresh food, you get sick, but you can’t afford a doctor, and you get sicker. You can’t afford to buy things with cash, so you put it on credit and go into debt that just keeps compounding. Any assistance programs we do have—they’re bureaucratic and expensive to operate. We need to cut through the red tape. We need to put a floor under people’s feet. And selfishly, I need to feel like all the bullshit I put up with—that it actually means something.”
I had forgotten what it was like to feel this way—just totally undone by someone’s art, swept up in their emotions. Experiencing my own feelings as too big for my skin.
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned, in my many, many long years,” Charlie says. “It’s that the world rarely ends when you think it will.”
“And then you said you wanted to love me for the rest of your life. And you said it enough times that I realized that it didn’t matter if I understood why. You knew exactly who you were getting, and you always wanted more. You had chosen me. And I had to start choosing me too. So, Kate, I promise that I will try to love myself the way you love me. And I will try to be worthy of the gift of your love, and your confidence, and your light, and your warmth, every day of our lives.”
