Twice

by Mitch Albom

“Suspicion and belief can’t share the same bed.” “What’s that supposed to mean?” “It means if I told you the truth, you’d have to accept something you can’t.”

Lallu was responsible for my second friend, a wiry girl with piercing green eyes and dark hair cut in pageboy bangs. Her mother was from the Philippines, but her father was American.

When you are lonely and you suddenly find a friend, it fills up your world.

The second time won’t always be better than the first.”

My parents used to go shopping, eat at restaurants, play gin rummy with the neighbors. But my mother’s death had left my dad rudderless. He worked. He came home. Now and then, when the weather was warm, he’d toss a baseball with me, but he always seemed distracted, his thoughts elsewhere.

In the silent vacuum of my mother’s absence, rules were what my father used to reset his balance.

The truth is, you never do as much good as you could.

I kind of liked her, in the way that a sixth-grade boy likes a girl, which is awkward and without reciprocation.

When we’re young, we want to satisfy every desire. When we’re old, our greatest desire is to not die alone.

“How do you know if a girl likes you?” I asked my father once. “Hard to say, Alfie.” “Isn’t there some clue?” “Well, if she doesn’t walk away when you say hello, you have a chance.”

A boy may not do everything for his mother. But he’ll do anything for her memory.

she wore Charlie fragrance by Revlon,

It doesn’t always make sense, the way you miss somebody. Sometimes, hurt seeks hurt.

There are years you think about for moments, and moments you think about for years.

People will forgive you anything but boredom.

Her family had left Kenya eight years earlier and moved to Morocco, then Italy, then the Philippines, where her mother was from, now America, all because of her father’s work.

She was hoping to stay put for a while by going to college at Boston University, where she planned to study literature.

I’ve noticed something about dying, Boss. When you come into this world, you have all these people who want to take care of you, and you don’t know any of them. Then, when you’re leaving this world, you have all these people you do know, but few of them want to be bothered.

if you keep getting second chances, you won’t learn a damn thing.”

I’d see her laughing in the student lounge with a group of Filipino classmates, or doing morning exercises with a tai chi club,

what we yearn for, deep down, is a heart that will embrace us after we make a fool of ourselves.

“Some of the biggest things in life happen over the smallest turns in the day.”

It’s like that old song, if something is wrong with my baby, something is wrong with me.

Our best choices often come when we have no choice.

She pushed her beautiful lips in my direction and I felt my nose brush the glass. That was our first kiss. Through a revolving door that a thousand dirty hands had pushed against that morning. It was perfect.

“Destiny is patient.”

This is what being old is. You worry about the young.”

want, and you want, and God does what God wants.”

It’s a wonderful thing, to be married to an excellent person.”

“Cayenne pepper,” he said, grabbing a shaker, “for the passion, yes? A lemon, for life’s disappointments. Some vinegar, for the challenges you will face. “And this . . .” He grabbed a jar of honey. “For the sweetness and joy.” He placed the goods on the counter. “If you taste these four elements during your ceremony, it means you will understand what lies ahead in marriage.” “That’s beautiful,” Gianna said. “Did you make that up?” “Yes. Well. First, I saw it done in Nigeria. Then I made it up!”

“Suspicion and belief cannot share the same bed.”

What was it they said about passion and rocket fuel? They both burn fast?

selfishness is always clearer when you’re looking back on it.

uneven in love is unhealthy.

What is it about time and love that turns us from red with desire to pale with familiarity?

I learned another Truth About True Love: it doesn’t have to cost you anything. Even when it might cost you everything.

When you realize you are about to lose a parent, you suddenly want to know everything, say everything, share every little detail you omitted during the years when you were taking them for granted.

Secrecy is a loan against your better judgment. You pay the interest in regret.

guilt, perhaps the world’s strongest motivator for man’s temporary good behavior.

That’s what I told myself. And what you tell yourself long enough becomes, like new paint on an old wall, the only color you see.

And here is another Truth About True Love: only a whole heart can support it.

“You teach my people God?” “My parents.” “You should teach them money. That what we need. Money now. God later.”

another Truth About True Love: it makes you feel like you belong someplace.

moments: how you forget so many over a lifetime, yet a lifetime can turn on a single one.

Sadly, when you lose yourself, you don’t realize who else you’re losing, too.

What is it about love that makes us think we can tame it, when all the while it is taming us?

I know it’s a cliché, Boss, that people take better care of themselves after a relationship ends. And it is strange that you’d rather make yourself attractive for the possibility of a love, than for one you already have.

We invent all kinds of theories about how our hearts get broken, when we’re the ones who drop them on the floor.

Like my grandmother said, there comes a point where you want to see what comes next more than you want to go back.”

What I’ve learned—after all this time—is that love is indeed the only rational act. And the only real lifesaver.