Ask Him Why

by Catherine Ryan Hyde

To this very day, I wonder why, when a man wants to insult another man, he calls him a woman or a girl. Now that I’m grown, I notice that these are guys with wives and girlfriends and daughters. Don’t they see what they’re saying?

Anything that lifts responsibility for our actions is addictive, I’ve found.

You can only save face for just so long before you wake up and realize you have nothing left worth saving.

People don’t eat when they’re upset, and they let their blood sugar get quite low, and their brain has nothing to power on, and then everything looks so dark. And they’re always so astonished at how they feel after filling up on bacon and eggs and home-fried potatoes. They need some protein, and they need to feel solid again.

“So if I have kids,” I said, “I’ll mess them up the same way?” “You’re not required to, and I don’t recommend it. It’s not mandatory. You can heal your own self first, but most people never do. Maybe because you have to start by admitting you’re broken.”

It’s like those hospitals and repair shops that have the doors that say ‘authorized personnel only.’ Well, somebody has to be authorized personnel, don’t they? Or what’s the point of the room behind the door?”

You can’t change anybody’s mind. No matter what you say to them. The sooner you figure that out, the happier your life will be.”

When people come here, everything in their life is bad, but that’s not the problem. The problem is, they think it always will be. They can’t see anything new and different down the road.

People can bear almost any amount of pain if they think there’s an end to it. So suddenly something happens that they never could have imagined: a daft old man invites them in for a nice hearty meal. It’s not the man or the meal that convinces them. It’s that they forgot how at any moment something can always happen that you never expected. Something better. Once they remember that, it’s a whole new ball game.”

“Everything grows best in oxygen and sunlight except secrets and guilt and regrets. They like the dank spaces. Drag them out into the light and they fail to thrive.”

the problem with people is that we forget that something unexpected can happen at any time.”

“Maybe nobody sets out to be judgmental. Maybe everybody’s just trying to protect themselves. From one thing or another.”