Looking for Alaska

by John Green

“Y’all smoke to enjoy it. I smoke to die.”

That is the fear: I have lost something important, and I cannot find it, and I need it.

I was not religious, but I liked rituals. I liked the idea of connecting an action with remembering.

There were so many of us who would have to live with things done and things left undone that day. Things that did not go right, things that seemed okay at the time because we could not see the future. If only we could see the endless string of consequences that result from our smallest actions. But we can’t know better until knowing better is useless.

Last Words of Notable People by William B. Brahms.