I hate now for men to dote in this way, the ones who don’t know me. Their praise lands uncertainly in the air somewhere between the two of us, because it doesn’t belong to me. I hate to hear them tell me what I am, even or especially when what they think I am is kind or brilliant or beautiful. I hate when they insist that I have no faults, that my laziness or violence or cruelty simply don’t exist.
