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But it wasn’t her who wanted me to be someone else—it was me.
Every human being—each of us—is like a country. You can build walls around yourself to protect yourself, to keep others out, never letting anybody visit you, never letting anybody in, never letting anybody see the beauty of the treasures you carry within. Building walls can lead to a sad and lonely existence. But we can also decide to give people visas and let them in so they can see for themselves all the wealth you have to offer. You can decide to let those who visit you see your pain and the courage it has taken you to survive. Letting other people in—letting them see your country—this is
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“Because straight little boys are callous dicks.”
“Cassandra, I’m gay. I’m seventeen years old—and I’m scared.”
If we’re lucky. If we’re very lucky, the universe will send us the people we need to survive.
That word, “school,” was hovering over us like vultures over a dead carcass.
And I wasn’t normally the kind of guy who did silly things like that because I didn’t particularly like silly, and I didn’t even like the word.
“When you are standing all alone,” she whispered, “the people who notice—those are the people who stand by your side. Those are the people who love you.”
And I guess I just wanted to thank you for adding that extra happy to my happy.” “Well, I had an extra happy lying around, so I decided to give it to you.”
“Aw, Ari. I’m sorry. Don’t…” And then she was crying too. “I know I’m hard. I need to be a little softer. It kills me to think that I hurt you.”
No one asks to be born. And no one wants to die. We don’t bring ourselves into the world, and when it’s time for us to leave, the decision will not be ours to make. But what we do with the time in between the day we are born and the day we die, that is what constitutes a human life. You will have to make choices—and those choices will map out the shape and course of your life. We are all cartographers—all of us. We all want to write our names on the map of the world.
There was no future for Ari and Dante.
Now is the only thing that’s real. Tomorrow is just an idea.
was starting to believe that we lived in different ways with each person that we loved.
But we always have to be able to break the rules if they do not serve the people they were meant to protect.”
I have so many things going through my head sometimes. It’s as if the whole world is in chaos and it’s all living inside me.
It was that word “hate” that killed him. And that word is going to kill us all if we don’t learn how to fight it.
“You know, Ari, racism is something that’s almost impossible to talk about. And so most of us don’t talk about it.
“Because we don’t know how to talk about certain things. And we’ve never learned. We’ve never learned because we’re not willing to change because we’re afraid of what we might lose.
“Sometimes the weather is fair. We’re going to have a fair-weather day. And then somewhere else there’s a tornado killing a hundred people. Across the globe, there are places where the weather isn’t fair.”
DAD SAID THAT THE ONLY thing you leave on this earth after you die that’s worth anything at all is your name. I wanted my father to live forever. But that wasn’t going to happen. And every time I entered a library, I was going to grab a book and write his name in it. So I could keep his name in this world.
“Don’t ever let the hate rob you of the life you’ve been given.”
Cowards start wars, and the brave fight them.”
“Stop it. There are nice straight boys out there.” “Let me know when you find one.”
And I saw the life go out of him and he was motionless and his eyes, which had been so alive, went blank and so far away. And I rocked him in my arms, rocked and rocked him, and I knew I was crying out—but it felt like it was someone else. “No. No. No, no, no, no, no. Dad. Dad. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. No, Dad! Dad!”
I do remember thinking that the world had ended and wondering why I was still here, on this earth, in this world that had ended.
“Oh, I don’t know if he did or he didn’t. I’m not a believer in the traditional sense. I was raised Catholic like you. But I call God the Great Creator. Science tells us that we are all energy and that we are all connected. And once energy is present in the universe, it doesn’t just disappear. Life moves from one form of energy to another. Your father is still very much a part of the universe.” I thought of what Emma had told us in her gallery. You matter more to the universe than you will ever know.
“I don’t know how to thank you for that, Ari. To know he left this world in peace. To know he wasn’t afraid when he died, to know he died in his son’s arms, a son whom he loved with all his wounded heart, to know he died with a smile and my name on his lips.
“forgiveness.” It was a word that needed to live inside me. I had a feeling that if that word didn’t live inside me, the word “happiness” would never live inside me either.
We do invent who other people are. And we invent ourselves. And we can have very unpretty and very ungenerous imaginations.”
maybe our hate would destroy the earth and everybody in it.
“Dad, Dad. Why did God take you when it was me who needed you? Tell me why. I don’t understand. I hate, I hate the fucking universe. And the universe hates me. Hates me, hates me, hates me.”
“Ari! Ari!” I knew that voice. I knew that voice. It was a better voice than mine. “Dante?” I whispered. “Ari!” I felt him pick me up and carry me in his arms.
FELT DANTE HOLDING ME as the hot water of the shower hit my skin.
Maybe one day, instead of always having to prove they were real men, guys would study women’s behavior and start acting a little more like them. Now, that would be awesome.
But I think that you think we’re not smart enough or that we don’t know enough about the world to understand the meaning of the word ‘racism.’ You think that it’s just that we don’t like her. You think we shouldn’t use the word ‘racism’ at all because we haven’t earned the right to use it. So we should leave it to you and to other enlightened adults to decide when it is appropriate to use that word. But you disrespect us and you underestimate us.
Where are we supposed to learn right from wrong? Maybe that’s it. They don’t want us to go looking for the truth. They don’t really want us to learn right from wrong. They just want us to behave.”
“Are you trying to make me fall in love with you, or what?”
Aaaaahhhhh foreshadowing!!!!??
“We have to dive into the water,” Dante said. “I can’t dive.” I didn’t think anyone could survive jumping into that water. And I thought Dante and I were going to die. Dante wasn’t afraid. He smiled. “We have to dive. Just dive when I dive.” I trusted him—so I dived when he dived. And then I felt myself coming to the surface. The water was warm, and Dante and I smiled at each other. And then he pointed toward the sandy beach. And I saw my father waving at us and smiling.
I hated the word “silly.” And I hated to think of myself as being silly.
And my mother, she looked as radiant as the setting sun.
“Isn’t it pretty to think so?”
“You beat my brother up.” “He must be a real nice guy.”
The real question is, what kind of person do you want to be? Do you want to love? Or do you want to continue the hate? Hate is a decision. Hate is an emotional pandemic we have never found a cure for. Choose to love.
You taught me how to swim in stormy waters— Then left me here to drown.
