Mad Honey

by Jodi Picoult

The bee itself is considered a symbol of Christ: the sting of justice and the mercy of honey, side by side.

Imagine a sorrow so deep that it batters the hatches of sleep; imagine drowning before you even realize you’ve gone under.

But their most important job, arguably, is taking care of the queen, who can’t take care of herself—feeding and cleaning her while she lays fifteen hundred eggs a day.

We are so lucky to have our children, even for a little while, but we take them for granted. We make the stupid assumption that as long as we are here, they will be, too, though that’s never been part of the contract.

you don’t ever recover from losing someone you love—even the ones you leave behind because you’re better off without them.

when you hurt someone else, you’re less likely to feel your own pain.

“Being gay or straight,” says Elizabeth, “is about who you want to go to bed with. Being trans—or cis—is about who you want to go to bed as.”

I wonder if it would be like being forced to wear size two clothes when you are a size twelve. You wouldn’t be able to move comfortably. You’d always be aware of the fact that something pinched. There would be wardrobe malfunctions and embarrassment when you thought people were looking at you oddly. You’d be thinking constantly about taking off the outfit just so you could breathe.

there is a vast canyon between who we want people to be, and who they truly are.

“you need to think about the difference between what is secret and what is private.”

I think about my history with Braden. Is what happened between us a secret, in the way that the nuclear codes are secret? Or is it private, in the way that—painful as the facts are—this is history that belongs to me, and is mine to reveal?

How similar does someone have to be to you before you remember to see them, first, as human?