Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

by Gabrielle Zevin

But life is filled with them, too. The most successful people are also the most able to change their mindsets.

You are American, Japanese, Korean, and by being all of those things, you are not truly any of those things. You consider yourself a citizen of the world.

(They say success kills relationships, but the lack of it will do it just as quickly.)

The way to turn an ex-lover into a friend is to never stop loving them, to know that when one phase of a relationship ends it can transform into something else. It is to acknowledge that love is both a constant and a variable at the same time.

There are no ghosts, but up here”—she gestured toward her head—“it’s a haunted house.”

art doesn’t typically get made by happy people.

She had once read in a book about consciousness that over the years, the human brain makes an AI version of your loved ones. The brain collects data, and within your brain, you host a virtual version of that person. Upon the person’s death, your brain still believes the virtual person exists, because, in a sense, the person still does. After a while, though, the memory fades, and each year, you are left with an increasingly diminished version of the AI you had made when the person was alive.

Maybe it was the willingness to play that hinted at a tender, eternally newborn part in all humans. Maybe it was the willingness to play that kept one from despair.