Shirley’s Reviews > The Lover's Dictionary > Status Update

"You called to ask me when I was coming home, and when I reminded you that I wasn't coming home, you sounded so disappointed that I decided to come home."

"When it's going well, the fact of it is everywhere. [...] The hitch, of course, is that when it's going badly, it's in all the same places."

"There are times when I worry that I've already lost myself. That is, that myself is so inseparable from being with you that if we were to separate, I would no longer be. I save that thought for when I feel the darkest discontent. I never meant to depend so much on someone else."

"I found myself thinking: If this continues, if this goes on, then when I dies, your memories of me will be my greatest accomplishment. Your memories will be my most lasting impression."

"There is no word for the recipient of love. There is only a word for the giver. There is the assumption that lovers come in pairs."

"It scares me how hard it is to remember life before you. I can't even make the comparisons any more, because my memories of that time have all the depth of a photograph. It seems foolish to play games of better and worse. It's simply a matter of is and is no longer."

"We'll have contests to see which one of us can be more sceptical. [...] But. In the end, we both want the right thing to happen, the right person to win, the right idea to prevail. We have no faith that it will happen, but still we want it. Neither of us has given up on anything."

"Trying to write about love is ultimately like trying to have a dictionary represent life. No matter how many words there are, there will never be enough."

"Every time I call you mine, I feel like I'm forcing it, as if saying it can make it so. As if I'm reminding you, and reminding the universe: mine. As if that one word from me could have that kind of power."

"There are times when I'm alone that I think, This is it. This is actually the natural state. [...] I am myself, and that is the point. Pairing is a social construction. It is by no means necessary for everyone to do it. Maybe I'm better like this. Maybe I could live my life in my own world, and then simply leave it when it's time to go."