I Called Him Necktie Quotes

“If there is anything for you to learn, it's only that you should not be ashamed. Don't be ashamed to be a person with feelings. No matter what it is, feel it tenderly and deeply. Feel it more tenderly, feel it more deeply. Feel it for yourself. Feel it for yourself. Feel it for others. And then: Let it go.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“And you? What brings you here? I shrugged my shoulders. No idea? Hm, you’re still young. Eighteen? I froze. Nineteen? Twenty? Incredible, so young. You have everything before you. No past. He sighed. Incredible, to have been so young once myself. Although what does that mean? There is only one age for anyone. I was and am, will always be fifty-eight. But you. Be careful what age you end up. It sticks to you. It seals you shut. The age you choose is like glue, it sets around you. This wisdom is not mine, you know. I got it from a book. A movie. I’m not sure. You notice things. It’s incredible. Your whole life you notice things.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Someone who only hears laughter in a laugh is deaf.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Ich streckte die Hand nach dir aus, und vielleicht, das ist meine Antwort auf deine Frage, ist es gerade dieses Ausstrecken, dieses Sich-Hinstrecken zum anderen, welches am dringendsten gebraucht wird.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“I am a plant, she said, I need fire, earth, water. Otherwise I will be stunted. And: Is marriage not such a stunting? The fire goes out. The wind grows weak. The earth dries out. The water dwindles. I would die. You too. She tossed her hair over her shoulders. Purple lavender. And what if it wasn't like that, I argued. What if the daily routine, our daily routine, is my promise to you? Your toothbrush next to mine. You get annoyed because I've forgotten to turn the light off in the bathroom. We choose wallpaper we think is horrible a year later. You tell me I'm getting a belly. Your forgetfulness. You've left your umbrella somewhere again. I snore, you can't sleep. In my dream I whisper your name...You tie my tie. Wave goodbye to me as I go to work. I think: you are like a fluttering flag. I think it with a stabbing pain in my heart. For Heaven's sake, is that not enough? Is that not enough to be happy? She turned away: Give me time. I'll think about it.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“If only I had cried, just once. I watched myself not crying. Jaw firm. Swallow. Break something. Quick. The mirror there, broken. And again. Smash your fist into it. A reassuring pain, masking the real one. The one that is not there. Which you force yourself not to feel. Sweep up the fragments. And away with them. To know, to know better, that not crying is crying. And yet you do not cry. Firm up the jaw. Swallow.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“There are rooms one never leaves.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Today on the platform, surrounded by so many people, I asked myself whether I would miss any one of them if they weren't here, and then: Whether they would miss me if I weren't here. Whether we are not all somehow here in order to touch one another. When the train finally came and I saw my reflection in its windows and in the sleeping faces rolling by behind them, there was no question, only an insight: We must all, every one of us, relate to one another.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“What you don't do, what you omit, often has more painful consequences than what you do.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“We must all, every one of us, relate to one another.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Je leeft maar één keer, wordt gezegd, waarom sterf je dan zo vaak. Alleen de stropdas ontbrak. Ik heb ernaar gezocht. Dat heet droefheid. En ik denk dat droefheid ook de reden was waarom hij zo z'n best heeft gedaan om een mens te zijn die functioneert.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Am I still writing? Unthinkable not to. In the very darkest night the words were like shiny pebbles. They caught the light of the moon and stars and reflected it back. One word among them that shone especially brightly. Simplicity. I would approach it, stepping softly, regard it from all sides, finally pick it up, enchanted by it, recognize that its enchantment lay in its shine, its pure meaning. Simplicity. To simply be there. Simply keep going. The longer I kept going, the easier it was to see how beautiful, simply beautiful, it is to be here.

I would like to write about how this word shines. I'd like to write about the simplest things.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“How to describe the bitterness? I was a glass, broken, and the space I once enclosed was now the same as the space around. Deserted space, in which I was lost, sharp knives under my feet. With each step it became less likely that I would ever get anywhere.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“What is everlasting? We are fireworks. Glowing bright and fading, we scatter sparks that soon die out.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“We had struck a pact: Better not to know anything about each other. And this pact is what holds families together for generations. We wore masks. Our faces no longer recognizable underneath, for our masks had grown onto us. It hurt to pull them off. It hurt so much that the pain of never meeting face to face was bearable, compared to the pain of showing your true face.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Tegenwoordig begrijp ik dat het onmogelijk is om iemand niet te ontmoeten. Door er te zijn en te ademen ontmoet je de hele wereld. De onzichtbare draad heeft je vanaf het moment van je geboorte met de anderen verbonden. Om die draad door te knippen is meer nodig dan een dood, en het heeft geen zin het daar niet mee eens te zijn.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Ik vraag me vaak af waarom wij dat niet meer kunnen, zinloos gelukkig zijn. Waarom we, als we groter worden, in nauwe en lage ruimten zitten, waar we ons ook bevinden, hooguit van de ene ruimte naar de andere gaan, terwijl we als kind toch in een ruimte zonder muren waren. Want zo herinner ik het me: toen ik klein was, was mijn onderdak mijn hier en nu. Noch het verleden noch de toekomst kon me iets maken, en hoe mooi zou het zijn als dat vandaag nog zo was. Als we bijvoorbeeld niet voor het resultaat zouden kunnen werken, maar uit overgave, zonder inspanning.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“After he finished he said: If there is anything for you to learn, it's only that you should not be ashamed. Don't be ashamed to be a person with feelings. No matter what it is, feel it tenderly and deeply. Feel it more tenderly, feel it more deeply. Feel it for yourself. Feel it for others. And then: Let it go.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Growing up signifies a loss. You think you are winning. Really you are losing yourself.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Despite our lack of freedom we constantly make decisions and we have to take responsibility for them and their consequences. And so, with every decision we take we become less free.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Einfachheit. Einfach da sein. Es einfach aushalten. Je mehr ich es aushielt, desto einfacher wurde es einzusehen, wie schön, einfach schön, es ist, da zu sein.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Can you hear me? Sighing. You were right. My requiem is well prepared. Still to be written is the poem that is never complete, an endless rubbing on the ink block, an endless dipping of the pen, an endless swoop over the white paper, the poem of my life. I will try to write it down. Soon, no, now, I will try. The first line. I called him Necktie. I will write: He taught me to see with eyes of feeling.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“He pointed to the right and left. We are unfree, all of us. Only, that does not absolve us of responsibility. Despite our lack of freedom we constantly make decisions and we have to take responsibility for them and their consequences. And so, with every decision we take we become less free.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“They call it mourning. And I think that was the reason he tried so hard to be someone who functioned. By holding on to how things had always been, he was mourning what was missing.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“We are unfree, all of us. Only, that does not absolve us of responsibility. Despite our lack of freedom we constantly make decisions and we have to take responsibility for them and their consequences. And so, with every decision we take we become less free.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“I have an image in my head. I see it clearly before me. Its colors are glaring and harsh in their brightness. But as soon as I rush to capture it, it explodes, and what I write down are separate bits that don’t form a whole.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“When you are small, so small that you believe things will stay the same forever, the world is a friendly place. That's what I thought when I recognized my childhood bench. This bench, or I should learn that nothing stays as it is, and yet it is still worthwhile being in the world. I am still learning that.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“There is only one age for anyone. I was and am, will always be fifty-eight. But you. Be careful what age you end up. It sticks to you. It seals you shut. The age you choose is like glue, it sets around you.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Vở diễn ấy, ban đầu đúng là vở diễn, vuột khỏi tay cô. Tàn bạo. Khi ta mất kiểm soát. Ta vừa nắm thế chủ động để mở màn trình diễn một cảnh mới với cao trào, nhưng rồi chẳng có gì xảy ra cả. Ta trở thành một phần của khán giả. Còn người kia đứng trên sân khấu, vở độc thoại, đèn pha chiếu vào mặt, khuôn mặt cô đơn. Trong khi ta ngói hàng sau cùng, trong bóng tối, bất lực không thể can thiệp, chỉ giương mắt nhìn động thái trên kia tự đi theo đường riêng. Màn hạ. Lẽ ra ngay từ đầu cô không được phép tham gia diễn xuất. Kể cả khi cô làm thế vì chú, lẽ ra cô vẫn nên biết là những vở kiểu ấy không kết thúc có hậu.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie

“Dù vậy tôi không ao ước gì hơn, khi trời mờ sáng: Người ta sẽ đi tim và tìm thấy tôi, túm vai tôi và tát vào mặt tôi, và hỏi: “Cớ gì chúng ta lại lạc nhau đến mức này?” Rồi ôm tôi nói: “Hãy để chúng ta bắt đầu lại từ đầu lần nữa.”
― Milena Michiko Flašar, I Called Him Necktie