An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination Quotes

“As for me, I believe that if there's a God - and I am as neutral on the subject as is possible - then the most basic proof of His existence is black humor. What else explains it, that odd, reliable comfort that billows up at the worst moments, like a beautiful sunset woven out of the smoke over a bombed city.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“This is why you need everyone you know after a disaster, because there is not one right response. It's what paralyzes people around the grief-stricken, of course, the idea that there are right things to say and wrong things and it's better to say nothing than something clumsy.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“All I can say is, it's a sort of kinship, as though there is a family tree of grief. On this branch, the lost children, on this the suicided parents, here the beloved mentally ill siblings. When something terrible happens, you discover all of the sudden that you have a new set of relatives, people with whom you can speak in the shorthand of cousins.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“I want a book that acknowledges that life goes on, but death goes on too, that a person who is dead is a long, long story. You move on from it, , but the death will never disappear from view.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“I didn't know what it was I was feeling. Then I realized it was seeing someone and knowing immediately that you love him.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“I'm thinking of that Florida lady again, the one who wanted a book about the lighter side of a child's death, and I know: all she wanted was permission to remember her child with pleasure instead of grief. To remember that he was dead, but to remember him without pain: he's dead but of course she still loves him, and that love isn't morbid or bloodstained or unsightly, it doesn't need to be shoved away.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“For us what was killing was how nothing had changed. We'd been waiting to be transformed, and now here we were, back in our old life.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“Perhaps it goes without saying that I believe in the geographic cure. Of course you can't out-travel sadness. You will find it has smuggled itself along in your suitcase. It coats the camera lens, it flavors the local cuisine. In that different sunlight, it stands out, awkward, yours, honking in the brash vowels of your native tongue in otherwise quiet restaurants. You may even feel proud of its stubbornness as it follows you up the bell towers and monuments, as it pants in your ear while you take in the view. I travel not to get away from my troubles but to see how they look in front of famous buildings or on deserted beaches. I take them for walks. Sometimes I get them drunk. Back at home we generally understand each other better.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“In front is a sign that says: An exact replica of a figment of my imagination, and that is what this life feels like some days. It's a happy life, but someone is missing. It's a happy life, and someone is missing. It's a happy life-”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“When I was a teenager in Boston, a man on the subway handed me a card printed with tiny pictures of hands spelling out the alphabet in sign language. I AM DEAF, said the card. You were supposed to give the man some money in exchange.
I have thought of that card ever since, during difficult times, mine or someone else's; surely when tragedy has struck you dumb, you should be given a stack of cards that explain it for you. When Pudding died, I wanted my stack. I still want it. My first child was stillborn, it would say on the front. It remains the hardest thing for me to explain, even now, or maybe I mean especially now - now that his death feels like a non sequitur. My first child was stillborn. I want people to know but I don't want to say it aloud. People don't like to hear it but I think they might not mind reading it on a card.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“Blame is a compulsive behavior, the emotional version of obsessive hand washing, until all you can do is hold your palms out till your hands are full of it, and rub, and rub, and accomplish nothing at all.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“I want a book that acknowledges that life goes on but that death goes on, too, that a person who is dead is a long, long story. You move on from it, but the death will never disappear from view. Your friends may say, Time heals all wounds. No, it doesn’t, but eventually you’ll feel better. You’ll be yourself again.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“This is the happiest story in the world with the saddest ending.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“At that moment I felt so ruined by life that I couldn’t imagine it ever getting worse, which just shows that my sense of humor was slightly more durable than my imagination.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

“I couldn’t tell whether amazing meant she was amazed at her own psychic abilities, or the nature of the coincidences, or the ability of a desperate mind to find meaning in a random assortment of visuals.”
― Elizabeth McCracken, An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination