What She Knew Quotes

“In the eyes of others, we’re often not who we imagine ourselves to be.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“But here's the thing; none of us deserve anything. That's an illusion we all exist under”
― Gilly Macmillan, Burnt Paper Sky

“This is what a total breakdown must be, I though. You find yourself standing somewhere you should't be, doing something so out of character that you wonder if you've become someone else entirely. You've lost the plot, taken a wrong turning, jumped into a train whose destination is total lunacy”
― Gilly Macmillan, Burnt Paper Sky

“Trust is like that. Once you lose it, you begin to adjust your attitudes toward people, you put up guards, and filter the information you want them to know.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“Seize the day - be brave - be independent - be thoughtful - don't be scared to make mistakes - keep learning - all those things, all the time”
― Gilly Macmillan, Burnt Paper Sky

“In the eyes of others, we're often not who we imagine ourselves to be.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“None of us deserve anything. That's an illusion we all exist under.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“Really, I’ve never understood why we haven’t thought of an English word for Schadenfreude.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“simply have been grateful for what I had. I should have celebrated my life as it was, imperfections, sadness, and all, and not forensically examined its faults. Those faults were largely in the eyes of a critical and sharp-edged society anyhow, and I had learned to recognize them by osmosis, by following the herd.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“I marveled at how the mundane activities that life demanded still needed to be done, even while the worst was happening.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“I miss her every day. I miss the months we haven’t had together and I miss the future I thought we were going to have, because without her it feels pointless, it feels, just, totally flat. Fuck! This”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“I wish now that I'd valued more the words that tumbled freely out of him before he was taken. I wish I'd collected them and kept them safely in packages that I wrapped up carefully, secured with a ribbon, and stored in a safe place for the future. I wish I hadn't been too distracted to listen to every word he said.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“life. I’ve thought about this a lot since my son, Ben, went missing, and every time I think about it, it also begs the question: if we’re not who we imagine we are, then is anybody else? If there’s so much potential for others to judge us wrongly, then how can we be sure that our assessment of them in any way resembles the real person that”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“I should have celebrated my life as it was, imperfections, sadness and all, and not forensically examined its faults. Those faults were largely in the eyes of a critical and sharp-edged society anyhow, and I had learned to recognize them by osmosis, by following the herd. I had not yet learned to use my intelligence, or to trust in my instincts. I see more clearly now, and I shall never make that mistake again.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“If someone lies to you habitually, you can't ever trust them. It erodes relationships.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“If we're not who we imagine we are, then is anybody else? If there's so much potential for others to judge us wrongly, then how can we be sure that our assessment of them in any way resembles the real person that lies underneath?”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“If you talk too openly about terrible things people shrink from you.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“There are some events and uncertainties that you take to the grave, and they threaten to tumble you every single step of the way. If”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“The news is a 24/7 monster. it devours all information and we feed it with our opinions, so we can't be shy of expressing ourselves even is we don't like the language other people use. It's called free speech”
― Gilly Macmillan, Burnt Paper Sky

“myself by blurting out things that sounded fine in my head. I don’t flounder, and then sink. This is a fantasy that can occupy long minutes of my time. The outcome is always the same: the imaginary interview goes really well, brilliantly, in fact, and the best thing about it is that the interviewer doesn’t ask me the question that I hate most of all.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“My insomnia makes a desperate, restless soul of me. There is no creativity, only hopelessness and frustration.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“Thanks,’ I managed. ‘If there’s anything I can do.’ ‘OK. Thanks.’ ‘John’s asked me to go back home, in case he turns up there.’ ‘OK. Good idea.’ It was awkward and strange. There’s no protocol for meeting your ex-husband’s new wife at the site where your son’s gone missing. ‘Well,”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“John couldn’t stand the waiting. He wanted to do something, so he spent most of the night driving around, circling the woods, following the routes back into Bristol, just in case. Each time he returned, he sat in my car and asked me to go over what had happened. ‘I’ve told you,’ I said, when he asked for the third time.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“Instead, I count my blessings every day for my blemished, damaged family, which is full of love, and that is fine, and that is all we need and all Ben needs to know.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“What I know now is that even after the divorce I should simply have been grateful for what I had. I should have celebrated my life as it was, imperfections, sadness, and all, and not forensically examined its faults. Those faults were largely in the eyes of a critical and sharp-edged society anyhow, and I had learned to recognize them by osmosis, by following the herd.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“He has such musicality, darling. There were mistakes, he must find discipline, but the musicality, this is a gift.” And my heart lurched because when I’m able to see through the blackness this is what I hope for. It’s that, in spite of his problems, Ben might be learning to live again, and that he might still have that capacity to find things that can drive him onward: that the beauty of music, or of a painting in the Bristol Museum, or of his connection with his baby sister, or of any damn thing he likes, can occasionally eradicate the blackness, and make it a life worth living.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“The way she said his name, the tenderness in those two words, the loss, told me that it was Charlie who she mourned above all.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“Our friendship didn’t survive. Some things are too big for other people to bear.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“What interests me now is that it might have been the betrayal of convention I felt most keenly, because in some way I felt I was owed the life we had together, and that I didn’t deserve the public humiliation of him leaving me for another woman. But here’s the thing: none of us deserve anything. That’s an illusion we all exist under.”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew

“the only life is a shadowy turbulence at the periphery of my vision, a fox perhaps,”
― Gilly Macmillan, What She Knew