We're all in the gutter.

He got up and stretched, which made all his muscles shift, t-shirt riding up to show a faint trickle of hair on his belly. I looked down at the frayed hem of my jeans because I just knew he was smiling at me. One of those smiles that made me want to touch the corners of his mouth.

And suddenly I got what the big deal was about kissing. How someone could suck on your bottom lip and make you come completely undone. That someone stroking the hair back from your face could make you swoon and someone sliding his hands underneath your top could make you feel wanted for the first time in your life.

She wanted to tell someone, "I am going to be a new person", and to have them answer, "Yes. Yes, of course you are."

Every once in a while you find ten dollars in your faded jeans and your hair falls into place.

Being single used to mean that nobody wanted you. Now it means you're pretty, sexy, & you're taking your time deciding how you want your life to be & who you want to spend it with.

I don't understand how a woman can leave the house without fixing herself up a little - if only out of politeness. And then, you never know, maybe that's the day she has a date with destiny. And it's best to be as pretty as possible for destiny.

And I flipped on the light switch and eyed myself in the mirror. I was pretty, I guess. I had long brown hair and bright blue eyes, full pink lips and a rosy complexion. I had designer bags and an off beat style you could only find in the fashion magazines. And I wondered if that was all people could see. If you looked deeper there was so much more to me. I had a story to tell. We all did. You just had to look deeper, and you had to ask. We just never took the time to.

I hate how people are always telling me, "everything will be fine, just be yourself" because then I find myself asking, "but what if I don't like who I am right now?"

She knew that medically-speaking, you couldn’t die because of an emotionally broken heart, but she also knew that you certainly couldn’t live with one.

When you need to be forgiven or forgotten, New York is the ideal place. Nobody cares if you stole licorice from the dollar store in seventh grade. It won’t phase your reputation when you’re nineteen. The man in the library who sees you looking at naughty books won’t gossip about you to his co workers. Your mother will never find out. In New York City you are permanently a face in the crowd. Your memory is washed off a stranger when they step into the shower that night. I needed New York.

There's one thing a quote does that nothing and no one else can do, it can become a part of you. You may never meet the person who said it but that person is now a companion. Quotes help you get over pain, feel love, make you smile and laugh, and help you through those days when you think no one else knows what you're going through.

People in France have a phrase: “spirit of the stairway”. In french: "spirit d’escalier". It means that moment when you find the answer but it’s too late. Say you’re at a party & someone insults you. You have to say something. So, under pressure, with everybody watching, you say something lame. But the moment you leave the party, as you start down the stairway -- magic! You come up with the perfect thing you should’ve said. The perfect crippling put-down.

When I say something he can’t quite hear, he says, “I’m sorry, sweetheart?” & the word sweetheart sounds so tender it soothes some raw part of me, & I find myself whispering so I can hear it again.

Kim & I got a lecture about behavior & how if we wanted boys to be gentlemen we should act like ladies, which was idiotic because we didn't want the boys to be gentlemen. We wanted them to think we were pretty & ask us to dance & hold our hands & maybe kiss us in the corner & then send us clever instant messages.

Why does it seem like there are always more girls than boys in these situations? Girls are always having to dance with each other, or they like the same boy, or they went out with the same boy. Just once I'd like to see a situation where there we too many boys.

He kissed me, then. Really put his arms around me & kissed me. It went through my body like he had flipped some electrical switch & lit me up. His skin was so warm, and he was suddenly so beautiful, & I thought, oh, so this is what all the hype is about.

There are some dreams that get stuck between your teeth when you sleep, so that when you open your mouth to yawn awake they fly right out of you.

Everyone has at least five dreams every night. That's like 30 billion dreams. One of them's gotta be about me.

-"Is she your girlfriend?"
--"No."
-"But you want her to be?"
--"You're about this close to knowing pain you've never known before."

We’re all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

I thought I had it all figured out. I'd catch the fish only to throw it back in the sea. Because I wanted something until I could actually have it. And I'd run scared. But, it seems to me, that maybe, I want something and when I finally get it, I don't know what to do with it & I run confused.

For she had adopted the standard of the young: what there was in the moment was everything & moments followed one another without necessarily belonging to one another.

There's nothing like being with people you've known almost your entire life. Having a shared history is something you just can't create with the new ones.

Sometimes you just have to put one foot in front of the other even though you don't know where you're going.

"Kiss me somewhere new."

There was that inevitable moment when a person realizes that they are completely and utterly hopeless. Like a night that lasted forever up until the moment you held hands, when, upon that action, time simply stopped. To be so young and in love. But maybe this isn't love at all. You've got university pamphlets that litter your floor--a collage of colleges. You've got half a tank of gas and half a mind to see him but no energy to drain either source. You don't miss one boy, you miss millions, even the ones you've never known. Because they could have all been something to you, and you could have been good for each of them. Yet, you continue to subject yourself to meaningless make-out sessions in elevators or bedrooms or the backs of cars. When you say, "Kiss me somewhere new", you never meant the backs of your knees. You meant kiss you somewhere even God can't find--on a highway where we're alone for miles and miles and miles. There are always highways in one's relationships, whether it be Route 66 or the window across the yard. Bittersweet seventeen and there are all these things in front of you, but suddenly, Miss Independent is wondering what it'd be like to have someone to share it all with. You had one taste of love and you're hooked, like some alcoholic. Whatever happened to your wild streak? Falling in love is such a wild thing to do, like when you're a little girl and you'd jump off the roof--if you jumped high enough, it was only natural you'd fly. Only natural... don't rush it, baby girl. All these things in front of you won't wait forever and soon you'll forget these boys' names, like you've already forgotten the taste of their kisses. It seems, to me, that triviality and romance go hand in hand."

Catch the hopeless

She caught the hopeless when she watched them on a Tuesday afternoon, waiting for her bus in the school yard. She watched them hold hands and held herself. She started to cry, because she'd be 15 soon and all she could make of love was a paper fortune teller with 1's, 2's and 3's and yellow and orange and pink. She watched their legs, the shades of the denim pressing together, the tan of his arms on the light pink of hers. She watched their foreheads touch and the headache began. She knew what it meant to catch the hopeless, and to think about nothing but love.

He caught the hopeless between the sides of the stall in the boys' locker room. He put out his cigarette and zipped up his pants. He started to cry, a little, a little... just to cure the thirst of his eyes that lingered from watching all the pretty girls. He'd be 16 soon, and he was losing his head. All he could make of love was a few pick-up lines, the backseat of a pick-up truck and some pick-me-up drinks. His elbows hit the tiled wall and he looked up at the lights. They weren't what made the bathroom hot. He knew what it meant to catch the hopeless, and to think about nothing but love.

It comes sometimes like little hearts, and sometimes like rain in the morning. It comes sometimes like little knives, and sometimes without any warning. To catch the hopeless is to want it either way: to just want to be someone in love."

His answer was "I do."

"His hello was the end of her endings, her laugh was their first step down the aisle. His hand would be hers to hold forever, his forever was as simple as her smile. He said she was what was missing, she said instantly she knew. She was a question to be answered, and his answer was I do."
--'Sex And The City'

I dreamed of a wedding. Elaborate elegance. A church filled with flowers and friends. I asked him what kind of wedding he wished for, and he replied, "one that would make you my wife."

Maybe we should all decide we're going to meet the man of our dreams when we're thirty-seven. Then we'll stop squeezing into tight shirts and walking around half-naked and analyzing every encounter as future husband material. We'll stop feeling the need to put on makeup to take out the trash just in case he's walking by. Maybe we should just assume that we'll meet our dream man at some future point, and stop driving ourselves crazy before then.

Life hands you lemons...

Michelangelo said the best way to judge the essential elements of a sculpture is to throw it down a hill and the unimportant pieces will break away. Sometimes life is like that. It tosses us down a hill. But when we reach the bottom and only the important things are left, that's when our vision clears. That's when we hold on tight to what we know, while hope stirs inside us. It's all a matter of perspective.

"You know that feeling when you wake up in the morning and you're excited for the day? I haven't felt that for awhile. That's one of the main goals in life."
--Kirsten Dunst

Life and death, energy and peace. If I stop today it was still worth it. Even the terrible mistakes that I made and would have unmade if I could. The pains that have burned me and scarred my soul, it was worth it, for having been allowed to walk where I've walked, which was to hell on earth, heaven on earth, back again, into, under, far in between, through it, and above.

I don't think we're ever ready for anything. Sometimes life hands you lemons when you'd rather have oranges, and you're just expected to make lemonade.

Nothing sucks worse than feeling alone.

Many things lost, but much gained. You never know what you had until it's gone, and you never know what you really want until you're alone. I haven't really changed, but I'm not the same person. Being alone either makes you get wiser or just insane, but maybe I'm both?

"Because nothing sucks worse than feeling alone, no matter how many people are around."
--'Scrubs'

What I want is to be needed. What I need is to be indispensable to somebody. Who I need is somebody that will eat up all my free time, my ego, my attention. A mutual addiction.

New York City is the type of environment that reminds you of how human you are. The type of place that lets you hurt anonymously. If a stranger passes and sees you crying alone at your restaurant table, they keep walking. They may exchange a glance with their date, or raise their eyebrows in pity, but they don’t care enough to stop and ask you why or how you are. I needed New York.

It seems that every relationship produces its share of disappointments, insecurity, and pain. Anyone who has never been hurt, is either very lucky or very lonely.

The most important thing in life is your family.

If you don't know your family's history, then you don't know anything. You are a leaf that doesn't know it is part of a tree.

My family is really boring. They have a coffee table book called 'Pictures We Took Just to Use Up the Rest of the Film.'

The most important thing in life is your family. There are days you love them, and others you don't, but in the end they're the people you always come home to. Sometimes it's the family you're born into and sometimes it's the one you make for yourself.

Home is where you can say anything you like 'cause nobody listens to you anyway.

I’m so homesick now for someone that I never knew. I’m so homesick now for someplace I will never be.

Love is your first foot in the grave.

"He started calling me sweetheart. Whenever he calls me sweetheart, I get thrown off balance. It makes me think that when other people call me 'baby', they don't really mean it. I think that this is love."
--Mian Mian, 'Candy'

"They used to bury women in their wedding dresses, you know. I thought it was because all those husbands were too cheap to spring for another gown, but now it makes sense: love is your first foot in the grave."
--Peter Craig, 'Hot Plastic'

"Ninety-percent of a women's pheromones come out the top of her head. That's why women are shorter. So that men will fall in love when they hug them."
--Phoebe, 'Friends'

I am no one of great consequence, but I love you.

You fill out job application after job application. Sometimes they don't even bother to call you. Sometimes they'll interview you and then you don't hear from them again. You either go back, call, fill out another application, or try else where. But you keep going because you need the money. Why isn't it like that with relationships? Don't you need the love?

You know that feeling right before you sneeze? And you just want it to come out? You stop whatever it is you're doing until it does. Well, sometimes, I'm about to sneeze out "I love you."

He actually said something real. "Love is like a whore, it sucks." I couldn't believe it. But, I smiled sweetly and replied, "life is like the wind, it blows." And for the first time, we both understood each other.

I’d imagine sitting beside the man of my dreams and feeling all was right with the world. I knew now what I’d been missing all these years.

Hope for the best, or just expect the worst.

"Does a hero know she’s a hero if no one tells her? Do you know a hero no one else knows? A hero doesn’t have to save a busload of kids from certain disaster. Or score the winning point in the big game. A hero can be anyone who inspires you, anyone you look up to, anyone who cheers you on, makes you better than you were before ; just as they made themselves better than they were before. Do you know a hero? Tell her. Then tell everyone."
--Nike Ad

Everyone has their weak spot. The one thing that, despite your best efforts, will always bring you to your knees, regardless of how strong you are otherwise.

The point is there's no way to be a hundred percent sure about anything or anyone. So you're left with a choice. Either hope for the best, or just expect the worst.

But sometimes, we just have to be happy with what people can offer us. Even if it's not what we want, at least it's something, you know?

It's pretty rare to find someone you actually like to be with in this world. There are a lot of annoying people out there.

I hate that time before you go to sleep at night because that's when all the thoughts you've been trying to avoid all day start to linger in your mind.

I've had good days and bad days and going half mad days.

Just because today is a terrible day doesn't mean tomorrow might not be the best day of your entire life. You just have to wake up and get there.

"If A is success in life, then A equals X plus Y plus Z. Work is X, Y is play and Z is keeping your mouth shut."
--Albert Einstein

"I'm afraid I can't explain myself, sir. Because I'm not myself, you know."
--'Alice in Wonderland'

And people do things every day they know will kill them, but that doesn't mean they want to die.

God loves you just the way you are, but he loves you too much to let you stay that way.

Would you like fries with that?

"Have you ever seen the deer heads on the walls of bars, the ones wearing party hats, sunglasses and streamers? I feel sorry for them because obviously they were at a party having a good time..."

--Ellen DeGeneres

"Did you know babies are nauseated by the smell of a clean shirt?"

--Jeff Foxxworthy

"Garbagemen come at 5 a.m. Why? They're picking up garbage. It's not going to go bad again."

--Dave Attell

"LEGO has announced that they are shutting down thier U.S. factory and moving it to Mexico. LEGO employees say it's their fault because they made the factory too easy to take apart and rebuild somwhere else."

--Conan O'Brien

"You know, marriage is making a big comeback. I know personally that in Hollywood people are marrying people they never married before."

--Bob Hope

"I went to McDonald's yesterday and said, "I'd like some fries." The girl at the counter said, 'Would you like fries with that?'"

--Jay Leno

"I constantly walk into a room and I don't remember why. But for some reason, I think there's going to be a clue in the fridge."

--Caroline Rhea

"You know, you get that tattoo of barbed wire when you're 18. By the time you're 80, it's a picket fence."

--Robin Williams

"My problem is I belong to so many anonymous groups, everybody knows who I am."

--Nancy Redman

"If carrots are so good for your eyesight, how come I see so many dead rabbits on the highway?"

--Richard Jeni

"Did you know that Americans spent $48 million on lottery tickets last year? 'What are you doing for your retirement?' 'Uh.. Powerball.'"

--Wanda Sykes

"Women don't want to hear what you think. Women want to hear what they think - in a deeper voice."

--Bill Cosby

"Gay people invented sports. Think about it. Boxing: two topless men... in silk shorts... fighting over a belt."

--Ant

"About a month ago, I got a cactus. And a week later, it died. I got really depressed because it was like, Damn, I am less nurturing than a desert."

--Demetri Martin

"I called a discount exterminator. A guy came by with a rolled up magazine."

--Will Shriner

"Don't touch that dial. And, if your tv has a dial, go buy a new one."

--Stephen Colbert

"When I was in London, I went to buy some chocolates. The cashier was like, 'That will be ten pounds.' and I'm like, 'Rub it in, why don't you?'"

--Carol Leifer

We shall get there someday.

All quotes from 'Winnie The Pooh'

"You seem so sad, Eeyore."

"Sad? Why should I be sad? It's my birthday... the happiest day of the year."

"Your birthday?" said Pooh in great surprise.

"Of course it is, can't you see? Look at all the presents I've had." He waved a foot from side to side. "Look at the birthday cake, candles, and pink sugar."

Pooh looked, first to the right and then to the left.

"Presents? said Pooh. "Birthday cake?" said Pooh. "Where?"

"Can't you see them?"

"No," said Pooh.

"Neither can I," said Eeyore. "Joke," he explained. "Ha. ha." 

"If the person you are talking to doesn't appear to be listening, be patient. It may simply be that he has a small piece of fluff in his ear."

"People who don't think probably don't have brains. Rather, they have gray fluff that's blown into their heads by mistake."

"Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day."

"Some people care too much, I think it's called love."

"You can't stay in your corner of the forest, waiting for others to come to you; you have to go to them sometimes."

"A day without a friend is like a pot without a single drop of honey left inside."

"It is more fun to talk with someone who doesn't use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like 'What about lunch?'"

"Sometimes, if you stand on the bottom rail of a bridge and lean over to watch the river slipping slowly away beneath you, you will suddenly know everything there is to be known."

"Promise me you'll never forget me, because if I thought you would I'd never leave."

"They're funny things: accidents. You never have them 'til you're having them."

--Eeyore

"When late morning rolls around and you're feeling a bit out of sorts, don't worry. You're probably just a little eleven o'clockish."

"It's snowing still," said Eeyore gloomily.

"So it is."

"And freezing."

"Is it?"

"Yes," said Eeyore. "However," he said, brightening a little, "we haven't had an earthquake lately."

"Nobody can be uncheered with a balloon."

Tigger: That icky, sticky stuff is only fit for heffalumps and woozles.
Pooh: You mean elephants and weasels.
Tigger: That's what I said, heffalumps and woozles.

Pooh: Good morning, Christopher Robin. 

Christopher Robin: Oh, good morning, Winnie the Pooh.
Eeyore: If it is a good morning, which I doubt.

"When you wake up in the morning, Pooh," said Piglet at last, "what's the first thing you say to yourself?"

"What's for breakfast?" said Pooh. "What do you say, Piglet?"

"I say, I wonder what's going to happen exciting today?" said Piglet.

Pooh nodded thoughtfully. "It's the same thing" he said.

Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind. "Pooh," he whispered.

"Yes, Piglet?" 

"Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw. "I just wanted to be sure of you."

We're all a little weird.

All quotes from 'Boy Meets World'

"We're all a little weird, and when we find those people whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall into mutually satisfying weirdness & we call them our best friends."

Eric: I have a question that I'm going to need a yes or no answer to. How many people get into Yale each year?

Mr. Feeny: No.

"Ever since I was young I never understood anything about the world and anything that happened in my life. The only thing that ever made sense to me was you, and how I felt about you. That's all I've ever known, and that's enough. That's enough for me for the rest of my life."

Cory: It's an interesting feeling, you know?

Shawn: What, knowing it's over?

Cory: No, being the only guy in the world who knows it's not.

Cory: I just broke up with someone I spent my entire life with. I don't have a heart anymore. I've lost my life.

Topanga: Cory, I love you.

Cory: I was hoping you did.

Shawn: [yelling] If I was only gonna be alive for one minute, I’d spend it looking into your eyes.

Angela: And if you were only gonna be alive for one minute, I'd tell you to stop looking and to start kissing.

"Somehow time goes by and what you had just goes away."

Shawn: All my life, I have felt like there was some part of me missing and I felt that everyone could tell, like there was some hole in me and everyone could see through it... like I wasn’t finished or something.

Shawn: Okay, it’s been raining for seven days, how do you explain that?

Cory: Warm air meets low pressure system?

Shawn: Wrong! It’s raining because God is crying and He’s crying because He created you and Topanga to be the role model of the perfect couple for the entire universe!

Cory: Don’t risk anything you aren’t willing to lose.

Mr. Feeny: I didn’t teach you that.

Cory: It’s just something I picked up along the way.

Rachel: You take your middle name and the name of the street you live on. Then you have your spy name. My name is Kimberly Beaumont.

Eric: I'm Jonathan Cumberland.

Jack: Eric, your middle name is Randall.

Eric: Jonathan Cumberland.

Jack: Did you even listen to the rules?

Eric: ...Who is Jonathan Cumberland?

Jack: All right. Good job.

Shawn: I'm Patrick... Trailer Park.

Angela: Get this... my spy name is Sha-Nay-Nay Martin Luther King Boulevard.

[silence]

Angela: I really gotta get some black friends.

Jack: What's your spy name, Topanga?

Topanga: I don't wanna play. My middle name is silly.

Jack: Your first name is Topanga. What could your middle name possibly be? Schmooboogie?

Cory: You are going to learn something from life every day. And make mistakes. And you'll make good friends and Mr. Feeny will probably teach you every grade you're ever in. And maybe someday you'll fall in love with a woman as wonderful as Topanga. How would you like that?

Joshua Matthews: Yeah.

Cory: And be lucky enough to make a good friend as Shawn. How'd you like that?

Joshua Matthews: Good.

Cory: And when you're not a little boy anymore, when the world has taught you how to be a man, then you'll still make mistakes. But your family, and all those good friends you've made along the way, will help you. And even though you'll think the world has gone out of its way to teach you all the tough lessons, you'll realize that it's the same world that's given you your family and those friends. You'll come to believe that no matter what happens, somehow the world will protect you, too. "Boy Meets World." Now I get it.

"You do your thing, I'll do mine. You go your way, I'll go mine. And if we end up together, it's beautiful."

Cory: Mom, Listen, I haven't been together with Topanga for twenty-two years, but we have been together for sixteen. That's a lot longer than most couples have been together. I mean, when we were born, you told me that we used to take walks in our strollers together in the park. When we were two, we were best friends, I mean, I, I knew everything about this girl. I knew her favorite color. I knew her favorite food. Then we became six, you know, and Eric made fun of me because it wasn't cool to have a best friend that was a girl or even know a girl, so for the next seven years I threw dirt at her. I like to call those "the lost years". Then when I was thirteen, Mom, she put me up against my locker and she kissed me. I mean, she gave me my first kiss. She taught me how to dance. She was always talking about these crazy things and I never understood a word she said. All I understood was that she was the girl I sat up every night thinking about, and when I'm with her I feel happy to be alive. Like I can do anything. Even talk to you like this. So that's, that's what I feel is love.

Eric: So I said to myself, "Kyle..." 

Alan: Kyle?

Eric: That's what I call myself.

Caterer: Quiche? 

Eric: Don't mind if I do. [kisses her] 

Shawn: Well, love is the most rare and precious thing in the whole world. 

Topanga: Have you ever fallen in love? 

Shawn: About five times a day. 

Cory: Sometimes I can't hold my breath long enough to get down to where Mr. Feeny likes to swim. 

Cory: Someday, Topanga's going to be a mother, and I'm going to be the father. Or, the uncle. Or, the way I'm going, the guy down the street with the binoculars.

"Lose one friend, lose all friends, lose yourself."

Topanga: I will never forget you. You were more of a father to me than my own dad.
Shawn: You never gave up on me. Never once. I’m not gonna forget you. You’re the best person I know.
Eric: I don’t know what’s gonna happen to me. But I do know that I’m gonna be a good person who cares about people. I blame you for that.
Cory: Well, I got Topanga to go to New York.
Mr. Feeny: Good for you.
Cory: She’s not even scared anymore.
Mr. Feeny: Nor should she be.
Cory: I am.
Mr. Feeny: Well, you have a right to be.
Cory: You coming with us? You gonna follow us? You gonna sneak up on us in Central Park or something?
Mr. Feeny: No, Mr. Matthews. I shall remain here.
Cory: No. You’ll always be with us… as long as we live.
Mr. Feeny: I love you all. Class dismissed.

Could I kiss you and make you a queen?

All lyrics by 'Augustana'

There you were in your black dress

Moving slow to the sadness

I could watch you dance for hours

I could take you by my side

--Fire

We're passing the time

We're breaking apart

We're damned at the end

We're damned at the start

Blame it on the roses

Blame it on the red

Running out of time

Running out of breath

--Hey Now

Back and forth and side to side

Right ain't wrong if wrong ain't right

I will love you day and night

--I Still Ain't Over You

Climb up a mountain, just to watch it come down

But sooner or later babe, you're gonna need me around

'Cause you're getting older, there ain't no stopping that

It's a backstabbing world honey, just lean your head back

--Meet Me There Someday

Six in the morning, never felt so sweet

Just put on Lucinda baby, and dance with me

I know I'm hard to count on

Forget half what I'm told

You probably only know my voice from

A goddamn microphone

--Meet Me There Someday

Breaking up with your breakdown

Standing tall in your white gown

You're going nowhere, you're going fast

Slowin' down, but it never lasts

Take your time

--Rest, Shame, Love

It's the wrong dream, with the wrong man

With a cold gun, in your own hand

Get it right this time, get it off your mind

Let the summer rain bring you rest and shame and love

--Rest, Shame, Love

If you can't love babe, then you can't hurt

You take the good times, with the worst

--Rest, Shame, Love

Could I kiss you and make you a queen? 

Or something in between

--Twenty Years

Move to New York City 

Take your woman by the hand 

Leave her there with her things on the doorstep 

And there's no way around it 

Could this be our last dance? 

So fall asleep with the TV, darling 

I'll be back again 

--Twenty Years

You're all alone, and you can't take it

You're just too tired to suffocate it

And all along we'll just fake it

--Where Love Went Wrong

Hold me down, sweet and low, little girl 

Hold me down, sweet and low, and I'll carry you home

--Sweet And Low

When she's sleeping on the sofa

When she's laying in her Sunday best

When she's turning over Friday

I could swear I'm sleeping less and less

When the ocean's getting warmer

And California's on her mind

Los Angeles is tired, but we always seem to feel alright

--Sunday Best

Jack and coke, please take off your coat
Come and dance, shuffle with a glance
Come and smile, please stay here awhile
--Bullets

She's shaking in the car with a gun in her hands
Falling over love and the sweet romance
And I ain't never thought it could come down to this
A bullet in my head with the sweetest kiss
--Bullets

'Cause it's 5 o'clock, the hour stops the sunlight
The buildings shade the masquerade and kill time
Here we're nothin' more than fools and whores and sad highs
Through the summer sand, we're living in a wasteland
--Wasteland

She said I think I'll go to Boston, I think I'll start a new life
I think I'll start it over, where no one knows my name
I'll get out of California, I'm tired of the weather
I think I'll get a lover and fly 'em out to Spain
I think I'll go to Boston, I think that I'm just tired
I think I need a new town, to leave this all behind
I think I need a sunrise, I'm tired of the sunset
I hear it's nice in the Summer, some snow would be nice
--Boston

Your heart knows what it wants.

All quotes from 'Girls Poker Night' by Jill A. Davis

"Have you ever written your name, or see it printed somewhere, and thought it look unfamiliar? Like maybe you spelled it wrong or something?"

"I’m kind of happy with the way I turned out. I mean, things could be worse. I could be boring. Or unhappy. Or, like, I don’t know, Canadian or something."

"Every day the opportunity exists to change your life. But most days, the idea of having to change the big things in life just seems like too much work."

"I feel like a refrigerator has fallen on me and I’m pinned underneath it hoping to escape but in the meantime my life is sprinting ahead of me, assuming I’ll catch up."

"That’s what people do – they move into their new life and disassemble the old life in some ungrateful way and leave it out by the curb. Like it never served any purpose at all. Like self-preservation is some frivolous little thing."

"Might as well just fold right now. Get out before I get too far in. I just want you to know that it’s not lost on me. That I realize this game is a metaphor for my life. My friends are different, though. They all seem okay with losing. They even enjoy it – the risk taking. Secretly, they must not like it, though, right? I mean, how could anyone enjoy that – losing? It must make them feel like, I don’t know, great big losers."

"Nothing says 'I’m a refined young lady' quite like eating popcorn directly out of a bag."

"And I’m sad that this is the kind of person I am. I am a person who will stay in a relationship for three years because I know that this relationship will never hurt me. I will park my love here because here I will never experience great joy, but more important, I will never be devastated. The dissolving of this won’t be painful at all. It will just be a formality. A formal ending to something that barely or never existed."

"It’s all about might. It might hurt. It might not work. It might be awful. I never think it might work. It might be good. It might be fun."

"Each day is a new table on which to roll the dice. Stop complaining and start rolling, people!"

"Has he been looking at me? I wouldn’t know, since I’ve been busy not looking at him."

"It’s funny how the prospect of love is so much more interesting when you don’t actually know the person you’re fabricating a fantasy life with."

"At least your heart knows what it wants. I mean, even if you are incapable of accepting happiness. At least some part of you is working toward it."

"Meg is one of my oldest friends, and we are completely different. And every so often I think maybe there’s not much point in our being friends anymore. But then she’ll do something amazing. She’ll say something that proves she knows me, really knows me. And I’m so grateful for that. It feels so good to be known, and I wonder if she ever wonders what the point of being friends with me is."

"We’re learning that the self we show to the world can be very different from the self we show to ourselves."

"And then I dreamed about you, and I thought that was really great, you showing up in my dreams like that. Unexpected, you know. So thanks for doing that. For showing up."

"He’s one of those guys, you know, who women go nuts for. It’s like his mother ignored him and now he has to make all women love him or something."

"We didn’t meet for coffee to talk about movies or to be together. We were having coffee so I could be told, without actually being told, that this is how it would be. We would never mention the kiss. We will pretend it never happened. Instead, we will talk about movies and condiments and all sorts of other things that don’t matter at all."

"I can’t speak. I am physically unable. I can’t fight. I can’t defend or explain myself. I thought these were my friends. I thought I didn’t have to work at keeping these people as friends. I thought they’d always be my friends. But nothing is ever straightforward. And there’s no such thing as forever. No matter how well you kid yourself. The truth is, you don’t know anyone."

"I’ve always avoided fights. I make jokes instead. I tell people what they want to hear in order to avoid a confrontation. I pretend to want things I don’t want, and I pretend not to want things I do want. No one gets hurt. Except me. The lines are so crossed and blurred at this point that I don’t know what I want. I just know I want it to be easy."

"I’m holding him up to a standard that no one can actually live up to."

"I’ve never picked anyone up. I don’t know how to pick up guys. I usually just camouflage myself as this wonderful person and let them come to me. It’s easier that way."

"But what I see is that everyone keeps changing, evolving, except for me. I lack courage. Not the kind of courage it takes to rescue a person from a burning building. Not adrenaline courage. But everyday courage, the kind that, once it’s added up, day after day, equals a happy life."

"I know exactly what I don’t want but very little about what I do want."

"'This is when your supposed to read the tabloids,' I said. 'This is when you get to read those tiny horoscope books. Or the miniature catbooks. Or look in the cart of the guy behind us and judge him on his purchases. Let's make him feel really good about the paper towels he's about to buy, and really bad about the make-your-own-taco kit.'"

"Imagine settling for a life you can have because you don't have the courage to go after the life you really want."

"I don’t have a clue where we’re going. But I keep walking anyway."

We are all on the brink.

All quotes from 'The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath'

"There is so much hurt in this game of searching for a mate, of testing, trying & you realize suddenly that you forgot it was a game, & turn away in tears."

"How we need that security! How we need another soul to cling to, another body to keep us warm. To rest & trust; to give your soul in confidence: I need this, I need someone to pour myself into. Maybe I do need a man. One sure thing, I haven’t met him yet."

"If I didn’t think, I’d be much happier; if I didn’t have any sex organs, I wouldn’t waver on the brink of nervous emotions & tears all the time."

"If only I can find him… the man who will be intelligent, yet physically magnetic & personable. If I can offer that combination, why shouldn’t I expect it in a man?"

"From now on when a boy starts telling me about his lost loves, I am going to run in the opposite direction screaming loudly."

"There is so much, & I am torn in different directions, pulled thin, taut against horizons too distant for me to reach."

"I know I am capable of getting good marks: I know I am capable of attracting males. All I need to do is keep my judgment, a sense of balance & philosophic sense of humor, & I’ll be fine, no matter what happens. If character is fate, I sure am adjusting mine under my lucky star."

"I have to exercise my memory in little feats just so I can stay in this damn wonderful place which I love & hate with all my heart."

"Now I am living on the edge. We all are on the brink."

A beautiful gasoline rainbow

All quotes from 'The Lovely Bones' by Alice Sebold

"I had rescued the moment by using my camera & in that way had found a way to stop time & hold it. No one could take that image away from me because I owned it."

"It was better to look like you were doing something when you stared into the distance, she had learned. Otherwise it was likely that strange men would come over & try to talk to you."

"Sometimes you cry, even when someone you love has been gone a long time."

"She now knew that being a mother was a calling, something plenty of young girls dreams of being."

"For both of us it was about getting lost. She got lost in her story, I got lost in her talk."

"Our only kiss was like an accident -- a beautiful gasoline rainbow."

"'A father’s suspicion…' she began 'is as powerful as a mother’s intuition.'"

"'How to commit the perfect murder' was an old game in heaven, I always chose the icicle: the weapon melts away."

"It always dissolved into giggles no matter the start."

Nobody's life is filled with perfect little moments.

All quotes from 'P.S. I Love You' by Cecelia Ahern

"She wished she hadn’t drunk so much, but with all the talk of weddings & husbands & happiness, she had needed all the wine in the bar to prevent her from screaming at everyone to shut up."

"What a luxury it was for people to be able to hold their loved ones whenever they wanted."

"'Are you okay?' Every time someone asks me that question, I say, ‘I’m fine, thank you,’ but to be honest, I’m not. Do people really want to know how you feel when they ask how are you? Or are they just trying to be polite? The next time the woman across the road from my house says to me, ‘How are you?’ I’m going to say to her, ‘Well, actually I’m not very well at all, thank you. I’m feeling a bit depressed & lonely, pissed off at the world. Envious of you & your perfect little family but not particularly envious of your husband for having to live with you’ & then I’ll tell her about how I started a new job & met lots of new people & how I’m trying hard to pick myself up but that I’m not at a loss about what to do. Then I’ll tell her how it pisses me off when everyone says time is a healer when at the same time they also say absence makes the heart grow fonder, which really confuses me, because that means that the longer he’s gone the more I want him. I’ll tell her that nothing is healing at all & that every morning I wake up in my empty bed it feels like salt is being rubbed into those unhealing wounds. & then I’ll tell her about how much I miss my husband & about how worthless my life seems without him, & I’ll explain how I feel like I’m just waiting for my world to end so that I can join him. She’ll probably say, ‘Oh that’s good,’ like she always does, kiss her husband goodbye, hop into her car & drop her kids at school, go to work, make the dinner & eat the dinner, & go to bed with her husband. And she’ll have it all done while I’m still trying to decide what color shirt to wear to work."

"If only every minute of my life were filled with perfect little moments like this, I would never moan again."

"Nobody’s life is filled with perfect little moments & if it were, they wouldn’t be perfect little moments. They would just be normal. How would you ever know happiness if you never experienced downs?"

"She couldn’t seem to let go. She couldn’t let go because she didn’t want to let go, & she didn’t want to let go because he was all she had, but she didn’t really have him, so she felt lost & confused."

"Just as soon as she was getting around to picking up the pieces of her shattered life, she dropped them all again & sent them shattering."

"She tried to find a routine she could happily fall into so that she felt like she belonged in her body & her body belonged in this life, instead of wandering around like a zombie watching everybody else live theirs while she waited around for hers to end."

"She wished all her memories could be of the good times, but the bad times kept coming back to haunt her. They had all been such a waste of time."

"She knew that people said that one day she would be happy again & that this feeling would just be a distant memory. It was getting to that day that was the hard part."

"She needed to stop living her life in her head, remembering old memories & dreaming impossible dreams. It would never get her anywhere."

"She wanted to feel happy for her friends, really she did, but she couldn’t shake off the feeling of being left behind. Everyone else’s lives were moving on except hers."

"She was jealous of them & their good fortune. She was angry with them for moving on without her. Even in the company of friends she felt alone; in a room of a thousand people she would feel alone, but mostly when she roamed the rooms of her quiet house she felt so alone."

"Memories were fine, but you couldn’t touch them, smell them or hold them. They were never exactly as the moment had been, & they faded with time."

"There is absolutely nothing wrong with returning to the house you grew up in every now & then. It’s good for the soul."

"I just have to do something that I really don’t want to do, but I kind of want to do it, which makes me not want to do it even more because it seems so wrong even though it’s right."

"She stopped at every single set of traffic lights she met, & all she wanted to do was go home & throw a tantrum in the privacy of her own home."

"There was no better laxative than fear."

You deserve a fucking phone call.

All quotes from 'He's Just Not That Into You' and 'It's Called A Break-Up Because It's Broken' by Greg Behrendt & Liz Tuccillo

"He's just not that into you if he's not asking you out. Because if he likes you, trust me, he will ask you out. So don't let him trick you into asking him out. When men want you, they do the work. I know it sounds old school, but when men like women, they ask them out."

"If men want you, they will find you. If you don't think you gave him enough time to notice you, take the time it took you to notice him and divide it by half."

"When it comes to men, deal with them as they are, not how you'd like them to be."

"An excuse is a polite rejection. Men are not afraid of 'ruining the friendship.'"

"If you can find him, then he can find you. If he wants to find you, he will."

"If he's not calling you, it's because you are not on his mind. Period."

"Men don't forget how much they like you. So put down the phone."

"You are good enough to be asked out."

"If he creates expectations for you, and then doesn't follow through on little things, he will do the same for big things. Be aware of this and realize he's okay with disappointing you. Don't be with someone who doesn't do what they say they're going to do."

"'Busy' is another word for 'asshole'. 'Asshole' is another word for the guy you're dating."

"You deserve a fucking phone call."

"Beware of the word 'friend'. It can often be used by men or the women that love them to excuse the most unfriendly behavior. Personally, when I'm picking friends, I like the ones who don't make me cry myself to sleep."

"Men, just like women, want to feel emotionally protected when a relationship starts to become serious. One way they do that is by laying claim to it. A man who's really into you is going to want you all to himself. And why wouldn't he, hot stuff?"

"Oh, how easy it is for you all to forget what it's about! Let me remind you: It's about the guy who wants you, calls you, makes you feel sexy and desired fully. He wants to see you more and more often because every time he sees you, he likes and then loves you more and more."

"Guys tell you how they feel even if you refuse to listen or believe them. 'I don't want to be in a serious relationship' truly means 'I don't want to be in a serious relationship with you.' Sorry."

"There's a guy out there who will want to tell everyone that he's your boyfriend. Quit goofing around and go find him."

"Your lost self-esteem may take longer to find than a new boyfriend, so prioritize accordingly."

"Let's call cheating what it is--a complete betrayal of trust."

"Bad boys are actually bad."

"Don't spend your time on and give your heart to any guy who makes you wonder about anything related to his feelings for you."

"Don't be flattered that he misses you. He should miss you. You're deeply missable. However, he's still the same person that broke up with you. Remember, the only reason he can miss you is because he's choosing, every day, NOT to be with you."

"Because here's what guys don't do if they can't live without you: They don't break up with you."

"It's not that he's so into you after a breakup. It's that he's so not into being alone."

"Just remember that the person you are getting back together with is the same person who, not long before, looked you in your beautiful face, took full stock of you and all your qualities, and told you that he was no longer in need of your company."

"Don't confuse classy with being a doormat."

"A guy says he doesn't want to be with you. Sometimes that guy realizes he's made the biggest mistake of his life. And then sometimes he doesn't. Either way, your only job is to move on with your life, and fast."

"Fine. Breakups, I've heard, are supposed to be just that. Breaks. Hard, clean breaks. No talking, no seeing, no touching... keep your hands to yourself. The relationship is over."

"There's a guy out there who's going to be really happy that you didn't get back together with your crappy ex-boyfriend."

"No answer is your answer."

"Unless he's all yours, he's still hers."

"There's lots of behavior that can be considered abusive that doesn't include being beaten about the head and neck. That includes getting yelled at, being publicly humiliated, or being made to feel fat and unattractive. It's hard to feel worthy of love when someone is going out of their way to make you feel worthless. Knowing that you're better than these relationships is a place to start. You are better than these relationships."

"Obviously I don't think people should go out with someone who is abusive to them. But there are subtle degrees of abuse. There are many shades of Mr. Wrong. And these guys that we're talking about? They're not just assholes. They can be nice, sometimes, too. And there are many days when I personally think it's better to be with someone who your friends might hate... than be alone. "

"You deserve to be with someone who is nice to you all the time (You have to be nice to them, too.)"

"There's never a reason to shout at someone unless they're in imminent danger."

"Make a space in your life for the glorious things you deserve."

"Even with all the mayonnaise in the world, you can't make chicken salad out of chicken shit."

"And you can't get over the heartbreak until you let yourself feel it."

"I was so desperate for him to love me, want me, to fight for me, that I was literaly grateful for any mere scrap of effort he put in."

"Because I'm telling you that from this great fall I've come a long way & I love my life now more than ever thought possible."

I have never danced on a bar.

All quotes from 'Something Borrowed' by Emily Giffin

"The feeling I have reminds me of New Year’s Eve, when the countdown is coming & I’m not quite sure whether to grab my camera or just live in the moment. Usually I grab the camera & later regret it when the picture doesn’t turn out. Then I feel enormously let down & think to myself that the night would have been more fun if it didn’t mean quite so much, if I weren’t forced to analyze where I’ve been & where I’m going."

"I have never danced on a bar. I wouldn’t know what to do up there besides fall."

"The only real guilt I can muster is guilt over not feeling guilty."

"Luck is buying a lottery ticket along with your Yoo-Hoo & striking it rich. Nothing about my life is lucky. It’s all about hard work, it is an uphill struggle."

"He looks good in a suit. Well, he looks good in anything, and nothing."

"He was my escape & sometimes that can feel an awful lot like love."

"I can’t even be satisfied in my dreams."

"And like a favorite old movie, sometimes the sameness in a friend is what you like the most about her."

"Songs and smells will bring you back to a moment in time more than anything else."

"It's amazing how much can be conjured with a few notes of a song or a solitary whiff of a room. A song you didn’t even pay attention to at the time, a place that you didn’t even know had a particular smell."

"It is both exciting & scary, like waiting for a wave to crash over your head."

"I rinse my hair & remember something else, a memory that has not surfaced before. It is like finding a photograph of yourself that you never knew was taken."

"The subject line reads 'you.'

You are an amazing person, and I don’t know where the feelings there you give me came from. What I do know is that I am completely and utterly into you and I want time to freeze so I can be with you all the time and not have to think of anything else at all. I like, literally, everything about you, including the way your face shows everything you’re thinking and especially the way it looks when we are together and your hair is back and your eyes are closed and your lips are open just a little bit. Okay. That’s all I wanted to say. Delete this.

I am breathless, dizzy. Nobody has ever written words like this to me. I read it again, absorbing every word. I like, literally, everything about you too, I think."

I'm sort of a plain Hershey person myself.

All quotes from 'The Year The Music Changed' by Diane Thomas

"You have to make a choice, but it’s the choosing that makes it interesting & fun. That’s how I see it, anyway."

"She looked beautiful, & mysterious like a famous actress I would never under normal circumstances get to meet."

"Here’s how I see it. You, me, everybody, we each got a voice inside our heads. Whatever your voice says you want to be, that’s what you got to plan for. You got to listen to that voice & trust it."

"I'm still not convinced the voices in our heads are anything more than us talking to ourselves."

"Right then I felt the best I ever felt my entire life. I knew in the marrow of my bones I was traveling the right path."

"How fast & exciting your life must be now. Sometimes I sit still & try to imagine it, but it all just whirls around me."

"I know now that sometimes one reason for doing something can outweigh ten, or even a thousand, reasons for doing something else."

"You want to hear something really nuts? I feel more comfortable on a stage than anywhere else on earth. I'm not shy there, or frightened. Not even with all those people staring. When you're on a stage you never have to worry about what to say or what to do next, like I did that Sunday at the drugstore. It's all there in the script. Too bad real life’s not like that."

"& I knew right then exactly what I am going to do with the whole rest of my life: everything that has anything at all to do with the stage."

"If they love each other so much, why do they both look so tormented? I thought when people loved each other, life go easy."

"Speaking of candy, I have a theory that you can tell a lot about people by the candy bars they choose. People who like Milky Ways tend to be cheerleaders & football players. People who like plain Hershey bars join the debate club or write for the school paper. There are others, too. I'm sort of a plain Hershey person myself."

"My heart’s so light I might shoot right to the ceiling like a helium balloon. Stay up there all my life, my head knocking & my feet dangling down."

Her fairy tale had begun.

All quotes from 'The Bitch Posse' by Martha O'Connor

"Who cares about the future? It's just a dream, imaginary, something you make up in your head."

"He heaves a great, heavy sigh. 'I'm so sorry.' 'Sorry?' Sorry is when you bump into someone in line by mistake. Sorry is not when you fuck up someone's whole fucking life."

"I know just how he feels, aching to be loved & being disappointed. Every. Fucking. Time."

"He's uncomplicated and un-needy, and he looks good next to me, and I'm the kind of girl who needs someone next to her."

"Emotion pulls itself up from a place so deep inside her she didn't even know it existed."

"Don't ever feel like it's the end of the road. You're just turning a corner."

"Her romances are dandelion puffs; one moment of a thrill and they're gone."

"For the rest of the term they walked around holding hands, and by the end of summer she was wearing an engagement ring and her fairy tale had begun."

"You have to hurt if you want to feel anything at all."

"You know what's sick? They're blaming our problems on our friendship when that's the only good thing in any of our lives."

"We, The Bitch Posse girls, do solemnly swear to be undyingly faithful to eath other, and to put no friends or lovers before one another, as long as the stars are fixed in the heavens and the fish sparkle in the sea."

A mind is a terrible thing to waste.

All quotes from 'Prozac Nation' by Elizabeth Wurtzel

"This is it. This is the pain you've been waiting for all your life. Heartbreak straight up."

"Sometimes, I get so consumed by depression that it is hard to believe that the whole world doesn't stop & suffer with me."

"When you're happy, there's so much you can do, but when you're sad, all you can do is sit around & be miserable, paralyzed by despair."

"There are two kinds of dysfunctional families: those who don't talk enough & those who talk too much."

"He sat down beside me, turned my face around, & gave me some version of a kiss. More like he gagged me with his tongue."

"I love the apartment so much that I sometimes just want to roll around on the hardwood floors with rapt delight."

"I would have to schedule all my activities around other people. I would always leave things I enjoyed early or stay somewhere miserable late because I needed to go with my ride. I could never just run home for five minutes to change clothes or grab something the way someone with a car could, so I had to plan my days carefully."

"When I got back into bed, I laughed to myself a little bit, & then I just thought, this is crazy. What's happening to me? I've got all this energy, & not a damn thing to do with it."

"Somehow, I had this moment of truth, & I felt certain that I didn't want this, didn't want to live this life, had to get out of there right then. So I pulled my hands away from his fly, pulled my shirt back on, & started to run, but the thing was, I couldn't run anywhere. I had to call a taxi first. & I thought to myself, you know, this sucks. It sucks when you can't make a clean get-away."

"No one could ever have imagined that as a child I was completely convinced that I could do anything on earth I wanted to."

"I was an astronaut who was going to fly so high, so far beyond the moon, so far beyond the whole wide world -- but then I never had to worry about a crash landing because I never even took off."

"He asks me a lot of questions about myself & my life, & being someone who just loves to talk, especially about my problems, I think it is mostly a lot of fun."

"I had, indeed, metamorphosed into this nihilistic, unhappy girl. I felt that I was wrong. My hair was wrong, my face was wrong, my personality was wrong. My god, my choice of flavors at Haagen-Dazs shop after school was wrong!"

"Whatever the reason, somehow I found myself, the girl who was scared of drugs because a mind is a terrible thing to waste, wanting to be wasted all the time."

"At heart, I have always been a coper, I've mostly been able to walk around with my wounds safely hidden, & I've always stored up my deep depressive episodes for weeks off when there was time to have an abbreviated version of a complete breakdown. But in the end, I'd be able to get up & go on with it, could always do what little must be done to scratch by."

"I'd fall asleep in the bathtub & lie awake all night in bed."

"I know I can do so much more than this, I know that I could be a life force, could love with a heart full of soul, could feel with the power that flies men to the moon. I know that if I could just get out from under this depression, there is so much I could do besides cry in front of the TV on a Saturday night."

"And that's how it is for me with everything. Nothing is real to me unless it's right in front of me."

"Plenty of people prefer to think that until you are actually flying out of a window, you don’t have a problem."

"The tears come down, not like rain, but like blows."

"Homesickness is just a state of mind for me. I'm always missing someone or someplace or something, I'm always trying to get back to some imaginary somewhere. My life has been one long longing."

"I am the girl who needs to go home."

"We are such extensions of each other, my mother & I, so much two pieces of the same being, that everything that’s hers is mine."

"'So all I was to you was a way to have fun?' I asked. 'Yes, that’s right,' he said. 'Be careful of your heart.'"

"What I wouldn’t do just to be able to play frisbee or walk to lecture halls laughing & holding hands, being somebody’s baby."

"I felt like a girl heading out for a first date with her dream boy, creating a mental agenda of potential conversation ideas just in case, heaven forbid, there was any kind of lag."

"There were no boys & no booze to blame for this downer, so it was probably just my fate."

"I need the thing that happens when your brain shuts off & your heart turns on."

"I've got it all worked out: everything is going to be just fine."

She wanted to go home.

"I don’t cheat. Okay, sometimes I cheat at cards, but just for the hell of it. And sometimes I lie when it’s expedient. Or when a lie’s just more fun than the truth. I can be mean when it suits me, which is a lot. But I don’t kick a man when he’s down, unless I’m the one who put him down in the first place. I don’t put him down unless he deserves it. And I don’t break my word when I give it. So I’ll give you my word, I won’t cheat on you."

--Nora Roberts, 'Northern Lights

"She’d done nothing in her life to deserve him. And somehow that made it all that much more wonderful."

--Nora Roberts, 'Northern Lights'

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else -- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting.

She didn't know whether she was running away from something or running to something, but she admitted that deep in her heart she wanted to go home.

THINK OF HAPPY THINGS, it's the same as having wings.

You could patch up whatever was broken, but if you were the one who had fixed it, you’d always know in your heart where the fault lines lay.

No one looks back to the past and sees the nights that they got plenty of sleep.

Good looking people should never open their own drink or light their own cigarette.

Hemingway wrote, “This world is a good place, and it is worth fighting for.” I believe in the second part.

I would have done it sober.

We waste a lot of time running after people we could have caught, just by simply standing still.

Note to self: Just breathe.

"Life sometimes gets so bogged down in the details, you forget you are living it. There is always another appointment to be met, another bill to pay, another symptom presenting, another uneventful day to be notched onto the wooden wall. We have synchronized our watches, studied our calendars, existed in minutes, and completely forgotten to step back and see what we've accomplished."

--Jodi Picoult, 'My Sister's Keeper'

"The only way someone can leave you is if you let them. And I'm not doing that. It may look like that today, or tomorrow, or even a month from now, but one day you're going to wake up and see that this whole time you've been gone, you've only been headed back to where you started. And I'll be there, waiting. It's not like I'm letting you go. I'm just trusting you enough to come back."

--Jodi Picoult, 'Vanishing Acts'

"It's raining. The kind of rain that comes down so heavy it sounds like the shower's running, even when you've turned it off. The kind of rain that makes you think of dams and flash floods, arks. The kind of rain that tells you to crawl back into bed, where the sheets havent lost your body heat, to pretend that the clock is five minutes earlier than it really is. Ask any kid who's made it past fourth grade and they can tell you: water never stops moving. Rain falls, and runs down a mountain into a river. The river finds it way to the ocean. It evaporates, like a soul, into the clouds. And then, like everything else, it starts all over again."

--Jodi Picoult, 'My Sister's Keeper'

After all, it’s all kinds of things that make up life, right? The big, like falling in love and spending time with your family. Or the little, like blow-drying your hair, applying concealer, and cursing those magazine inserts. It all counts. It has to.

Maybe our girlfriends are our soul mates and guys are just people to have fun with.

I’ve always liked the time before dawn, because there’s no one around to remind me who I’m supposed to be, so it’s easier to remember who I am.

Where do they go, all the things we think and feel but don’t say?

"Once upon a time, in a galaxy not entirely unlike our own, there was a girl. There was nothing extraordinary about this girl. She was by her own estimation a relatively simple sort, yet she was cursed. For as long as she could remember, boys had been something of a disaster. Boys either fell too hard, too fast, or not at all. She had long since given up on the notion of a functional relationship, which is why, she was surprised to find herself in the company of a boy who made her feel as if the curse had been lifted."

--'Dawson's Creek'

"That was when I gave up. Because it was beyond stupid to think that I had picked exactly the right place and time and I was going to simply walk into my soul mate just because I was so desperate to."

--Stephenie Meyer, 'Breaking Dawn'

"What do I look like? The wizard of Oz? You need a brain? You need a heart? Go ahead. Take mine. Take everything I have."

--Stephenie Meyer, 'Breaking Dawn'

Big: What would you come back as?

Carrie: Someone who knows better.

A DEEP BREATH & BABY STEPS, that's how the whole thing starts

Fiction is the only way you're dealing; you turn your pretty head if it gets real.

I just met a wonderful new man. He's fictional... but you can't have everything.

"When you understand," Brandy says, "that what you're telling is just a story. It isn't happening anymore. When you realize the story you're telling is just words, when you can just crumple it up and throw your past in the trashcan," Brandy says, "Then we'll figure out who you're going to be."

--Chuck Palahniuk, 'Invisible Monsters'

She had always known everything worth knowing. Now she knew better.

Act like a retard, laugh like it's infamous, dance endlessly and i promise you--you're living the life you've always wanted to live, just never had.

Life didn't promise to be wonderful.

"Just because you didn't speak the facts out loud didn't erase their existance. Silence was just a quieter way to lie."

--Jodi Picoult, 'The Tenth Circle'

Tell a man there are 300 billion stars in the universe and he'll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint on it and he'll have to touch it to be sure.

When your life is sucking, you get drunk and sleep with inappropriate men. It’s your thing. And I think it’s charming.

When I see you, the world stops. It stops and all that exists for me is you and my eyes staring at you. That and nothing else. No noise, no other people, no thoughts or worries, no yesterday, no tomorrow. The world stops, and it is a beautiful place, and there is only you. Just you, and my eyes staring at you. When you’re gone, the world starts again and I don’t like it as much. I can live in it, but I don’t like it. I just walk around in it and wait to see you again and wait for it to stop again. I love it when it stops. It’s the best fucking thing I’ve ever known or ever felt, the best thing, and that, Beautiful Girl, is why I stare at you.

Sometimes I think people don’t understand how lonely it is to be a kid, like you don’t matter. So I’m eight, and I have these toys, these dolls. My favorite is this ugly girl who I call Clementine, and I keep yelling at her, “You can’t be ugly! Be pretty!” It’s weird, like, if I can transform her, I would magically change, too.

But Mariella just crossed her arms as she walked up the stairs, and she went into her bedroom, and she sat on her bed, and she looked in the mirror, and she thought to herself, "If I wanna play, I can play with me. If I wanna think, I’ll think in my head."

I’m selfish enough to want to get better, but I’m backwards enough not to take any steps to get there. When you realize it’s a pattern and not a phase, it’s what you’ve become, and it’s what you will stay... that’s the ballgame.

Be loved but never love. Attach but never combine. Trip but never fall. To be broken is better than shattered. Tell them of your strength but never of your past. Be trustworthy but never trust. Be cracked but never open.

I would have done it sober.

The truth: rock bottom is endless.