Barbara

“Yes, people age horribly. They suffer strokes. Their bodies and brains fall apart. But the male ego? Firmly intact until the bitter end.”
― Jen Beagin, Big Swiss

“I’m always amazed at how books find us at the time we need them, as if there’s some omniscient, benevolent librarian in the sky.”
― Eve Babitz, Black Swans

“Even though I don't believe in a god, I still feel I am in touch with something beyond myself. Sometimes it's an occurence timed with such ingenuity it feels cosmic. Like the gift of the piano. Other times, it's a sense of profound connection. One morning my cat settled on the pillow just above my head. It's always my desire for her to do this, but most often she does not; she lies between my legs, or on my hip, and after some minutes I feel the need to move, and she slopes away. But that particular morning she settled and inched her face forward until her cheek rested on my own. It felt like a connection beyond offering her the soft warmth of my body, a cosy place for her to nap. It felt like she was giving herself to me for my comfort alone, letting me lean on her. I felt the friendship of a cat and it touched me. Even though I could easily rathionalise the comfort out of it, I let it be taken as I needed to in that moment. My soul needs signs and symbols, not logic.”
― Amy Key, Arrangements in Blue: Notes on Loving and Living Alone

“The thing that is liberating about literature is it offers us access to something greater than we are. Greater than our pain, greater than our personal experience, greater than the intensity I’ve talked about. Discovering literature is like gaining access to a world of extreme risk, of encounters with the enormity of life and death, but on a different plane. It can be a consolation. A form of consolation, but never enough to save a person.”
― Neige Sinno, Triste tigre