book bits

“The habit of loneliness persists. Leonard tells me that if I don't convert the loneliness into useful soli-tude, I'll be my mother's daughter forever. He is right, of course. One is lonely for the absent idealized other, but in useful solitude I am there, keeping myself imaginative company, breathing life into the silence, filling the room with

“Once again, as it has with irregular regularity throughout my waking life, that sickening sense of language buried deep within comes coursing through arms, legs, chest, throat. If only I could make it reach the brain, the conversation with myself might perhaps begin.“ - The Odd Woman and the City, Vivian Gornick