feelings i identify with

And my birthday gift to myself is the certainty that I have what it takes to start over if I need to.

That is what these characters consistently struggle with: they don’t want to make themselves legible, or they desperately want to but can’t.

because writing is the best means I have of metabolizing my own life

I want to write every day and read books and to be in love and live near all my friends and work on what I know to be true and good. For me, that’s salvation—that’s ambition.

The gift of grief is a well-honed bullshit radar.There are many things you can fake or hide, including from yourself, but hitting rock bottom blows everything wide open.

at once precise and discursive, friendly and skeptical, direct and elliptical

You are someone who needs faith more than you need bulletproof, long-term plans.