. . .Tell me, Clare: why on earth would a lovely girl like you want to marry Henry?' Everything in the room seems to hold its breath. Henry stiffens but doesn't say anything. I lean forward and smile at Mr. DeTamble and say, with enthusiasm, as thoug...
Knowing the future is different from being told what I like.
Chaos is more freedom; in fact, total freedom. But no meaning. I want to be free to act, and I also want my actions to mean something.
I sit quietly and think about my mom. It's funny how memory erodes, If all I had to work from were my childhood memories, my knowledge of my mother would be faded and soft, with a few sharp memories standing out.
We are often insane with happiness. We are also very unhappy for reasons neither of us can do anything about. Like being separated.
I think about my mother singing after lunch on a Summer afternoon, twirling in blue dress across the floor of her dressing room
I won't ever leave you, even though you're always leaving me.
I want my own bed, in my own apartment. Home sweet home. No place like home. Take me home, country roads. Home is where the heart is. But my heart is here. So I must be home.
I am suddenly comsumed by nostalgia for the little girl who was me, who loved the fields and believed in God, who spent winter days home sick from school reading Nancy Drew and sucking menthol cough drops, who could keep a secret.
Don't you think it's better to be extremely happy for a short while, even if you lose it, than to be just okay for your whole life?
But now, I know, how absence can be present, like a damaged nerve, like a dark bird.
...and I suddenly feel that Henry is there, incredible need for Henry to be there and to put his hand on me even while it seems to me that Henry is the rain and I am alone and wanting him - Clare
I love you always. Time is nothing.
There is only one page left to write on. I will fill it with words of only one syllable. I love. I have loved. I will love.
It's hard being left behind. (...) It's hard to be the one who stays.
It’s dark now and I am very tired. I love you, always. Time is nothing.
Why is love intensified by absence?
I go to sleep alone, and wake up alone. I take walks. I work until I'm tired. I watch the wind play with the trash that's been under the snow all winter. Everything seems simple until you think about it. Why is love intensified by abscence?
