A good story isn't the one that shuts everyone down and sort of leaves them in silent awe. A good story is one that, even before you finish the anecdote, you can see their eyes shining because it has so resonated with something from their own lives that everyone in the group has a version of the same story and they cannot wait to tell it, and that they're going to compete to make their version even more extreme than your version. So your version is just a seed.

What I mean is sometimes, for an artist, chronic pain can be a gift.

Almost all the time, you tell yourself you're loving somebody when you're just using them. This only looks like love.

I don't want to die without a few scars.

I would pay snakes to bite her.

Hope is something really tough and tenacious you have to give up. It’s an addiction to break.

Some stories, she’d say, the more you tell them, the faster you use them up. Those kind, the drama burns off, and every version, they sound more silly and flat. The other kind of story, it uses you up. The more you tell it, the stronger it gets. Those kind of stories only remind you how stupid you were. Are. Will always be.