I learned to read but not to comprehend, and that might well have stood me in good stead, because what's there to understand, really? Everything I later learned to understand was unspeakably ugly anyway. In time, I bought some rulebooks and squeezed my way onto the honor roll, but, decades later, I've been pointed toward people described as "actively dying" who only now and then seemed to be going about it friskily.There was mostly no hustle I could notice.
Gary LutzKim Chinquee writes with remarkable heart and grace. Her wise capsulizings of love's devastations and of life's roil and disappointments come at you with a sorrowing precision that comforts even as it haunts.
Gary LutzIt was my mother who taught me the one worthwhile thing: when they ask if you like what you see in the mirror, pretend that what they mean is what's behind you--the shower curtain, the tile, the wallpaper, whatever's there.
Gary LutzI don't like to read or write about life in its tiring entirety. Most days, months, even years are just filler between those few moments of modest but decisive catastrophe, misfortunes so fittingly flimsy they're almost welcome. The heart doesn't storm that often on its own, so you have to wait for something outside of yourself to get the wrecking ball rolling, and then you're set: you've finally got an impression to make on others - you're in the world distinctly and distinguishable now. It's only by our ravages that we're recognizable to each other at last.
Gary Lutz