But then I think about my sister and what a shell-less turtle she was and how she wanted me to be one too. C'mon, Lennie, she used to say to me at least ten times a day. C'mon Len. And that makes me feel better, like it's her life rather than her death that is now teaching me how to be, who to be.
Jandy NelsonAll her knowledge is gone now. Everything she ever learned, or heard, or saw. Her particular way of looking at Hamlet or daisies or thinking about love, all her private intricate thoughts, her inconsequential secret musings โ theyโre gone too. I heard this expression once: Each time someone dies, a library burns. Iโm watching it burn right to the ground.
Jandy NelsonI gasp, because Isn't that just exactly what I've been doing too: writing poems and scattering them to the winds with the same hope as Gram that someone, someday, somewhere might understand who I am, who my sister was, and what happened to us.
Jandy NelsonLifeโs a freaking messโฆ thereโs not one truth ever, just a bunch of stories, all going on at once, in our heads, in our hearts, all getting in the way of each other. Itโs all a beautiful calamitous mess.
Jandy Nelson