The Degree to which I am blessed staggers me... the degree to which I take that for granted shames me. -Streetwalking with Jesus

If I had cared about her as I should have, as I thought I did, how could I have let her go?

It took me a sleeve of Girl Scout Thin Mints and forty minutes to get over that boy.

I told myself – as I’ve told myself before – that the body shuts down when the pain gets too bad, that consciousness is temporary, that this will pass. But just like always, I didn’t slip away. I was left on the shore with the waves washing over me, unable to drown.

You can't not like "The Great Gatsby." It's got the best sentences in, like, ever.

These are all direct quotes, except every time they use a curse word, I'm going to use the name of a famous American poet: 'You Walt Whitman-ing, Edna St. Vincent Millay! Go Emily Dickinson your mom!' 'Thanks for the advice, you pathetic piece of E.E. Cummings, but I think I'm gonna pass.' 'You Robert Frost-ing Nikki Giovanni! Get a life, nerd. You're a virgin.' 'Hey bro, you need to go outside and get some fresh air into you. Or a girlfriend.' I need to get a girlfriend into me? I think that shows a fundamental lack of comprehension about how babies are made.

Because it's kind of great, being an idea that everybody likes. But I could never be the idea to myself, not all the way.