Madonna Kolbenschlag suggest that if an awakened woman forgoes innocence and denial, if she refuses to make compromises with herself and defect to patriarchy, then her only option becomes deviance. I chose deviance. I chose to be a loving dissident. To dance the dance of dissidence. This stance can be assumed from the inside or the outside. Whichever place we choose, the important thing is having the sustained will to be, act, and speak from the ground of our feminine souls.

I said, "If I was a Negro girl-" He placed his fingers across my lips so I tasted his saltiness. "We can't think of changing our skin," he said. "Change the world-that's how we gotta think."

People can start out one way, and by the time life gets through with them they end up completely different.

People, in general, would rather die than forgive. It's that hard.

One day I will have to forgive life for ending, I tell myself. I will have to learn how to let life be life with its unbearable finality ... just be what it is.

Actually, you can be bad at something...but if you love doing it, that will be enough. - August Boatwright

Into every life a little rain must fall.