What Matters Quotes (page 52)
The day before is what we bring to the day we're actually living through, life is a matter of carrying along all those days-before just as someone might carry stones, and when we can no longer cope with the load, the work is done, the last day is the only one that is no the day before another day.
Jose Saramago
The really amazing thing about all this is no matter what you believe, it took some doing to get from a point where there was nothing, to a point where all the right neurons fire and pop so that we can make decisions. More amazing is how even though that's become second nature, we all still manage to screw it up.
Jodi Picoult
You’ve got a goddamn bug today—you know that? What the hell’s the matter with you anyway?"
Franny quickly tipped her cigarette ash, then brought the ashtray an inch closer to her side of the table. "I’m sorry. I’m awful," she said. "I’ve just felt so destructive all week. It’s awful. I’m horrible."
"Your letter didn’t sound so goddamn destructive."
Franny nodded solemnly. She was looking at a little warm blotch of sunshine, about the size of a poker chip, on the tablecloth. "I had to...
J. D. Salinger
I have never been able to understand the complaint that a story is "depressing" because of its subject matter. What depresses me are stories that don't seem to know these things go on, or hide them in resolute chipperness; "witty stories," in which every problem is the occasion for a joke; "upbeat" stories that flog you with transcendence. Please. We're grown ups now.
Tobias Wolff