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61 " The day dragged, yet it also went too fast, in the way it always does when you're waiting for something, yet also dreading it. "
― C.J. Tudor , The Hiding Place
62 " Grief is personal. It isn't something you can share, like a box if chocolates. It is yours and yours alone. A spiked steel ball chained to your ankle. A coat of nails around your shoulders. A crown of thorns. No one else can feel your pain. They cannot walk in your shoes because your shoes are full of broken glass and every time you try and take a step forward it rips your soles to bloody shreads. Grief is the worst kind of torture and it never ends. You have dibs on that dungeon for the rest of your life. "
63 " Odd how we measure things. As if the ability to purchase a large building or the most fuel-guzzeling mode of sitting in a traffick jam is the ultimate expression of achievement during our scant years upon this planet. Despite all our advances, we still judge people on terms of bricks, cloth and horsepower. "
64 " That's what living is. Keeping ourselves busy, averting our eyes so we don't have to stare into the abyss. Because it would drive us insane. "
65 " The young are incredibly resilient. She would be back to her old self in no time, he was sure. "
66 " The dead cannot hurt us. Bones are just bones. Shadows are nothing but shadows. Except shadows are never just shadows. They are the deepest part of darkness. And the deepest part of the darkness is where the monsters hide. "
67 " A place like this does not want to be reclaimed. It is happy being foresaken, lying dormant and dead. A graveyard of lost livelihoods, lost dreams, coal dust and bones. We only skim the surface of this earth. But it has many layers. And sometimes you shouldn't dig too deep. "
68 " Because the dead never really leave us. We carry them inside. In everything we do. In our dreams, and nightmares. The dead are a part of us. And maybe they are a part of something else too. This place. This earth. "
69 " Despite all our advancements, we still judge people in terms of bricks, cloth and horsepower. "
70 " Flippancy is a flimsy defence mechanism. Trust me, I should know. It's one of the first things to fall away when people are in fear for their lives. "
71 " The wounded animal doesn't escape the trap only to throw itself back into the metal jaws and wait for them to pulverise its bones. "
72 " It seemed to make sense. Most bad decisions do at the time. "
73 " I learned a lot working with children all these years. One - never ask anything outright. They will only lie. Two - always make them think it is their idea. Three - make something interesting enough and they will come to you. "
74 " In that moment I understood things no fifteen year old should. Above human nature. About self-preservation. Able desperation. Panic rose in a tidal wave, filling my throat, making it harder to breathe. "
75 " But then, very few of us talk about death, do we? It's a dirty secret. And yet, in a way, death is the most important part of life. Without it, our existence would be unthinkable. "
76 " That's why history does. We like to pretend we learn from out mistakes, but we don't. We always think it will be different this time. And it never is. "
77 " Never show weakness. "
78 " A nice, comfortable, safe place for a young boy to grow up. Except he never did. "
79 " The problem is, if you let kids be kids, then before you know it they’re smearing their faces in pigs’ blood, pushing each other off the edge of cliffs and smashing their mates’ heads in with rocks. Our job as teachers, adults and parents is to stop, at every level, kids being kids, or they’ll tear the fucking world down around our ears. "
80 " But what if the earth is rotten? What if the things you plant there grow back full of poison? I think about how you can never build the same snowman, or how the tapes that dad's mate copied were always fuzzy and corrupted. There are some things - some beautiful, perfect things - you can never recreate without ruining them. "