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1 " They had started one of those wish-fulfillment kids’ adventure books, where the boy hero has exactly the qualities he needs to triumph, at every moment… She’d been bored and annoyed, and at one point she tried to explain to Sebastian why it wasn’t her favor-ite of his books. But Sebastian had loved the book unreservedly. Why hadn’t she just read the fucking thing with gusto and relished every moment with her son? Why had she brought her adult judgment and professional story opinions to a book her kid loved? Of course the child hero should always triumph! Who wanted a kids’ book to feel like real life? Real life was fucking intolerable. "
― Maile Meloy , Do Not Become Alarmed
2 " One aspect of human resilience, in all its marvelousness, was the ability to recalibrate, to adjust to new circumstances with astonishing speed. "
3 " People regressed, around their families, to the age at which they had been angriest. "
4 " They could talk about shallow things without judgment and deep things without self-consciousness. "
5 " It takes experience to know what is a catastrophe (Richard Hughes, 'A High Wind in Jamaica'), "
6 " and braking, "
7 " But how could you measure your own pain against the pain of the world? "
8 " Maybe the Fates snipped with their scissors when they wanted to snip. "
9 " Benjamin called it “estro-lock,” the way the two women could talk for hours and lose track of time. They ended up in conversation across any table, screening out noise from kids and men. They could talk about shallow things without judgment and deep things without self-consciousness. "
10 " Civilization, her mother had told her since she was small, was a series of agreements about what was good for everyone, enforced by law. And civilization was only a thin veneer over the savagery and greed that were the human default. "
