Junior Best Friend Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Junior Best Friend. Here they are! All 28 of them:

You forget all of it anyway. First, you forget everything you learned-the dates of the Hay-Herran Treaty and Pythagorean Theorem. You especially forget everything you didn't really learn, but just memorized the night before. You forget the names of all but one or two of your teachers, and eventually you'll forget those, too. You forget your junior class schedule and where you used to sit and your best friend's home phone number and the lyrics to that song you must have played a million times. For me, it was something by Simon & Garfunkel. Who knows what it will be for you? And eventually, but slowly, oh so slowly, you forget your humiliations-even the ones that seemed indelible just fade away. You forget who was cool and who was not, who was pretty, smart, athletic, and not. Who went to a good college. Who threw the best parties Who could get you pot. You forget all of them. Even the ones you said you loved, and even the ones you actually did. They're the last to go. And then once you've forgotten enough, you love someone else.
Gabrielle Zevin (Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac)
Because his art is such a difficult one, the writer is not likely to advance in the world as visibly as do his neighbors: while his best friends from high school or college are becoming junior partners in prestigious law firms, or opening their own mortuaries, the writer may be still sweating out his first novel.
John Gardner (On Becoming a Novelist)
Let me tell you girls a story, short and sweet. In high school, I was a junior varsity cheerleader dating a senior who was up for football scholarships. I'd slept with him several times willingly. One night I wasn't in the mood, but he was. So he held me down and forced me. The few people I told about it - including my best friend - pointed out what would happen to him if I told. They stressed the fact that I hadn't been a virgin, that we were dating, that we'd had sex before. So I kept quiet. I never even told my mother. That boy put bruises on my body. I was crying and begging him to stop and he didn't. That's called rape, ladies.
Tammara Webber (Easy (Contours of the Heart, #1))
Detectives discovered gross contradictions to Eric’s insta-profile already cemented in the media. In Plattsburgh, friends described a sports enthusiast hanging out with minorities. Two of Eric’s best friends turned out to be Asian and African American. The Asian boy was a jock to boot. Eric played soccer and Little League. He followed the Rockies even before the family moved to Colorado, frequently sporting their baseball cap. By junior high he had grown obsessed with computers, and eventually with popular video games.
Dave Cullen (Columbine)
I focus on my favorite daydream, the one where I return from London at the end of the summer and am all glamorous and drop-dead gorgeous and every girl in my school is completely jealous when Quinn McKeyan asks me to Fall Homecoming because he can’t resist my charm. Hey, it’s my daydream. I can dream what I want to. The thing is, Quinn’s face keeps getting replaced in my head by Dante’s. Since I’ve had a mad crush on Quinn from the time we started kindergarten all the way through our junior year last year, that’s saying something. Every daydream I’ve had for eleven years has been of him. I’m a very loyal daydreamer. And I suddenly feel like I’m cheating on my imaginary boyfriend, a boy who happens to be real, but who has been dating my best friend Becca for the past two years. And no. Becca has no idea that I’m secretly in love with her boyfriend. It’s the one secret that I’ve kept from her.
Courtney Cole (Dante's Girl (The Paradise Diaries, #1))
I don’t see him much.” “It happens, baby. You forget all of it anyway. First, you forget everything you learned – the dates of the Hay-Herran Treaty and the Pythagorean theorem. You especially forget everything you didn’t really learn, just memorised the night before. You forget the names of all but one or two of your teachers, and eventually you’ll forget those, too. You forget your junior year class schedule and where you used to sit and your best friend’s home phone number and the lyrics to that song you must have played a million times. For me, it was something by Simon & Garfunkel. Who knows what it will be for you? And eventually, but slowly, oh so slowly, you forget your humiliations – even the ones that seemed indelible just fade away. You forget who was cool and who was not, who was pretty, smart, athletic, and not. Who went to a good college. Who threw the best parties. Who could get you pot. You forget all of them. Even the ones you said you loved, and the ones you actually did. They’re the last to go. And then once you’ve forgotten enough, you love someone else.
Gabrielle Zevin (Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac)
For the next nine months, Sylvia would report on campus trends, politics, tastes, style. It was an honor, but it was grueling. Sylvia was overworked. She had boyfriend problems. She longed for Europe. She broke her leg in a skiing accident. Her best friend, Marcia Brown, had gotten engaged and moved off campus - other girls were away on their junior year abroad. The whole campus seemed mired in some bleak haze- there were suicide attempts, abortions, disappearances, and hasty marriages. Sylvia coped with shopping binges in downtown Northhampton- sheer blouses, French pumps, red cashmere sweaters, white skirts, and tight black pullovers - clothes more suited to voguish amusements than studying. Everyone wanted to be one of Mademoiselle's guest editors, but Sylvia needed it - some shot of glamour to pull her out of the mud.
Elizabeth Winder (Pain, Parties, Work: Sylvia Plath in New York, Summer 1953)
The important parts of my story, I was realizing, lay less in the surface value of my accomplishments and more in what undergirded them—the many small ways I’d been buttressed over the years, and the people who’d helped build my confidence over time. I remembered them all, every person who’d ever waved me forward, doing his or her best to inoculate me against the slights and indignities I was certain to encounter in the places I was headed—all those environments built primarily for and by people who were neither black nor female. I thought of my great-aunt Robbie and her exacting piano standards, how she’d taught me to lift my chin and play my heart out on a baby grand even if all I’d ever known was an upright with broken keys. I thought of my father, who showed me how to box and throw a football, same as Craig. There were Mr. Martinez and Mr. Bennett, my teachers at Bryn Mawr, who never dismissed my opinions. There was my mom, my staunchest support, whose vigilance had saved me from languishing in a dreary second-grade classroom. At Princeton, I’d had Czerny Brasuell, who encouraged me and fed my intellect in new ways. And as a young professional, I’d had, among others, Susan Sher and Valerie Jarrett—still good friends and colleagues many years later—who showed me what it looked like to be a working mother and consistently opened doors for me, certain I had something to offer. These were people who mostly didn’t know one another and would never have occasion to meet, many of whom I’d fallen out of touch with myself. But for me, they formed a meaningful constellation. These were my boosters, my believers, my own personal gospel choir, singing, Yes, kid, you got this! all the way through. I’d never forgotten it. I’d tried, even as a junior lawyer, to pay it forward, encouraging curiosity when I saw it, drawing younger people into important conversations.
Michelle Obama (Becoming)
To be watched made her uneasy, as though she had to compete with every other person he might gaze upon, and she had known for quite some time that competing was not what she did best. Even as a child this had been true; the game of musical chairs had filled her with panic — that dreadful, icy knowledge that when the music stopped someone would be out. It was better when she stopped trying, because there were so many things a young person was required to endure: spelling bees, endless games in gym class; in all these things she had stopped trying, or if she tried, she did so with little expectation of herself, so was not disappointed to misspell “glacier” in a fourth-grade spelling bee, or to strike out in softball because she never swung the bat. It became a habit, not trying, and in junior high, when the biggest prize of course was to be popular among the right friends, Amy found she lacked the fortitude once more to get in there and swing. Arriving at the point where she felt almost invisible, she was aware that her solitude was something she might have brought upon herself. But here was Mr. Robertson and she was not invisible to him. Not when he looked at her like that—she couldn't be. (Still, there was her inner tendency to flee, the recrudescence of self-doubt.) But his hand came forward and touched her elbow.
Elizabeth Strout (Amy and Isabelle)
Strong underneath, though!’ decided Julian. ‘There’s no softness there, if you ask me. I think Emma’s got authority but it’s the best sort. It’s quiet authority . . .’ ‘Rita wasn’t exactly loud, Martin!’ Elizabeth pointed out, rather impatiently. ‘I bet Rita was very like Emma before she was elected head girl. Was she, Belinda? You must have been at Whyteleafe then.’ Belinda had been at Whyteleafe longer than the others. She had joined in the junior class. She frowned now, deep in thought. ‘Why, Elizabeth, I do believe you’re right! I remember overhearing some of the teachers say that Rita was a bit too young and as quiet as a mouse and might not be able to keep order! But they were proved wrong. Rita was nervous at the first Meeting or two. But after that she was such a success she stayed on as head girl for two years running.’ ‘There, Martin!’ said Elizabeth. ‘Lucky the teachers don’t have any say in it then, isn’t it?’ laughed Julian. ‘I think all schools should be run by the pupils, the way ours is.’ ‘What about Nora?’ asked Jenny, suddenly. ‘She wouldn’t be nervous of going on the platform.’ ‘She’d be good in some ways,’ said Belinda, her mind now made up, ‘but I don’t think she’d be as good as Emma . . .’ They discussed it further. By the end, Elizabeth felt well satisfied. Everyone seemed to agree that Thomas was the right choice for head boy. And apart from Martin, who didn’t know who he wanted, and Jenny, who still favoured Nora, everyone seemed to agree with her about Emma. Because of the way that Whyteleafe School was run, in Elizabeth’s opinion it was extremely important to get the right head boy and head girl. And she’d set her heart on Thomas and Emma. She felt that this discussion was a promising start. Then suddenly, near the end of the train journey, Belinda raised something which made Elizabeth’s scalp prickle with excitement. ‘We haven’t even talked about our own election! For a monitor to replace Susan. Now she’s going up into the third form, we’ll need someone new. We’ve got Joan, of course, but the second form always has two.’ She was looking straight at Elizabeth! ‘We all think you should be the other monitor, Elizabeth,’ explained Jenny. ‘We talked amongst ourselves at the end of last term and everyone agreed. Would you be willing to stand?’ ‘I – I—’ Elizabeth was quite lost for words. Speechless with pleasure! She had already been a monitor once and William and Rita had promised that her chance to be a monitor would surely come again. But she’d never expected it to come so soon! ‘You see, Elizabeth,’ Joan said gently, having been in on the secret, ‘everyone thinks it was very fine the way you stood down in favour of Susan last term. And that it’s only fair you should take her place now she’s going up.’ ‘Not to mention all the things you’ve done for the school. Even if we do always think of you as the Naughtiest Girl!’ laughed Kathleen. ‘We were really proud of you last term, Elizabeth. We were proud that you were in our form!’ ‘So would you be willing to stand?’ repeated Jenny. ‘Oh, yes, please!’ exclaimed Elizabeth, glancing across at Joan in delight. Their classmates wanted her to be a monitor again, with her best friend Joan! The two of them would be second form monitors together. ‘There’s nothing I’d like better!’ she added. What a wonderful surprise. What a marvellous term this was going to be! They all piled off at the station and watched their luggage being loaded on to the school coach. Julian gave Elizabeth’s back a pat. There was an amused gleam in his eyes. ‘Well, well. It looks as though the Naughtiest Girl is going to be made a monitor again. At the first Meeting. When will that be? This Saturday? Can she last that long without misbehaving?’ ‘Of course I can, Julian,’ replied Elizabeth, refusing to be amused. ‘I’m going to jolly well make certain of that!’ That, at least, was her intention.
Enid Blyton (Naughtiest Girl Wants to Win)
ever. Amen. Thank God for self-help books. No wonder the business is booming. It reminds me of junior high school, where everybody was afraid of the really cool kids because they knew the latest, most potent putdowns, and were not afraid to use them. Dah! But there must be another reason that one of the best-selling books in the history of the world is Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus by John Gray. Could it be that our culture is oh so eager for a quick fix? What a relief it must be for some people to think “Oh, that’s why we fight like cats and dogs, it is because he’s from Mars and I am from Venus. I thought it was just because we’re messed up in the head.” Can you imagine Calvin Consumer’s excitement and relief to get the video on “The Secret to her Sexual Satisfaction” with Dr. GraySpot, a picture chart, a big pointer, and an X marking the spot. Could that “G” be for “giggle” rather than Dr. “Graffenberg?” Perhaps we are always looking for the secret, the gold mine, the G-spot because we are afraid of the real G-word: Growth—and the energy it requires of us. I am worried that just becoming more educated or well-read is chopping at the leaves of ignorance but is not cutting at the roots. Take my own example: I used to be a lowly busboy at 12 East Restaurant in Florida. One Christmas Eve the manager fired me for eating on the job. As I slunk away I muttered under my breath, “Scrooge!” Years later, after obtaining a Masters Degree in Psychology and getting a California license to practice psychotherapy, I was fired by the clinical director of a psychiatric institute for being unorthodox. This time I knew just what to say. This time I was much more assertive and articulate. As I left I told the director “You obviously have a narcissistic pseudo-neurotic paranoia of anything that does not fit your myopic Procrustean paradigm.” Thank God for higher education. No wonder colleges are packed. What if there was a language designed not to put down or control each other, but nurture and release each other to grow? What if you could develop a consciousness of expressing your feelings and needs fully and completely without having any intention of blaming, attacking, intimidating, begging, punishing, coercing or disrespecting the other person? What if there was a language that kept us focused in the present, and prevented us from speaking like moralistic mini-gods? There is: The name of one such language is Nonviolent Communication. Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication provides a wealth of simple principles and effective techniques to maintain a laser focus on the human heart and innocent child within the other person, even when they have lost contact with that part of themselves. You know how it is when you are hurt or scared: suddenly you become cold and critical, or aloof and analytical. Would it not be wonderful if someone could see through the mask, and warmly meet your need for understanding or reassurance? What I am presenting are some tools for staying locked onto the other person’s humanness, even when they have become an alien monster. Remember that episode of Star Trek where Captain Kirk was turned into a Klingon, and Bones was freaking out? (I felt sorry for Bones because I’ve had friends turn into Cling-ons too.) But then Spock, in his cool, Vulcan way, performed a mind meld to determine that James T. Kirk was trapped inside the alien form. And finally Scotty was able to put some dilithium crystals into his phaser and destroy the alien cloaking device, freeing the captain from his Klingon form. Oh, how I wish that, in my youth or childhood,
Kelly Bryson (Don't Be Nice, Be Real)
Today is the first day in the next chapter of my life.  My best friend, Ivy, and I are leaving home to finish college. We will be roommates and have the time of our lives. She has been staying at our house since November of our senior year in high school.  My parents agreed to help us both with college if we would take two years of basic courses at the local junior college.  Now we are moving to Springfield, Missouri to attend Missouri State University. 
Hilary Storm (Don't Close Your Eyes (Bryant Brothers Book 1))
complement the first. The initial credit line Junior offered for investing in artists was only $100 million, much less than what had been available at Warner, but Morris could see that, sitting on a limitless tap of booze money, there was a lot more where that came from.4 Best of all, Seagram was domiciled in Canada, where the lyrics of popular rap songs were not a pressing political issue. Although Jimmy Iovine and Doug Morris were temporarily estranged as colleagues, they remained best friends and hoped to reunite. Fuchs’ actions had stung them both, and Iovine had raised such a stink after Morris’ sacking that he was no longer permitted in the Time Warner Building. Under normal circumstances, he too would have been fired, but Iovine didn’t actually work for Warner directly—he was an equity partner in a joint venture, and the only way to get rid of him was to sell him back his shares. This was an expensive proposition, as Interscope had diversified beyond rap, signing No Doubt, Nine Inch Nails, and Marilyn Manson. Together, the two came up with a plan. Iovine, the agitator, would make himself unbearable to Fuchs, and push extreme albums like Dogg Food and Antichrist Superstar that made the provocations of The Chronic seem boring by comparison. Morris,
Stephen Witt (How Music Got Free: What happens when an entire generation commits the same crime?)
Maddie thinks for a moment, then says, “Okay, if I imagine those words not coming out of your mouth, they actually kind of make sense.” I clap, smile, and try not to be offended by that last part, especially since she’s had such a rough day. I continue. “Okay, step one: grab their attention.” I stand and give jazz hands. “In Hollywood, they always say the best way to do that is by firing someone on your first day of work.” “Liv, I’m not firing any of my friends,” Maddie says adamantly. I roll my eyes. “Ugh. Do I have to connect all the dots for you? I will join the team and you can fire me for being terrible. The team will know you mean business if you’re ruthless enough to crush your twin’s fake dream!
Lexi Ryals (Disney Liv and Maddie: Sisters Forever (Disney Junior Novel))
As an only child, I considered the core members of the BSC—Kristy, Mary Anne, Claudia, Stacey, and Dawn my friends in my head. Eventually, they took on two junior members, eleven-year-olds Mallory and Jessi. Interestingly, Jessie was African American, but I was never too pressed to read about her. I already knew what it felt like to be the only one in a friend group of white girls, and Ann Martin never quite captured that experience. But what I loved about these girls was the authenticity of their friendship. They were young, smart, and enterprising. They didn’t all think alike but they did things together. They weren’t the mean girls or the cool kids, but they had their sacred friendship unit and they honored it. In the safety of that friendship unit, every girl was her full, best, awesome self. They fought sometimes, but always made up. And in the end, no matter what, they rode for each other.
Brittney Cooper (Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower)
Julia and I sit next to each other sometimes. We’re not best friends. Sharon Matterson used to be my best friend, but she went to St. Mary’s. I’m at Brightport Junior High. Julia’s the only person here that I might want to be best friends with. But I think she really wants to be best friends with Mandy Rushton. They hang out together between classes.
Liz Kessler (The Tail of Emily Windsnap (Emily Windsnap #1))
good ideas. Junior was there, saying hi to people and getting petted like crazy. We also had homemade dog biscuits from Grandma Dotty to give away. And I drew the T-shirt designs myself. “Step right up! Check it out!” Flip kept saying. Georgia was signing up customers. And I helped Magic Murray
James Patterson (Dog's Best Friend (Middle School #8))
Rapunzel! She’s just like me. I just relate to her so much, and I’ve been told that she’s my cartoon twin! I’d love to be her best friend! Or play her on Broadway! [laughs]
Lexi Ryals (Disney Liv and Maddie: Sisters Forever (Disney Junior Novel))
Entertaining is a way of life for the Southern girl. We’ve been doing it for over three hundred years now, and we’re not too shy to say we’re just about the best in the world at it. There really doesn’t have to be an occasion to entertain in the South. Just about any excuse will do, from the anniversary of your friend’s divorce (a “comfort” party) to national flag day (Southern girls are always eager to show the flag the respect it’s due). Parties in the South have always been big affairs. In pre--Civil War days, it was a long way between plantations on bad roads (or no roads at all), so parties lasted for days on end. The hostess spared no expense, with lavish dances, beautiful dresses, and meals that went on and on, with all the best dishes the South had to offer: from whole roast pig to wild game stew. After all, plantation parties were a circuit. You might go to twenty parties a year, but you were only going to throw one--so you better make it memorable, darlin’. Grits work hard to keep this tradition alive. The Junior League and Debutante balls are not just coming out parties for our daughters, god bless them, they are the modern version of old Southern plantation balls. The same is true of graduation, important birthdays, yearly seasonal galas, and of course our weddings.
Deborah Ford (Grits (Girls Raised in the South) Guide to Life)
housekeeper. She’s like the absentminded professor in that old movie. Then there are Jessi Ramsey and Mallory Pike, junior officers in the club. Jessi and Mal are best friends. They’re also sixth-graders, while the rest of us are eighth-graders. We all go to Stoneybrook Middle School. Mal and Jessi are both the oldest kids in their families, both love horses, both love to read, both think their parents treat them like infants — even though recently they were allowed to get their ears pierced (just one hole in each ear, of course) — and neither one of them has ever had a boyfriend. But the similarities end there. Mal comes from a huge family (she has seven younger brothers and sisters), while Jessi comes from an average-sized family — one younger sister and a baby brother. Mal wants to be an author
Ann M. Martin (Dawn's Wicked Stepsister (The Baby-Sitters Club, #31))
It was 1993, and Reese and I had just begun the last quarter of our junior year. I could no longer hang out with my best friend—my boyfriend—because no one could accept the fact that we were gay. That summer, Reese and his family moved away to another state so they could start their life over again.
Charles Benedict (My Life In and Out: One Man’s Journey into Roman Catholic Priesthood and Out of the Closet)
Jessica, Willow, and Abby burst through the door in a loud explosion of giggles and then stop at the counter to get their Diet Cokes before heading to the back to join us. I don’t really like these girls—I have never liked these girls—and yet somehow they are on the periphery of our friend group. Okay, fine, we are actually on the periphery of their friend group, since as a trio, Jessica, Willow, and Abby are by far the most popular girls in the junior class. I have no idea how they’ve managed to swing it—popularity is an undefinable thing at Mapleview, which as best I can tell involves a whole lot of unearned, effortless confidence and the ability to get other people to look at you for no reason at all. Jessica is a blonde, Willow is a brunette, and Abby is a redhead, just like every teen friend group on television (except, in this case, sans a sassy black sidekick). Boom! Best friends for life. I assume there’s more to their friendship than hair-color optics and an affinity for thong underwear. That taken individually there is the distant possibility they might actually be interesting people. I doubt I will ever know, though, since they travel as a pack
Julie Buxbaum (What to Say Next)
Everyone in the club is thirteen and in the eighth grade, except for our junior officers, Mallory Pike and Jessica Ramsey. Mal and Jessi are best friends. They are eleven years old and in the sixth grade. Both have pierced ears, and both adore horses — and any movie, book, or video game that has a horse in it. I don’t know how many times they’ve read Marguerite Henry’s Misty of Chincoteague, but I do know they’ve seen The Black Stallion at least twenty times. They recite the lines along with the actors. (I don’t recommend watching it with them.)
Ann M. Martin (Mary Anne and the Memory Garden (The Baby-Sitters Club, #93))
reframed as Hamlet with lions. 9. Speak to a different audience. Instead of seeking out friendly people who share your values, try approaching disagreeable people who share your methods. In the U.S. Navy, a young aviator named Ben Kohlmann created a highly effective rapid-innovation cell by assembling a band of junior officers who had disciplinary actions brought against them for challenging authority. They had a history of principled dissent, and although they held different objectives, their habits of loyal opposition meshed well. Your best allies are the people who have a track record of being tough and solving
Adam M. Grant (Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World)
Sweet and Sour Summers “There is something my parents did, and it was pretty unique. My brother and I refer to it as ‘The Sweet and Sour Summer.’ My parents would send us, for the first half of the summer, to an internship with a relative or a friend of the family who had an interesting job. So, at 12, I went and interned with my godbrother, who is a lobbyist in D.C. I would go along with him to pitch congressmen. I had one tie, and I was a pretty good writer. I’d write up one-page summaries of these bills we were pitching, and I’d literally sit there with these congressmen with these filthy mouths—you know, the old Alabaman senator and stuff like that—and watch the pitch happen. It was awesome. I learned so much and developed so much confidence, and really honed my storytelling skills. “But then, from there, I would come home and work in a construction outfit, in a nasty, nasty job. I mean, hosing off the equipment that had been used to fix septic systems, gassing shit up, dragging shit around in the yard, filling up propane tanks. Just being the junior guy on the totem pole, and quite literally getting my ass kicked by whichever parolee was angry at me that day. I think it was part of their master plan, which was: There’s a world of cool opportunities out there for you, but let’s build within you a sense of not just work ethic, but also, a little kick in the ass about why you don’t wanna end up in one of those real jobs. . . .” TIM: “You had the introduction to the godbrother, for the lobbying. Did your parents also help organize the sour part of each summer?” CHRIS: “The guy who ran that construction company is my dad’s best friend, and he was under strict orders to make sure we had the roughest day there.
Timothy Ferriss (Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers)
don’t fuck your dead brother’s best friend, who is twelve years your junior.
Parker S. Huntington (Darling Venom)
Obi-Wan laughed. “Good-bye, old friend. May the Force be with you.” “May the Force be with you,” Anakin echoed. His voice was serious—almost somber. As Obi-Wan walked toward the waiting starcruiser, uneasiness struck him. This is just an ordinary mission, he told himself. I’ll be back in a week or two. If something’s bothering Anakin, we can talk about it then. But for some reason, he felt as if he’d said good-bye to his best friend and former apprentice for the last time.
Patricia C. Wrede (Star Wars: Prequel Trilogy: Collecting The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith (Disney Junior Novel (ebook)))
But then, on a brisk February evening my junior year, I attended a free yoga class at the Harvard Divinity School Andover Chapel. I came in fully expecting to do cat, cow, and child’s pose. Our instructor, Nicholas, who was also a graduate student there, had us on our backs with taut abs, legs held in the air in a ninety-degree position, neck lifted off the ground, hands stretched above our heads. I had become the sleeping dragon. One minute in, my body was trembling. You can’t. I told myself I could. You can’t. I opened my eyes and saw everyone else peacefully holding their pose. This voice yelling at me wasn’t my own. So where was it coming from? You can’t. It was Hang telling me to dump my elementary school best friends who still played with toy horses at thirteen. He said I needed to be more strategic about my social ranking. You can’t be friends with them. My sister excluding me from her life when we became teenagers. You can’t hang out with us. Ba calling me pathetic when I told him I wasn’t pursuing med school. You can’t even try because you’re too dumb. I screamed, You can’t, right back inside of my head, telling all of them what I never had the courage to say. My body shuddered as the rage escaped my body like bats flying out from a cave. Hot tears fell from the sides of my eyes into the chapel carpet floor. And then I heard a clear voice inside of me speak. It was not mine, it was someone else’s. “All those times you’ve felt unloved or alone, you weren’t. God, through the presence of the body, has always been there for you.” Who was this voice? And how could my body be the key to loving myself? My body was always something I had seen as an inconvenience, a detached thing I had to fix. But tonight, I felt welcome to get to know my body.
Susan Lieu (The Manicurist's Daughter)