Laurie Anderson Quotes

When people don't express themselves, they die one piece at a time.

You have to know what you stand for, not just what you stand against.

In one aspect, yes, I believe in ghosts, but we create them. We haunt ourselves.

THE FIRST TEN LIES THEY TELL YOU IN HIGH SCHOOL 1. We are here to help you. 2. You will have time to get to your class before the bell rings. 3. The dress code will be enforced. 4. No smoking is allowed on school grounds. 5. Our football team will win the championship this year. 6. We expect more of you here. 7. Guidance counselors are always available to listen. 8. Your schedule was created with you in mind. 9. Your locker combination is private. 10. These will be the years you look back on fondly. TEN MORE LIES THEY TELL YOU IN HIGH SCHOOL 1. You will use algebra in your adult lives. 2. Driving to school is a privilege that can be taken away. 3. Students must stay on campus during lunch. 4. The new text books will arrive any day now. 5. Colleges care more about you than your SAT scores. 6. We are enforcing the dress code. 7. We will figure out how to turn off the heat soon. 8. Our bus drivers are highly trained professionals. 9. There is nothing wrong with summer school. 10. We want to hear what you have to say.

There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever. There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn't matter anymore.

We are crayons and lunchboxes and swinging so high our sneakers punch holes in the clouds.

I have survived. I am here. Confused, screwed up, but here. So, how can I find my way? Is there a chain saw of the soul, an ax I can take to my memories or fears?

I am beginning to measure myself in strength, not pounds. Sometimes in smiles.

Art without emotion its like chocolate cake without sugar. It makes you gag.

Homework is not an option. My bed is sending out serious nap rays. I can't help myself. The fluffy pillows and warm comforter are more powerful than I am. I have no choice but to snuggle under the covers.

I just want to sleep. A coma would be nice. Or amnesia. Anything, just to get rid of this, these thoughts, whispers in my mind. Did he rape my head, too?

It's easier to floss with barbed wire than admit you like someone in middle school.

It's easier not to say anything. Shut your trap, button your lip, can it. All that crap you hear on TV about communication and expressing feelings is a lie. Nobody really wants to hear what you have to say.

I wonder how long it would take for anyone to notice if I just stopped talking.

Do I want to die from the inside out or the outside in?

Gym should be illegal. It's humiliating.

Write about the emotions you fear the most.

I am getting better at smiling when people expect it.

I have never heard a more eloquent silence.

When you meet a man who is broken, pick him up and carry him. When you meet a woman who’s broken, put her all into your arms. Cause we don’t know where we come from … we don’t know where we are.

I am angry that I starved my brain and that I sat shivering in my bed at night instead of dancing or reading poetry or eating ice cream or kissing a boy...

Eating was hard. Breathing was hard. Living was hardest.

CONJUGATE THIS: I cut class, you cut class, he, she, it cuts class. We cut class, they cut class. We all cut class. I cannot say this in Spanish because I did not go to Spanish today. Gracias a dios. Hasta luego.

I failed eating, failed drinking, failed not cutting myself into shreds. Failed friendship. Failed sisterhood and daughterhood. Failed mirrors and scales and phone calls. Good thing I'm stable.

What do I want? The answer to that question does not exist.

Who wants to recover? It took me years to get that tiny. I wasn't sick; I was strong.

I knew how much it hurt to be the daughter of people who can't see you, not even if you are standing in front of them stomping your feet.

IT happened. There is no avoiding it, no forgetting. No running away, or flying, or burying, or hiding.

Be careful what you wish for. There's always a catch.

I breathe in slowly. Food is life. I exhale, take another breath. Food is life. And that's the problem. When you're alive, people can hurt you. It's easier to crawl into a bone cage or a snowdrift of confusion. It's easier to lock everybody out. But it's a lie.

This is where you can find your soul if you dare. Where you can touch that part of you that you've never dared look at before. Do not come here and ask me to show you how to draw a face. Ask me to help you find the wind.

Sometimes I think high school is one long hazy activity: if you are tough enough to survive this, they'll let you become an adult. I hope it's worth it.

Censorship is the child of fear and the father of ignorance.

For one moment we are not failed tests and broken condoms and cheating on essays; we are crayons and lunch boxes and swinging so high our sneakers punch holes in the clouds.

If I ever form a clan, we'll be the anti-cheerleaders and walk under the bleacher forming mild acts of mayhem.

You’re not dead, but you’re not alive, either. You’re a wintergirl, Lia-Lia, caught in between the worlds. You’re a ghost with a beating heart. Soon you’ll cross the border and be with me. I’m so stoked. I miss you wicked.

I want to go to sleep and not wake up, but I don't want to die. I want to eat like a normal person eats, but I need to see my bones or I will hate myself even more and I might cut my heart out or take every pill that was ever made.

I believe that you've created a metaphorical universe in which you can express your darkest fears. In one aspect, yes, I believe in ghosts, but we create them. We haunt ourselves, and sometimes we do such a good job, we lose track of reality.

Do they choose to be so dense? Were they born that way? I have no friends. I have nothing. I say nothing. I am nothing.

The stuffing/puking/stuffing/puking/stuffing/puking didn't make her skinny, it made her cry.

I need a new friend. I need a friend, period. Not a true friend, nothing close or share clothes or sleepover giggle giggle yak yak. Just a pseudo-friend, disposable friend. Friend as accessory. Just so I don't feel or look so stupid.

Everybody told me to be a man. Nobody told me how.

I want to make a memorial for our turkey. Never has a bird been so tortured to provide such a lousy dinner.

He doesn't see my breasts or my waist or my hips. He only sees the nightmare.

I lift my arm out of the water. It's a log. Put it back under and it blows up even bigger. People see the log and call it a twig. They yell at me because I can't see what they see. Nobody can explain to me why my eyes work different than theirs. Nobody can make it stop.

Mr. Freeman sighs. "No imagination. What are you thirteen? Fourteen? You've already let them beat your creativity out of you!

I am the space between my thighs, daylight shining through.

When people don't express themselves, they die one piece at a time. You'd be shocked at how many adults are really dead inside—walking through their days with no idea who they are, just waiting for a heart attack or cancer or a Mack truck to come along and finish the job. It's the saddest thing I know.

Another page turns on the calendar, April now, not March. ......... I am spinning the silk threads of my story, weaving the fabric of my world...I spun out of control. Eating was hard. Breathing was hard. Living was hardest. I wanted to swallow the bitter seeds of forgetfulness...Somehow, I dragged myself out of the dark and asked for help. I spin and weave and knit my words and visions until a life starts to take shape. There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever. There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn't matter anymore. I am thawing.

I wish I had cancer. I will burn in hell for that, but it's true.

I picked up one of the books and flipped through it. Don't get me wrong, I like reading. But some books should come with warning labels: Caution: contains characters and plots guaranteed to induce sleepiness. Do not attempt to operate heavy machinery after ingesting more than one chapter. Has been known to cause blindness, seizures and a terminal loathing of literature. Should only be taken under the supervision of a highly trained English teacher. Preferably one who grades on the curve.

Life is for the living. Don't let the fear of striking out let you from keep you from playing the game.

Why are you being so mean?" "Friends tell friends the truth." "yeah, but not to hurt, to help.

Here stands a girl clutching a knife. There is grease on the stove, blood in the air, and angry words piled in the corners. We are trained not to see it, not to see any of it. . . . Someone just ripped off my eyelids.

I can’t tell anymore when I’m asleep and when I’m awake, or which is worse.

I know my head isn't screwed on straight. I want to leave, transfer, warp myself to another galaxy. I want to confess everything, hand over the guilt and mistake and anger to someone else. There is a beast in my gut, I can hear it scraping away at the inside of my ribs. Even if I dump the memory, it will stay with me, staining me. My closest is a good thing, a quiet place that helps me hold these thoughts inside my head where no one can hear them.

First thought: It was a dream Second thought: No it wasn't Third thought: Crap

A scar is a sign of strength. . .the sign of a survivor.

Cold and silence. Nothing quieter than snow. The sky screams to deliver it, a hundred banshees flying on the edge of the blizzard. But once the snow covers the ground, it hushes as still as my heart.

Why not spend that time on art: painting, sculpting, charcoal, pastel, oils? Are words or numbers more important than images? Who decides this? Does algebra move you to tears? Can plural possessives express the feelings in your heart? If you don't learn art now, you will never learn to breathe!

Smoke gunpowder and go to school to jump through hoops, sit up and beg, and roll over on command. Listen to the whispers that curl into your head at night, calling you ugly and fat and stupid and bitch and whore and worst of all "a disappointment." Puke and starve and cut and drink because you don't want to feel any of this.

She offered herself to the big, bad wolf and didn't scream when he took the first bite.

I'm learning how to taste everything.

We held hands when we walked down the gingerbread path into the forest, blood dripping from our fingers. We danced with witches and kissed monsters. We turned us into wintergirls, when she tried to leave, I pulled her back into the snow because I was afraid to be alone.

You’re not dead, but you’re not alive, either. You’re a wintergirl.

This girl shivers and crawls under the covers with all her clothes on and falls into an overdue library book, a faerie story with rats and marrow and burning curses. The sentences build a fence around her, a Times Roman 10-point barricade, to keep the thorny voices in her head from getting too close.

Nothing is perfect. Flaws are interesting. Be the tree.

I needed to hear the world but didn't want the world to know I was listening.

The only number that would ever be enough is 0. Zero pounds, zero life, size zero, double-zero, zero point. Zero in tennis is love. I finally get it.

It is my first morning of high school. I have seven new notebooks, a skirt I hate, and a stomachache.

I would never be popular. I didn't want to be; I liked being shy. I'd never be the smartest or the hottest or the happiest. By eighth grade you start to figure out your limits.

This is wonderful, wonderful! Be the bird. You are the bird. Sacrifice yourself to abandoned family values....

I make it through the first two weeks of school without a nuclear meltdown.

Rumors are spread by jealous people

It doesn't hurt. Nothing hurts except the small smiles and blushes that flash across the room like tiny sparrows.

My face becomes a Picasso sketch, my body slicing into pieces.

I want to be in fifth grade again. Now, that is a deep dark secret, almost as big as the other one. Fifth grade was easy -- old enough to play outside without Mom, too young to go off the block. The perfect leash length.

Cutting pain was a different flavor of hurt. It made it easier not to think about having my body and my family and my life stolen, made it easier not to care... -Wintergirls

I knew it!" He pumps a fist into the air. "You've fallen in love with me. You want to have my babies. We'll get a team of horses and a covered wagon and we'll journey to South America and raise goats.

I was good at digging holes. It was the rest of life I sucked at.

The same boys who got detention in elementary school for beating the crap out of people are now rewarded for it. They call it football.

I am learning how to be angry and sad and lonely and joyful and excited and afraid and happy.

Oppressive bastards, think they own the place. I told them that karma's going to kick their asses....

She cannot chain my soul. Yes, she could hurt me. She'd already done so...I would bleed, or not. Scar, or not. Live, or not. But she could not hurt my soul, not unless I gave it to her.

Emma is a mattress who got thrown off the truck when her parents split up. It's not like you can blame a mattress when people don't tie it down tight enough.

I watch the Eruptions. Mount Dad, long dormant, now considered armed and dangerous. Mount Saint Mom, oozing lava, spitting flame. Warn the villagers to run into the sea.

All that crap you hear on TV about communication and expressing feelings is a lie. Nobody really wants to hear what you have to say.

Literature is the safe and traditional vehicle through which we learn about the world and pass on values from on generation to the next. Books save lives.

To keep up appearances, I stomp my room and slam the door.

Sometimes being an adult means doing the right thing, even if it's not what you want.

I'd treat myself to a reading marathon all weekend. All the ice cream I could eat, all the pages I could read. Heaven.

I knit the afternoon away. I knit reasons for Elijah to come back. I knit apologies for Emma. I knit angry knots and slipped stitches for every mistake I ever made, and I knit wet, swollen stitches that look awful. I knit the sun down.

There's no point in asking why, even though everybody will. I know why. The harder question is "why not?" I can't believe she ran out of answers before I did.

They yell at me because I can’t see what they see. Nobody can explain to me why my eyes work different than theirs. Nobody can make it stop.

I cry to let everything out

The number doesn't matter. If I got down to 070.00, I'd want to be 065.00. If I weight 010.00, I wouldn't be happy until I got down to 005.00. The only number that would ever be enough is 0. Zero pounds, zero life, size zero, double-zero, zero point. Zero in tennis is love. I finally get it.

I just thought of a great theory that explains everything. When I went to that party, I was abducted by aliens. They have created a fake Earth and fake high school to study me and my reactions. This certainly explains cafeteria food.

I want to go to sleep and not wake up, but I don’t want to die.

Why? You want to know why? Step into a tanning booth and fry yourself for two or three days. After your skin bubbles and peels off, roll in coarse salt, then pull on long underwear woven from spun glass and razor wire. Over that goes your regular clothes, as long as they are tight. Smoke gunpowder and go to school to jump through hoops, sit up and beg, and roll over on command. Listen to the whispers that curl into your head at night, calling you ugly and fat and stupid and bitch and whore and worst of all, "a disappointment." Puke and starve and cut and drink because you don't want to feel any of this. Puke and starve and drink and cut because you need the anesthetic and it works. For a while. But then the anesthetic turns into poison and by then it's too late because you are mainlining it now, straight into your soul. It is rotting you and you can't stop. Look in a mirror and find a ghost. Hear every heartbeat scream that everysinglething is wrong with you. "Why?" is the wrong question. Ask "Why not?

A little kid asks my dad why that man is chopping down the tree. Dad: He's not chopping it down. He's saving it. Those branches were long dead from disease. All plants are like that. By cutting off the damage you make it possible for the tree to grow again. You watch - by the end of summer, this tree will be the strongest on the block.

I am locked into the mirror and there is no door out.

We swore sacred oaths to be strong and to save the planet and to be friends forever.

None of [the books are] worth reading. There are no fairy tales, no faerie tails, no sword-swinging princesses or lightning-throwing gods.

Censoring books that deal with difficult, adolescent issues does not protect anybody. Quite the opposite. It leaves kids in the darkness and makes them vulnerable. Censorship is the child of fear and the father of ignorance. Our children cannot afford to have the truth of the world withheld from them

Who cares what the color means? How do you know what he meant to say? I mean, did he leave another book called "Symbolism in My Books?" If he didn't, then you could just be making all of this up. Does anyone really think this guy sat down and stuck all kinds of hidden meanings into his story? It's just a story.... But I think you are making all of this symbolism stuff up. I don't believe any of it.

The one good thing about being kind of shy is that nobody bugs you when you want to be left alone.

Don't expect to make a difference unless you speak up for yourself.

They say they have noticed me drawing. I almost tell them right then and there. They noticed.

He says a million things without saying a word. I have never heard a more eloquent silence.

Where did you live before you came here?" I asked. "The moon," he said smoothly. "We left because the place had no atmosphere.

I see IT in the hallway. IT goes to Merryweather. IT is walking with Aubrey cheerleader. IT is my nightmare and I can't wake up.IT sees me. IT smiles and winks. Good thing my lips are stitched together or I'd throw up.

Principal Principal: Where's your late pass, mister? Errant Student: I'm on my way to get one now. PP: But you can't be in the hall without a pass. ES: I know, I'm so upset. That's why I need to hurry, so I can get a pass. Principal Principal pauses with a look on his face like Daffy Duck's when Bugs is pulling a fast one. PP: Well, hurry up, then, and get that pass.

People who have to announce that they are trustworthy deserve to be lied to.

too many grown-ups tell kids to follow their dreams like that's going to get them somewhere Auntie Laurie says follow your nightmares instead cuz when you figure out what's eating you alive you can slay it

No, I am never setting foot in this house again it scares me and makes me sad and I wish you could be a mom whose eyes worked but I don't think you can.

I can't do everything for you. You must walk alone to find your soul.

You hurt her by starving yourself, you hurt her with your lies, and by fighting everybody who tries to help you. Emma can only sleep a couple of hours a night now. She's haunted by nightmares of monsters that eat our whole family. They eat us slowly, she says, so we can feel their sharp teeth.

You're the one who doesn't understand, I've been standing on the edge with you for years.

Too much sun after a Syracuse winter does strange things to your head, makes you feel strong, even if you aren't.

My English teacher has no face. She has uncombed stringy hair that droops on her shoulders. The hair is black from her part to her ears and then neon orange to the frizzy ends. I can't decide if she had pissed off her hairdresser or is morphing into a monarch butterfly. I call her Hairwoman.

I am not going to think about it. It was ugly, but it’s over, and I’m not going to think about it.

Mr. Freeman: You are getting better at this, but it's not good enough. This looks like a tree,but it is an average, ordinary, everyday, boring tree. Breathe life into it. Make it bend - trees are flexible, so they don't snap. Scar it, give it a twisted branch - perfect trees don't exist. Nothing is perfect. Flaws are interesting. Be the tree.

Dead girl walking” the boys say in the halls. “Tell us your secrets” the girls whisper, one toilet to another. "I am that girl. I am the spaces between my thighs, daylight shinning through. I am the bones they want, wired on a porcelain frame.

Didn't help to ponder things that were forever gone. It only made a body restless and fill up with bees, all wanting to sting something.

It's Nathaniel Hawthorne Month in English. Poor Nathaniel. Does he know what they've done to him? We're reading The Scarlet Letter one sentence at a time, tearing it up and chewing on its bones. It's all about SYMBOLISM, says Hairwoman. Every word chosen by Nathaniel, every comma, every paragraph break -- these were all done on purpose. To get a decent grade in her class, we have to figure out what he was really trying to say. Why couldn't he just say what he meant? Would they pin scarlet letters on his chest? B for blunt, S for straightforward?

Because I am still a little girl who believes in Santa and the tooth fairy and you.

I am so sorry. I wish you knew even one tenth of one percent of how sorry I am. ...It was my fault. Can I kill myself here, or should I do it outside, so the mess on your carpet doesn't upset your mother?

I wanted to pull down a book, open it proper, and gobble up page after page

We should teach our girls that snapping is ok, instead of waiting for someone else to break them.

Killing people is easier than it should be.” Dad put on his beret. “Staying alive is harder.

If I run or breathe too deep, the cheap stitches holding me together will snap, and all the stickiness inside will pour out and burn through the concrete.

You must walk alone to find your soul.

I pull my lower lip all the way in between my teeth. If I try hard enough, maybe I can gobble my whole self this way.... I didn't try hard enough to swallow myself.

There is no safer. There’s not even safe, never has been.

I won the wintergirl trip over the border into dangerland.

If I had lady-spider legs, I would weave a sky where the stars lined up. Matresses would be tied down tight to their trucks, bodies would never crash through windshields. The moon would rise above the wine-dark sea and give babies only to maidens and musicians who had prayed long and hard. Lost girls wouldn't need compasses or maps. They would find gingerbread paths to lead them out of the forest and home again. They would never sleep in silver boxes with white velvet sheets, not until they were wrinkled-paper grandmas and ready for the trip.

Having a friend made everything else suck less.

I can see us, living in the woods, her wearing that A, me with a S maybe, S for silent, S for stupid, for scared. S for silly. For shame.

My first class is biology. I can't find it and get my first demerit for wandering the hall. It is 8:50 in the morning. Only 699 days and 7 class periods until graduation.

I don't just use yarn from a store. I buy old sweaters from consignment shops. The older the better, and unravel them. There are countries of women in this scarf/shawl/blanket. Soon it will be big enough to keep me warm.

My parents didn't raise me to be religious. The closest we come to worship is the Trinity of Visa, Mastercard, and American Express. I think the Merryweather cheerleaders confuse me because I missed out on Sunday School. It has to be a miracle. There is no other explanation. How else could they sleep with the football team on Saturday night and be reincarnated as virginal goddesses on Monday?

When life sucks, read. They can't yell at you for that. And if they do, then you can ignore them.

Puke and starve and cut and drink because you don't want to feel any of this. Puke and starve and cut and drink because you need an anesthetic and it works. For awhile. But then the anesthetic turns into poison and by then it's to late because you are maintaining it now,straight into your soul. It is rotting you and you can't stop.

When you're alive, people can hurt you. It's easier to crawl into a bone cage or a snowdrift of confusion. It's easier to lock everybody out. But it's a lie.

Censorship is the child of fear the father of ignorance and the desperate weapon of fascists everywhere.

Note: 'family' does NOT only mean a biological unit composed of people who share genetic markers or legal bonds, headed by a heterosexual-mated pair. Family is much, much more than that.

They tied me back together, but they didn't use double knots. My insides are draining out of the fault lines in my skin, I can feel it, but every time I check the bandages, they're dry.

Make it bend — trees are flexible, so they don’t snap. Scar it, give it a twisted branch — perfect trees don’t exist. Nothing is perfect. Flaws are interesting. Be the tree.

wats yr typ? people who can spell

I pushed my ragged mouth against the mirror. A thousand crushed bleeding lips pushed back at me...

I flip ahead in the textbook. There's an interesting chapter about acid rain. Nothing about sex. We aren't scheduled to learn about that until eleventh grade.

Do you know how much women loathe it when guys think every show of negative emotion is tied to our menstrual cycle, like we're sheep or something?

Melancholy held me hostage, and the bees built a hive of sadness in my soul.

Eating plain toast will detonate her. "I'll have some honey." When the bread is done I scrape on a microscopic layer of it and pour a cup of coffee, black. She pretends not to listen or watch as I crunch through my breakfast. I pretend that I don't notice her pretending.

I don’t know how they do it. I don’t know how anybody does it, waking up every morning and eating and moving from the bus to the assembly line, where the teacherbots inject us with Subject A and Subject B, and passing every test they give us. Our parents provide the list of ingredients and remind us to make healthy choices: one sport, two clubs, one artistic goal, community service, no grades below a B, because really, nobody’s average, not around here. It’s a dance with complicated footwork and a changing tempo. I’m the girl who trips on the dance floor and can’t find her way to the exit. All eyes on me.

My head is killing me, my throat is killing me, my stomach bubbles with toxic waste. I just want to sleep. A coma would be nice. Or amnesia. Anything, just to get rid if this, these thoughts, whispers in my mind.

I scared myself, because once you've thought long and hard enough about doing something that is colossally stupid, you feel like you've actually done it, and then you're never quite sure what your limits are.

The world is crazy. You need a license to drive a car and go fishing. You don't need a license to start a family. Two people have sex and BAM! Perfectly innocent kid is born whose life will be screwed up by her parents forever.

And then a new screen, one I had never seen before, never even heard of popped up. It gave me a choice. I could become the new Lord of Darkness myself, or I could take a gamble and be reincarnated. I chose wisely.

Can the plural possessive express the feelings in your heart? If you don't learn art now, you will never learn to breathe!

Can't escape pain, kiddo. Battle through it and you get stronger.

Mr Freeman: "Art without emotion is like chocolate cake without sugar. It makes you gag." He sticks his finger down his throat. "The next time you work on your trees, don't think about trees. Think about love, or hate, or joy, or pain- whatever makes you feel something, makes your palms sweat, or your toes curl. Focus on that feeling. When people don't express themselves, they die on piece at a time. You'd be shocked at how many adults are really dead inside- walking through their days with no idea who they are, just waiting for a heart attack or cancer or a mack truck to come along and finish the job. It's the saddest thing I know.

Why bother trying? What was the point? So I could go to some suck-ass college, get a diploma, march out into a job that I hated, marry a pretty girl who would want to divorce me, but then she wouldn't because we'd have kids, so instead she'd be the angry woman at the other end of the kitchen table, and the kids would grow up watching this, until one day I'd look at my son and he'd look just like that face in the bathroom mirror? If that was life, then it was twisted.

I kissed him until everything that hurt inside me melted into a pool of black water so deep I couldn’t touch the bottom. As long as I was touching him, I wouldn’t drown.

I look at my homely sketch. It doesn't need anything. Even through the river in my eyes I can see that. It isn't perfect and that makes it just right.

Shame, turned inside out, is rage.

I am thawing.

I keep thinking that if I could just unzip my skin, step out of this body, then I would see who I really am.“ She nods her head slowly. „What do you think you‘d look like?” “Smaller, for a start.

We tilt our heads back and open wide. The snow drifts into our zombie mouths crawling with grease and curses and tobacco flakes and cavities and boyfriend/girlfriend juice, the stain of lies. For one moment we are not failed tests and broken condoms and cheating on essays; we are crayons and lunch boxes and swinging so high our sneakers punch holes in the clouds. For one breath everything feels better. Then it melts. The bus drivers rev their engines and the ice cloud shatters. Everyone shuffles forward. They don't know what just happened. They can't remember.

I stuff my mouth with old fabric and scream until there are no sounds left under my skin.

What do you miss about being alive?" The sound of my mom singing, a little off-key. The way my dad went to all my swim meets and I could hear his whistle when my head was underwater, even if he did yell at me afterward for not trying harder. I miss going to the library. I miss the smell of clothes fresh out of the dryer. I miss diving off the highest board and nailing the landing. I miss waffles" - p. 272.

I open a paperclip and scratch it across the inside of my left wrist. Pitiful. If a suicide attempt is a cry for help, then what is this. A whimper, a peep? I draw little window cracks of blood, etching line after line until it stops hurting.

I keep thinking that if I could just unzip my skin, step out of this body, then I would see who I really am.

Technology is the campfire around which we tell our stories.

The school board banned one of Maya Angelou's books, so the librarian had to take down her poster. I fished it out of the trash. She must be a great writer if the school board is scared of her.

There is something about Christmas that requires a rug rat. Little kids make Christmas fun. I wonder if could rent one for the holidays. When I was tiny we would by a real tree and stay up late drinking hot chocolate and finding just the right place for the special decorations. It seems like my parents gave up the magic when I figured out the Santa lie. Maybe I shouldn't have told them I knew where the presents really came from. It broke their hearts. I bet they'd be divorced by now if I hadn't been born. I'm sure I was a huge disappointment. I'm not pretty or smart or athletic. I'm just like them- an ordinary drone dressed in secrets and lies. I can't believe we have to keep playacting till I graduate. It's a shame we just can't admit that we have failed at family living, sell the house, split up the money, and get on with our lives. Merry Christmas.

You’re not dead, but you’re not alive, either. You’re a wintergirl, Lia-Lia, caught in between the worlds. You’re a ghost with a beat- ing heart. Soon you’ll cross the border and be with me. I’m so stoked. I miss you wicked.

I understood what triggered her earthquakes, most of them.

be aggressive, BE-BE Aggressive! B-E A-G-G-R-E-S-S-I-V-E

My good sense bitch slapped my estrogen and told her to get a grip.

Yes it is, because you can only be brave if you're scared.

I want to eat like a normal person eats, but I need to see my bones or I will hate myself even more and I might cut out my heart or take every pill that was ever made.

The best time to talk to ghosts is just before the sun comes up.

Grandma frowned and yelled something in Russian. She could have been saying, 'Open up, your best friend is here.' On the other hand, it could have been, 'America is a great country because of canned ravioli.

I swallowed the fear. It’s always there– fear– and if you don’t stay on top of it, you’ll drown. I swallowed again and stood tall, shoulders broad, arms loose. I was balanced, ready to move. My body said, “Yeah, you’re bigger and stronger, but if you touch this, I will hurt you.

I don’t know what I’m doing in the next five minutes and she has the next ten years figured out. I’ll worry about making it out of ninth grade alive. Then I’ll think about a career path.

I am a gluttonous, gorging failure. A waste. My body isn’t used to high-sugar carbs laced with witchcraft. It can barely cope with soup and crackers.

the false innocence you render for them by censoring truth protects only you

The light beyond my eyes flashflashflashes with a hundred futures for me. Doctor. Ship's captain. Forest ranger. Librarian. Beloved of that man or that women or those children or those people who voted for me or who painted my picture. Poet. Acrobat. Engineer. Friend. Guardian. Avenging whirlwind. A million futures--not all pretty, not all long, but all of them mine. I do have a choice" - p. 271

This is not our fight', the old man said. 'British or American, that is not the choice. You must choose your own side, find your road through the valley of darkness that will lead you to the river Jordan. . . Look hard for your river Jordan, my child. You'll find it.

The dead do walk and haunt and crawl into your bed at night. Ghosts sneak into your head when you're not looking. Stars line up and volcanoes birth out bits of glass that foretell the future. Poison berries make girls stronger, but sometimes kill them. If you howl at the moon and swear on your blood, anything you desire will be yours. Be careful what you wish for. There's always a catch.

Adrenaline kicks you in when you’re starving. That’s what nobody understands. Except for being hungry and cold, most of the time I feel like I can do anything. It gives me superhuman powers of smell and hearing. I can see what people are thinking, stay two steps ahead of them. I do enough homework to stay off the radar. Every night I climb thousands of steps into the sky to make me so exhausted that when I fall into bed, I don’t notice Cassie. Then suddenly it’s morning and I leap on the hamster wheel and it starts all over again.

I stand in the center aisle of the auditorium, a wounded zebra in a National Geographic special, looking for someone, anyone to sit next to. A predator approaches: gray jock buzz cut, whistle around a neck thicker than his head. Probably a social studies teacher, hired to coach a blood sport.

i was raped, too sexually assaulted in seventh grade, tenth grade. the summer after graduation, at a party i was 16 i was 14 i was 5 and he did it for three years i loved him i didn't even know him he was my best friend's brother, my grandfather, father, mommy's boyfriend, my date, my cousin, my coach i met him for the first time that night and- 4 guys took turns, and- i'm a boy and this happened to me, and- ...i got pregnant i gave up my daughter for adoption... did it happen to you, too?

Brain: You don’t want this. Hormones: Dude, this is EXACTLY what I want. B: No, not like this—she's wasted. H: What's your point? B: She won't remember this, and if she does, she'll be angry. H: Do you see where her hand is? God, that feels good. Can't you feel that? B: She's drunk. You can't do this. It's wrong H: I want to do this. B: Really? You want to go to school and say you scored with Bethany Milbury when she was so drunk she barely knew her name? H: H: H: You're an asshole. I hate you. B: She needs to eat something and drink some water. Don't let her drink anymore beer. H: H: Yeah, I know B: She'll love you for taking care of her. She'll love that you respected her. H: Five more minutes? Just five? B: Now. H: I can't believe you're making me do this.

You can dance. You can make me laugh. You've got x-ray eyes. You know how to sing. You're a diplomat. You've got it all. Everybody loves you. You can charm the birds out of the sky, But I, I've got one thing. You always know just what to say And when to go, But I've got one thing. You can see in the dark, But I've got one thing: I loved you better. Last night I woke up, Saw this angel. He flew in my window. And he said, Girl, pretty proud of yourself, huh?" And I looked around and said, Who me?" And he said, "The higher you fly, the faster you fall." He said, "Send it up. Watch it rise. See it fall, Gravity's rainbow. Send it up. Watch it rise. See it fall, Gravity's Angel.

I am spinning the silk threads of my story, weaving the fabric of my world. The tiny elf dancer became a wooden doll whose strings were jerked by people not paying attention. I spun out of control. Eating was hard. Breathing was hard. Living was hardest. I wanted to swallow the bitter seeds of forgetfulness. Cassie did, too. We leaned on each other, lost in the dark and wandering in endless circles. She got too tired an went to sleep. Somehow, I dragged myself out of the dark and asked for help. I spin and weave and knit my words and visions until a life starts to take shape. There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever. There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn't matter anymore. I am thawing.

I am Outcast." "The kids behind me laugh so loud I know they’re laughing about me. I can’t help myself. I turn around. It’s Rachel, surrounded by a bunch of kids wearing clothes that most definitely did not come from the EastSide Mall. Rachel Bruin, my ex-best friend. She stares at something above my left ear. Words climb up my throat. This was the girl who suffered through Brownies with me, who taught me how to swim, who understood about my parents, who didn’t make fun of my bedroom. If there is anyone in the entire galaxy I am dying to tell what really happened, it’s Rachel. My throat burns." "Her eyes meet mine for a second. “I hate you,” she mouths silently.

The parents are making threatening noises, turning dinner into performance art, with dad doing his Arnold Schwarzenegger imitation and mom playing Glenn Close in one of her psycho roles. I am the Victim. Mom: [creepy smile] “Thought you could put one over us, did you, Melinda? Big high school students now, don’t need to show your homework to your parents, don’t need to show any failing test grades?” Dad: [bangs table, silverware jumps] “Cut the crap. She knows what’s up. The interim reports came today. Listen to me, young lady. I’m only going to say this to you once. You get those grades up or your name is mud. Hear me? Get them up!” [Attacks baked potato.]

Why?’ She nods. ‘She had everything: a family who loved her, friends, activities. Her mother wants to know why she threw it all away?’ Why you want to know why? Step into a tanning booth and fry yourself for two or three days. After your skin bubbles and falls off, roll in coarse salt, then put on long underwear woven from spun glass and razor wire. Over that goes your regular clothes, as long as they are tight. Smoke gunpowder and go to school to jump through hoops, sit up and beg, and roll over on command. Listen to the whispers that curl into your head at night, calling you ugly and fat and stupid and bitch and whore and worst of all ‘A disappointment.’ Puke and starve and cut and drink because you need an anesthetic and it works. For a while. But then the anesthetic turns into poison and by then it’s too late because you are mainlining it now, straight into your soul. It is rotting you and you can’t stop. Look in a mirror and find a ghost. Hear every heartbeat scream that everythingsinglething is wrong with you. ‘Why?’ is the wrong question. Ask ‘Why not?