Mieko Kawakami Heaven Quotes

But I wasn’t crying because I was sad. I guess I was crying because we had nowhere else to go, no choice but to go on living in this world. Crying because we had no other world to choose, and crying at everything before us, everything around us.

Everything was beautiful. Not that there was anyone to share it with, anyone to tell. Just the beauty.

Because we’re always in pain, we know exactly what it means to hurt somebody else.

Listen, if there is a hell, we're in it. And if there's a heaven, we're already there. This is it.

her voice was amazing, like a 6B pencil

Without school, I could get by without seeing anyone or being seen by anyone. It was like being a piece of furniture in a room that nobody uses. I can't express how safe it felt never being seen.

Everything that I could see was beautiful. I cried and cried, standing there, surrounded by that beauty, even though I wasn’t standing anywhere. I could hear the sound of my own tears. Everything was beautiful. Not that there was anyone to share it with, anyone to tell. Just the beauty.

Even if something happens to us, even if we die and never have to deal with them again, the same thing will happen to someone, somewhere. The same thing. The weak always go through this, and there’s nothing we can do about it. Because the strong never go away. That’s why you want to pretend to be like them, isn’t it? You want to join them.

In the cold December air, all the leaves, thousands upon thousands of them, flashed against the sky, drenched in gold. Every leaf rang with its own light, and all the light poured into me without end.

At first, suicide was just a word, a vague idea separate from reality. It pointed at a way that other people chose to die, people I didn't even know. But once the word became my own, it took on the strangest shape. I could feel it growing deep inside of me. Suicide wasn't something that happened to strangers. I could make it happen, if I wanted to.

I knew that it was cruel to be so optimistic, but, in my solitude, I couldn't resist the urge and spent entire days basking in idiotic fantasies, sometimes verging on prayer.

There are all kinds of things in the world I don't understand, but I really wanted to understand you.

Then it hit me: dying is just like sleeping. You only know you’re sleeping when you wake up the next day, but if morning never comes, you sleep forever. That must be what death is like. When someone dies, they don’t even know they’re dead. Because they never see it happen, nobody ever really dies. This hit me like a sucker punch.

Because we're always in pain, we know exactly what it means to hurt somebody else.

I remembered how she wrote once about when you send someone a letter, how it's out of your hands. It's not yours anymore, even though you wrote it.

But I wasn't crying because I was sad. I guess I was crying because we had nowhere else to go, no choice but to go on living in this world. Crying because we had no other world to choose, and crying at everything before us, everything around us.

What is dying anyway? I let this impossible question fill the darkness of my bedroom. I thought about how somebody was always dying somewhere, at any given moment. This isn’t a fable or a joke or an abstract idea. People are always dying. It’s a perfect truth. No matter how we live our lives, we all die sooner or later. In which case, living is really just waiting to die. And if that’s true, why bother living at all? Why was I even alive? I made myself crazy, tossing and turning, hyperventilat- ing. Then it hit me: dying is just like sleeping. You only know you’re sleeping when you wake up the next day, but if morn- ing never comes, you sleep forever. That must be what death is like. When someone dies, they don’t even know they’re dead. Because they never see it happen, nobody ever really dies. This hit me like a sucker punch.

When I was writing, I realized something. Your voice reminds me of a 6B. I'm not sure if this is going to make sense, but it's like they're soft and rigid at the same time. Almost unbreakable.

No, I shouted. I don’t want that kind of strength. I don’t want to be dragged into this, and I don’t want to drag anyone else down, either.

You think about how other people feel. You're so kind. It makes sense. Because we're always in pain, we know exactly what it means to hurt somebody else.

It's funny, but when I'm doing nothing, I get this feeling like I'm fighting something. Stick... fighting. It never goes away, even when I'm in bed, even when I'm walking around.

No matter how we live our lives, we all die sooner or later. In which case, living is really just waiting to die. And if that's true, why bother living at all? Why was I even alive?

If anything has meaning, everything does. And if nothing has meaning, nothing does. That's what I was saying. It's all the same. You, me, we're all free to interpret the world however we want. We see the world differently. It's that simple.

For people to actually live by some golden rule, we’d have to be living in a world with no contradictions. But we don’t live in a world like that. No one does. People do what works for them, whatever makes them feel good. But because nobody likes getting stepped on, people start spouting crap about being good to others, being considerate, whatever. Tell me I’m wrong. Everyone does things they don’t want people doing back. Predators eat prey, and school serves no real purpose other than separating the kids who have what it takes from the ones who don’t. That’s the whole point. Everywhere you look, the strong walk all over the weak. Even those fools who think they’ve found the answers by coming up with perfect little sayings about how the world ought to be can’t escape it. Because the real world is everywhere.

If you don’t like it, stopping it is up to you and no one else. It’s that simple. You should know that this rule about treating others the way you want to be treated is bullshit. Total bullshit. It’s just this thing that people with no power and no talent tell themselves. Wake the hell up.

They don't know how they make other people feel, and they've never stopped to think about other people's pain.

Sometimes you can’t see the scars. But there’s a lot of pain, I think.” After that, she was quiet.

We'll understand some things while we're alive and some after we die. But it doesn't really matter when it happens. What matters is that all the pain and all the sadness have meaning.

What did it mean for us to be friends? What was a friend supposed to do? I couldn’t bring myself to ask.

She was alive, and seeing her like that infused me with a loneliness and indescribable longing.

Smells can remind you of all kinds of things. More than remind, they bypass your mind altogether, tingling in your palms and nose, triggering feelings before they even become feelings.

Something really painful happened to them. Something really, really sad. But know what? They made it though. That’s why they can live in perfect harmony. After everything, after all the pain, they made it here. It looks like a normal room, but it’s really Heaven.

The paintings here were mystifying. In the reds and greens of the canvases, maidens danced with animals, a goat or something carried a violin in its mouth, and a man and a woman embraced under a gigantic blazing bouquet. This swarm of unrelated images was like a glimpse into a dream. But not a good one. The joy I saw there was ferocious, and the sadness suffocatingly cold. Blues thrown onto the canvas warred with yellows approaching like tornadoes. People gathered round aghast to watch a circus spin to life.

Weakness matters, she said. It has real meaning. I was silent, focused on her voice. But know what, she said, if weakness matters, then so does strength. And I don’t mean weak people using the idea of strength to justify their weakness.

It’s the only thing we can do. And not just for our sake, you know? It’s for the other kids, too, even if they don’t realize it. But that doesn’t matter. All that matters is we understand it, you and me. We get it. And, like, in that way, living with this weakness, accepting it completely, that’s the greatest strength in the whole world. It’s not just my dad or them or us. We do it for everyone who’s weak everywhere, in the name of actual strength. Everything we take, all of the abuse, we do it to rise above. We do it for the people who know how important it is.

People who don’t know what it’s like being poor are always like, ‘It’s okay to be poor, as long as you have love,’ but they don’t know what they’re saying.

Hey...if we keep doing this, just saying nothing, no matter what they do, think maybe we'll become things, too?

Happamine.” “What’s that mean?” “It’s, like, dopamine that comes out when you’re really happy.

I guess I was crying because we had nowhere else to go, no choice but to go on living in this world. Crying because we had no other world to choose, and crying at everything before us, everything around us.

When you were a kid, people probably told you that you would go to hell if you were bad, right? Well, guess what. There’s no hell. It’s all made up. They made it up. Nothing had any meaning, so they had to make some. The weak can't handle reality. They can't deal with the pain or sadness, let alone the obvious fact that nothing has any meaning.

I almost never feel like eveything’s okay, but just because most of my life feels wrong doesn’t mean that’s how I want it to be. There’s a part of me that doesn’t feel like anything is wrong or okay. Just normal. That’s the part of me I like, the normal part.

It’s just that some people can do things, and others can’t. There are things that they want to do and things that they don’t. Everyone has their own likes and dislikes. It couldn’t be any simpler. People do what they can get away with.” Momose suppressed a yawn. “None of it happens for any reason, though. We can do those things, for no reason. We can. We do. And you can’t. There’s no reason for that either.

How did I feel about Kojima? How come I never spoke to her at school or even attempted eye contact? Sure, I was scared of Ninomiya, but what exactly made me scared? Was I afraid of getting hurt? If that was it, if that was what was haunting me, why couldn’t I stand up to him? What does it mean to be hurt? When they bullied me and beat me up, why couldn’t I do anything but obey them? What does it mean to obey? Why was I scared? Why? What does it mean to be scared?

People are always dying. It's a perfect truth. No matter how we live our lives, we all die, sooner or later. In which case, living is really just waiting to die.

I couldn't stop the tears. I asked myself if I was sad, but I'd lost touch with what sadness was supposed to be.

And, like, in that way, living with this weakness, accepting it completely, that's the greatest strength in the whole world.

The more I looked at it, the less it seemed like something for a house. More like a tiny gravestone.

For people to actually live by some golden rule, we’d have to be living in a world with no contradictions. But we don’t live in a world like that. No one does. People do what works for them, whatever makes them feel good. But because nobody likes getting stepped on, people start spouting crap about being good to others, being considerate, whatever … Everyone does things they don’t want people doing back.

This is our will. We let them do this. It's almost like we chose this. That's all the more reason why they can't leave us alone. They're so scared, so terrified, and there's nothing they can do to stop it.

They’re scared to admit there’s anything they don’t understand. They can’t do anything on their own, so they band together, but they aren’t really friends, and when something in the world stands out, they get scared and try to destroy it.

Whatever had been left of summer had disappeared; I was standing in the thick of autumn, and the light and the soil and the smells had been replenished with its cold, as if a silent rain had fallen when nobody was looking, chilling everything.

It made me remember the very first time we met up at Whale Park. The kind of evening you can watch descend, the blue sky darkening into night before your eyes. It felt like it had happened in another life, but it had happened that same year, just in a different season

Know what's funny about letters? Unless you beg the person you sent them to, you never get to read the letters you wrote again. Isn't that weird? Anyways, I'm taking excellent care of your letters in case you ever want to know what you sounded like when you were fourteen.

Kojima said everyone was just scared of my eyes. She said that when they looked at them, and couldn’t tell where I was looking, it sent a signal to their brains that there were things they didn’t understand, and to keep the scary feeling away, they had to keep on bullying us. She said my eyes are who I am, and that she and I weren’t simply giving in, but had chosen things to be this way, and were letting them happen.

All of you have things you value more than anything, right? Photos, or maybe letters. In reality it's all just paper, but we project our memories and emotions onto them, giving them meaning, and that's what makes them more than paper. And out of all those pictures and letters, I bet one or two stand out from the rest, special in a way that no one else would ever understand. That's what it feels like for Kojima to look the way she does. I know it might seem weird, but if photos and letters can mean that much, if you can admit how much they mean to you, is it really so strange that being dirty could do the same thing for someone else? We all see the world in our own way.

Sailboat Table (table by Quint Hankle) The Voyage of the Narwhal, by Andrea Barrett Complete Stories, by Clarice Lispector Boy Kings of Texas, by Domingo Martinez The Marrow Thieves, by Cherie Dimaline A Brief History of Seven Killings, by Marlon James There There, by Tommy Orange Citizen: An American Lyric, by Claudia Rankine Underland, by Robert Macfarlane The Undocumented Americans, by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio Deacon King Kong, by James McBride The Dutch House, by Ann Patchett Will and Testament, by Vigdis Hjorth Every Man Dies Alone, by Hans Fallada The Door, by Magda Svabo The Plot Against America, by Philip Roth Fates and Furies, by Lauren Groff The Overstory, by Richard Power Night Train, by Lise Erdrich Her Body and Other Parties, by Carmen Maria Machado The Penguin Book of the Modern American Short Story, edited by John Freeman Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates Birds of America, by Lorrie Moore Mongrels, by Stephen Graham Jones The Office of Historical Corrections, by Danielle Evans Tenth of December, by George Saunders Murder on the Red River, by Marcie R. Rendon Leave the World Behind, by Rumaan Alam Ceremony, by Leslie Marmon Silko On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, by Ocean Vuong The Unwomanly Face of War, by Svetlana Alexievich Standard Deviation, by Katherine Heiny All My Puny Sorrows, by Miriam Toews The Death of the Heart, by Elizabeth Bowen Mean Spirit, by Linda Hogan NW, by Zadie Smith Being Mortal, by Atul Gawande Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Firekeeper’s Daughter, by Angeline Boulley Erasure, by Percival Everett Sharks in the Time of Saviors, by Kawai Strong Washburn Heaven, by Mieko Kawakami Books for Banned Love Sea of Poppies, by Amitav Ghosh The English Patient, by Michael Ondaatje Euphoria, by Lily King The Red and the Black, by Stendahl Luster, by Raven Leilani Asymmetry, by Lisa Halliday All the Pretty Horses, by Cormac McCarthy Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides The Vixen, by Francine Prose Legends of the Fall, by Jim Harrison The Winter Soldier, by Daniel Mason

Fire on the Mountain, by Anita Desai Sailboat Table (table by Quint Hankle) The Voyage of the Narwhal, by Andrea Barrett Complete Stories, by Clarice Lispector Boy Kings of Texas, by Domingo Martinez The Marrow Thieves, by Cherie Dimaline A Brief History of Seven Killings, by Marlon James There There, by Tommy Orange Citizen: An American Lyric, by Claudia Rankine Underland, by Robert Macfarlane The Undocumented Americans, by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio Deacon King Kong, by James McBride The Dutch House, by Ann Patchett Will and Testament, by Vigdis Hjorth Every Man Dies Alone, by Hans Fallada The Door, by Magda Szabó The Plot Against America, by Philip Roth Fates and Furies, by Lauren Groff The Overstory, by Richard Power Night Train, by Lise Erdrich Her Body and Other Parties, by Carmen Maria Machado The Penguin Book of the Modern American Short Story, edited by John Freeman Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates Birds of America, by Lorrie Moore Mongrels, by Stephen Graham Jones The Office of Historical Corrections, by Danielle Evans Tenth of December, by George Saunders Murder on the Red River, by Marcie R. Rendon Leave the World Behind, by Rumaan Alam Ceremony, by Leslie Marmon Silko On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, by Ocean Vuong The Unwomanly Face of War, by Svetlana Alexievich Standard Deviation, by Katherine Heiny All My Puny Sorrows, by Miriam Toews The Death of the Heart, by Elizabeth Bowen Mean Spirit, by Linda Hogan NW, by Zadie Smith Being Mortal, by Atul Gawande Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Firekeeper’s Daughter, by Angeline Boulley Erasure, by Percival Everett Sharks in the Time of Saviors, by Kawai Strong Washburn Heaven, by Mieko Kawakami

We’ll understand some things while we’re alive and some after we die. But it doesn’t really matter when it happens. What matters is that all the pain and all the sadness have meaning.

You think about how other people feel. You’re so kind. It makes sense. Because we’re always in pain, we know exactly what it means to hurt somebody else.

Her face was glowing in a way it never did at school, and even brighter than the time we met up in the stairwell. When I looked at her, the nervousness I had been feeling burned off in the glow, and I felt an upwelling of relief.

Her voice wasn't high or low, but it was firm, like there was something at its center, holding it together.

Kojima was changing, and watching it happen from a distance petrified me. The changes she was going through had rolled in unannounced, surrounding the small but persistently bright space she had created for me, pushing me out.

Then it hit me: dying is just like sleeping. You only know you’re sleeping when you wake up the next day, but if morning never comes, you sleep forever. That must be what death is like. When someone dies, they don’t even know they’re dead. Because they never see it happen, nobody ever really dies.

I can’t express how safe it felt never being seen. I knew the peace could never last,

We were barreling headfirst into an entire summer.

It looks like a normal room, but it's really Heaven.

But it isn’t meaningless. When it’s all over, we’ll reach a place, somewhere or something we could never reach without having gone through everything we’ve gone through. Know what I mean?

When they say that they’re grossed out, they’re lying. They’re just scared. They’re terrified. I don’t mean they’re scared of the way your eyes look or anything. They’re scared to admit there’s anything they don’t understand. They can’t do anything on their own, so they band together, but they aren’t really friends, and when something in the world stands out, they get scared and try to destroy it. They try to get rid of it. In reality, they’re as scared as anyone, but they trick themselves out of it. They’re trying to find peace, but the more they hide, the more numb they become. But that feeling of fear, it stays with them, so it goes on and on, day after day. No matter how they torture us, we never say anything. Especially not to our teachers or our parents. And no matter what they do, we come to school each day, which makes them even more scared. If we ever started screaming or threw ourselves at their feet and started begging, I bet we could make them stop. But we’re not just playing by their rules. This is our will. We let them do this. It’s almost like we chose this. That’s all the more reason why they can’t leave us alone. They’re so scared, so terrified, and there’s nothing they can do to stop it.

At first, my desire to die was a desire to disappear. I wanted to erase myself and feel real peace. But if dying doesn’t actually involve a moment where you die, could I really disappear? Wouldn’t death basically mean wandering around forever, in something like a dream? It made me wonder: who could tell the difference between living in this world and living in a dream?

I knew the peace could never last, but it was immensely comforting to know that, if I never left my room, no one in the world could lay a finger on me.

It’s funny, but when I’m doing nothing, I get this feeling like I’m fighting something. Stuck . . . fighting. It never goes away, even when I’m in bed, even when I’m walking around.

I don’t really know how to say it, but it’s like something’s wrong, all the time, and I can’t do anything to stop it. It’s always there. When I’m at home, when I’m at school. But things can be good sometimes. Really good. Like when I’m talking to you or writing letters. Those things are really good for me. Then I start feeling like everything’s okay. And that makes me happy. But know what? That feeling like everything’s wrong and this feeling like everything’s okay, I guess a part of me wants to believe that neither one of them is, like, natural . . . I guess I want to feel like they’re both exceptions to the rule. I mean, I almost never feel like everything’s okay, but just because most of my life feels wrong doesn’t mean that’s how I want it to be. There’s a part of me that doesn’t feel like anything is wrong or okay. Just normal. That’s the part of me I like, the normal part.

I can’t express how safe it felt never being seen. I knew the peace could never last, but it was immensely comforting to know that, if I never left my room, no one in the world could lay a finger on me.

But everything starts from nothing. Always

Those two things have nothing to do with each other. Why can't I do things to people that I don't want other people doing to my sister?

Ninomiya smiled at me with his entire face. His skin vibrant, taut with excitement. How was this a human face?

You’re so kind. It makes sense. Because we’re always in pain, we know exactly what it means to hurt somebody else.

everything was beautiful. not that there was anyone to share it with, anyone to tell. just the beauty

Then it hit me: dying is just like sleeping. You only know you’re sleeping when you wake up the next day, but if morning never comes, you sleep forever. That must be what death is like. When someone dies, they don’t even know they’re dead. Because they never see it happen, nobody ever really dies. This hit me like a sucker punch.

Sailboat Table (table by Quint Hankle) The Voyage of the Narwhal, by Andrea Barrett Complete Stories, by Clarice Lispector Boy Kings of Texas, by Domingo Martinez The Marrow Thieves, by Cherie Dimaline A Brief History of Seven Killings, by Marlon James There There, by Tommy Orange Citizen: An American Lyric, by Claudia Rankine Underland, by Robert Macfarlane The Undocumented Americans, by Karla Cornejo Villavicencio Deacon King Kong, by James McBride The Dutch House, by Ann Patchett Will and Testament, by Vigdis Hjorth Every Man Dies Alone, by Hans Fallada The Door, by Magda Svabo The Plot Against America, by Philip Roth Fates and Furies, by Lauren Groff The Overstory, by Richard Power Night Train, by Lise Erdrich Her Body and Other Parties, by Carmen Maria Machado The Penguin Book of the Modern American Short Story, edited by John Freeman Between the World and Me, by Ta-Nehisi Coates Birds of America, by Lorrie Moore Mongrels, by Stephen Graham Jones The Office of Historical Corrections, by Danielle Evans Tenth of December, by George Saunders Murder on the Red River, by Marcie R. Rendon Leave the World Behind, by Rumaan Alam Ceremony, by Leslie Marmon Silko On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, by Ocean Vuong The Unwomanly Face of War, by Svetlana Alexievich Standard Deviation, by Katherine Heiny All My Puny Sorrows, by Miriam Toews The Death of the Heart, by Elizabeth Bowen Mean Spirit, by Linda Hogan NW, by Zadie Smith Being Mortal, by Atul Gawande Americanah, by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Firekeeper’s Daughter, by Angeline Boulley Erasure, by Percival Everett Sharks in the Time of Saviors, by Kawai Strong Washburn Heaven, by Mieko Kawakami

we project our memories and emotions onto them, giving them meaning, and that’s what makes them more than paper.

There's a part of me that doesn't feel like anything is wrong or okay. Just normal. That's the part of me I like, the normal part.

We do it for everyone who's weak everywhere, in the name of actual strength. Everything we take, all of the abuse, we do it to rise above. We do it for the people who know how important it is.

Without school, I could get by without seeing anyone or being seen by anyone. It was like being a piece of furniture in a room that nobody uses. I can’t express how safe it felt never being seen.

If we're weak, our weakness has real meaning. We may be weak, but we get it. We know what's important, and we know what's wrong.

Mungkin … ada hal-hal yang maknanya bisa dipahami selama hidup … dan mungkin ada hal-hal yang baru bisa dipahami setelah mati dan orang lantas orang berkata seperti, ‘Oh, ternyata begitu …’ Lagipula kapan sesuatu bisa dipahami itu tidak penting, yang penting adalah bahwa penderitaan dan kesedihan begini pasti ada maknanya.

Karena kau selalu dilukai, kau sungguh-sungguh memahami seperti apakah orang terluka.

When she turned to look at me, I felt I could see my own face before my eyes.

If we keep doing this, just saying nothing, no matter what they do, think maybe we'll become things, too?

Listen, if there’s a hell, we’re in it. And if there’s a heaven, we’re already there. This is it.

Their whispers, rustling like fabric,

That feeling like every­thing's wrong and this feeling like everything's okay, I guess a part of me wants to believe that neither one of them is, like, natural . . . I guess I want to feel like they' re both exceptions to the rule. I mean, I almost never feel like everything's okay, but just because most of my life feels wrong doesn't mean that's how I want it to be. There's a part of me that doesn't feel like anything is wrong or okay. Just normal. That's the part of me I like, the normal part.

I don’t really know how to say it, but it’s like something’s wrong, all the time, and I can’t do anything to stop it. It’s always there. When I’m at home, when I’m at school. But things can be good sometimes. Really good. Like when I’m talking to you or writing letters. Those things are really good for me. Then I start feeling like everything’s okay. And that makes me happy. But know what? That feeling like everything’s wrong and this feeling like everything’s okay, I guess a part of me wants to believe that neither one of them is, like, natural . . . I guess I want to feel like they’re both exceptions to the rule. I mean, I almost never feel like everything’s okay, but just because most of my life feels wrong doesn’t mean that’s how I want it to be. There’s a part of me that doesn’t feel like anything is wrong or okay. Just normal. That’s the part of me I like, the normal part.

I don’t really know how to say it, but it’s like something’s wrong, all the time, and I can’t do anything to stop it. It’s always there. When I’m at home, when I’m at school. But things can be good sometimes. Really good. Like when I’m talking to you or writing letters. Those things are really good for me. Then I start feeling like everything’s okay. And that makes me happy. But know what? That feeling like everything’s wrong and this feeling like everything’s okay, I guess a part of me wants to believe that neither one of them is, like, natural . . . I guess I want to feel like they’re both exceptions to the rule. I mean, I almost never feel like everything’s okay, but just because most of my life feels wrong doesn’t mean that’s how I want it to be. There’s a part of me that doesn’t feel like anything is wrong or okay. Just normal. That’s the part of me I like, the normal part.

I knew that it was cruel to be so optimistic, but, in my solitude, I couldn’t resist the urge and spent entire days basking in idiotic fantasies, sometimes verging on prayer.

Know what’s funny about letters? Unless you beg the person who you sent them to, you never get to read the letters you wrote again. Isn’t that weird? Anyway, I’m taking excellent care of your letters, just in case you ever want to know what you sounded like when you were fourteen. Hey, I just thought of something good. On the second Wednesday of July 1999, whatever we’re doing and wherever we are, let’s meet up. We can bring all of our letters with us. Isn’t that the best idea? Where should we meet? Can’t wait for your next letter. Hello.

This swarm of unrelated images was like a glimpse into a dream. But not a good one. The joy I saw there was ferocious, and the sadness suffocatingly cold. Blues thrown onto the canvas warred with yellows approaching like tornadoes. People gathered round aghast to watch a circus spin to life. Above a city of snow, a man in white robes closed his eyes and prayed. Every painting was a moment of destruction coinciding with the birth of something wonderful. Each frame contained conflicting worlds. A crowd drawn into a sun spinning like a windmill. Fish washed ashore. A leery horse with eyes more human than anyone alive. A pale maiden.

captivated as I was, I realized this was just another marvel from a world that would never accept me. The only feeling that was truly mine was the pain lingering in my nose. The pain was receding, easier to handle by the day, but it felt like my spirits were never going to lift, no matter how long I waited for change.

People are always dying. It’s a perfect truth. No matter how we live our lives, we all die sooner or later. In which case, living is really just waiting to die. And if that’s true, why bother living at all?

I was haunted by a certainty that there was some essential, fatal flaw in the basis of my thinking, a guarantee that any thought, by virtue of its premise, would be mistaken.