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But When It Came Right Down To It, The Skin Of My Wrist Looked So White And Defensless That I Couldn't Do It. It Was As If What I Wanted To Kill Wasn't In That Skin Or The Thin Blue Pulse That Jumped Under My Thumb, But Somewhere Else, Deeper, More Secret, And A Whole Lot Harder To Get." I Know What She's Talking About. The Something Deeper And More Secret. It's Like Cracks Inside Of You. Like There Are These Fault Lines Where Things Don't Meet Up Right.

-John Green

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But When It Came

John Green

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But When It Came Right Down To It, The Skin Of My Wrist Looked So White And Defensless That I Couldn't Do It. It Was As If What I Wanted To Kill Wasn't In That Skin Or The Thin Blue Pulse That Jumped Under My Thumb, But Somewhere Else, Deeper, More Secret, And A Whole Lot Harder To Get." I Know What She's Talking About. The Something Deeper And More Secret. It's Like Cracks Inside Of You. Like There Are These Fault Lines Where Things Don't Meet Up Right.

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Something Invisible Snapped Inside Her.

And Then I Screwed Up And The Colonel Screwed Up And Takumi Screwed Up And She Slipped Through Our Fingers.

Labyrinth Looking For Alaska

'cause I'm Just - I Want To Go To Amsterdam, And I Want Him To Tell Me What Happens After The Book Is Over, And I Just Don't Want My Particular Life, And Also The Sky Is Depressing Me, And There Is This Old Swing Set Out Here That My Dad Made For Me When I Was A Kid.' 'i Must See This Old Swing Set Of Tears Immediately,' He Said. 'i'll Be Over In Twenty Minutes.'

How Are The Eyes?' 'oh, Excellent,' He Said. 'i Mean, They're Not In My Head Is The Only Problem.' 'awesome, Yeah,' Gus Said. 'not To One-up You Or Anything, But My Body Is Made Out Of Cancer.' 'so I Heard,' Issac Said, Trying Not To Let It Get To Him. He Fumbled Toward Gus's Hand And Found Only His Thigh. 'i'm Taken,' Gus Said.

I Don't Decide Where I Live. My Wife Decides. She's A Curator Of Contemporary Art, And She Works At An Art Museum, So We Go Wherever She Has A Job. All Basements Look The Same, So I Can Write From Whatever Basement I Happen To Be Living In.

I Wouldn’t Have A Career If It Weren’t For Independent Bookstores.

What About The Rest Of Your Life?" She Shrugged. "what About It?" "aren't You Worried About, Like, Forever?" "forever Is Composed Of Nows," She Says.

Rest Of Your Life

It's So Easy To Get Stuck. You Just Get Caught In Being Something, Being Special Or Cool Or Whatever, To The Point Where You Don't Even Know Why You Need It; You Just Think You Do.

Ma'am," Augustus Said, Nodding Toward Her, "your Daughter's Car Has Just Been Deservingly Egged By A Blind Man. Please Close The Door And Go Back Inside Or We'll Be Forced To Call The Police.

In Our Hyper-secular World, Worship Is Still Inevitable. But It Is Vital To Remember That Our Gods Don't Choose Us, We Choose Them.

I Realized It In Waves And We Held On To Each Other Crying And I Thought, God We Must Look So Lame, But It Doesn't Matter Much When You Have Just Now Realized, All The Time Later, That You Are Still Alive.

Y'all Smoke To Enjoy It. I Smoke To Die.

The Future Lay Before Him, Inevitable But Invisible.

Getting You A Date To Prom Is So Hard That The Hypothetical Idea Itself Is Actually Used To Cut Diamonds. Ben, Getting You A Date To Prom Is So Hard That The American Government Believes The Problem Cannot Be Solved With Diplomacy, But Will Instead Require Force.

She Cannot Possibly Be Dead, People Do Not Just Die

You'll Live Forever In Our Hearts, Big Man. That Particularly Galled Me, Because It Implied The Immortality Of Those Left Behind: You Will Live Forever In My Memory, Because I Will Live Forever! I Am Your God Now, Dead Boy! I Own You!

Dad Had A Sign Of His Own. My Beautiful Family, It Read, And Then Underneath That (and Gus).

Nothing's Wrong. Everything's Right. Things Couldn't Be Righter. Things Could Be Less Tired. They Could Be Less Busy. They Could Be Less Caffeinated. But They Couldn't Be Righter.

Right, Well, He'd Been Sick For A While And His Nurse Said To Him, 'you Seem To Be Feeling Better This Morning,' And Isben Looked At Her And Said, 'on The Contrary,' And Then He Died.

History Reminds Us That Revolutions Are Not Events, So Much That They’re Processes – That For Tens Of Thousands Of Years, People Have Been Making Decisions That Irrevocably Shaped The World That We Live In Today; Just As Today, We Are Making Subtle, Irrevocable Decisions That People Of The Future Will Remember As Revolutions.

But Of Course There Is Always A Hamartia And Yours Is That Oh, My God, Even Though You Had Freaking Cancer You Give Money To A Company In Exchange For The Chance To Acquire Yet More Cancer.

Because No One Thought She Was A Person, She Had No One To Really Talk To.

But What Could I Lose By Continuing That Had Not Already Been Lost?

In The End, What You Do Isn't Going To Be Nearly As Interesting Or Important As Who You Do It With.

There's Some People In This World Who You Can Just Love And Love And Love No Matter What.

The Dead Are Visible Only In The Terrible Lidless Eye Of Memory.

Half-drunk On Well-creamed Gas Station Coffee And The Exhilarating Loneliness Of A Freeway In Nighttime.

I Make A Gesture That Is Intended To Convey, "hey, No Hurry, Talk As Long As You'd Like," And Probably Actually Conveys, "hey, Look At Me! I Have Spastic Hands.

Love Is Just A Shout In The Void.

We Had To Forgive To Survive The Labyrinth

I Hated Sports. I Hated Sports, And I Hated People Who Played Them, And I Hated People Who Watched Them, And I Hated People Who Didn't Hate People Who Watched Or Played Them.

We Gotta Do Something About This Frigging Swing Set,' He Said. 'i'm Telling You, It's Ninety Percent Of The Problem.

So We Gave Up. I'd Finally Had Enough Of Chasing After A Ghost Who Did Not Want To Be Seen. We'd Failed, Maybe, But Some Mysteries Aren't Meant To Be Solved.

I Didn't Want To Look At Them, So I Looked Away, And To Look Away Was To Look At Augustus.

Without Pain, How Could We Know Joy?

If You Don't Live A Life In Service Of A Greater Good, You've Gotta At Least Die A Death In Service Of A Greater Good, You Know? And I Fear That I Won't Get Either A Life Or A Death That Means Anything.

According To The Conventions Of The Genre, Augustus Waters Kept His Sense Of Humor Till The End, Did Not For A Moment Waiver In His Courage, And His Spirit Soared Like An Indomitable Eagle Until The World Itself Could Not Contain His Joyous Soul.

I'm Just Reveling In The Glory Of Not Having To Hear The Neediness And Impotence Of My Own Voice.

You See How Fake It All Is. It's Not Even Hard Enough To Be Made Out Of Plastic. It's A Paper Town.

I Could Try To Pretend That I Didn't Care Anymore, But It Could Never Be True Again. You Can't Just Make Yourself Matter, And Then Die, Alaska, Because Now, I Am Irretrievably Different, And I'm Sorry I Let You Go, Yes, But You Made The Choice.

Waffles Are Just Awesome Bread.

We Just Sat There Quiet For A Long Time, Which Was Fine, And I Was Thinking About Way Back In The Very Beginning In The Literal Heart Of Jesus.

Augustus, Perhaps You’d Like To Share Your Fears With The Group.” “my Fears?” “yes.” “i Fear Oblivion,” He Said Without A Moment’s Pause. “i Fear It Like The Proverbial Blind Man Who’s Afraid Of The Dark.” “too Soon,” Isaac Said, Cracking A Smile. “was That Insensitive?” Augustus Asked. “i Can Be Pretty Blind To Other People’s Feelings.

I Stood Under The Awning For A Moment, But Finally I Decided That Being In A Bad Mood With Your Friends Beats Being In A Bad Mood Without Them.

I Told Myself – As I’ve Told Myself Before – That The Body Shuts Down When The Pain Gets Too Bad, That Consciousness Is Temporary, That This Will Pass. But Just Like Always, I Didn’t Slip Away. I Was Left On The Shore With The Waves Washing Over Me, Unable To Drown.

I Like To Build Places Online Where Readers Can Have Productive Conversations About Books.

I Pointed At The Little Kids Goading Each Other To Jump From Rib Cage To Shoulder And Gus Answered Just Loud Enough For Me To Hear Over The Din, 'last Time, I Imagined Myself As The Kid. This Time, The Skeleton.

Does He Have Ugly Hands? Sometimes Beautiful People Have Ugly Hands." "no He Has Kind Of Amazing Hands.

I'm Not Saying That Everything Is Survivable. Just That Everything Except The Last Thing Is.

Colin Had Always Preferred Baths; One Of His General Policies In Life Was Never To Do Anything Standing Up That Could Just As Easily Be Done Lying Down

Colin's Skin Was Alive With The Feeling Of Connection To Everyone In That Car And Everyone Not In It. And He Was Feeling Not-unique In The Very Best Possible Way.

You Could Hear The Wind In The Leaves, And On That Wind Traveled The Screams Of The Kids On The Playground In The Distance, Little Kids Figuring Out How To Be Alive, How To Navigate A World That Wasn't Made For Them By Navigating A Playground That Was.

I Always Liked Routine. I Suppose I Never Found Boredom Very Boring.

That Was Part Of Her, And You Used To Know It. It's Like Now You Only Care About The Alaska You Made Up.

You Can Pick Your Friends, And You Can Pick Your Nose, But You Can’t Pick Your Friend’s Nose.

That's The Thing About Pain, It Demands To Be Felt.

True Love Will Triumph In The End—which May Or May Not Be A Lie, But If It Is A Lie, It's The Most Beautiful Lie We Have.

You Can't Just Make Me Different And Then Leave. You Can't. You Can't Change Me And Make My Whole Life Centered Around You, Then Leave.

I Was Born Into Bolívar's Labyrinth, And So I Must Believe In The Hope Of Rabelais' Great Perhaps.

You’re Joining Us For Dinner, I Hope?” Asked His Mom. She Was Small And Brunette And Vaguely Mousy. “i Guess?” I Said. “i Have To Be Home By Ten. Also I Don’t, Um, Eat Meat?” “no Problem. We’ll Vegetarianize Some,” She Said. “animals Are Just Too Cute?” Gus Asked. “i Want To Minimize The Number Of Deaths I Am Responsible For,” I Said. Gus Opened His Mouth To Respond But Then Stopped Himself.

I Call My Mom From The Car. I Tell Her That Neutral Milk Hotel Is Playing At The Hideout And She Says, "who? What? You're Hiding Out?" And Then I Hum A Few Bars Of One Of Their Songs And Mom Says, "oh, I Know That Song. It's On The Mix You Made Me," And I Say, "right," And She Says, "well You Have To Be Back By Eleven," And I Say, "mom This Is A Historical Event. History Doesn't Have A Curfew," And She Says, "back By Eleven," And I Say, "fine. Jesus," And Then She Has To Go Cut Cancer Out Of Someone.

...it Occurred To Me That The Voracious Ambition Of Humans Is Never Sated By Dreams Coming True, Because There Is Always The Thought That Everything Might Be Done Better And Again.

I Wouldn't Have Cared If My Girlfriend Was A Jaguar-driving Cyclops With A Beard - I'd Have Been Grateful Just To Have Someone To Make Out With.

Poetry Is Just So Emo." He Said. "oh, The Pain. The Pain. It Always Rains. In My Soul.

Oh, I Wouldn't Mind, Hazel Grace. It Would Be A Privilege To Have My Heart Broken By You.

Harry Potter Isn’t Real? Oh No! Wait, Wait, What Do You Mean By Real? Is This Video Blog Real? Am I Real If You Can See Me And Hear Me, But Only Through The Internet? Are You Real If I Can Read Your Comment But I Don’t Know Who You Are Or What Your Name Is Or Where You’re From Or What You Look Like Or How Old You Are? I Know All Of Those Things About Harry Potter. Maybe Harry Potter’s Real And You’re Not.

Colin Emphatically Pushed The Book Cover Shut When He Finished Reading. "did You Like It?" His Dad Asked. "yup," Colin Said. He Liked All Books, Because He Liked The Mere Act Of Reading, The Magic Of Turning Scratches On A Page Into Words Inside His Head.

It's Just That I Learned A While Ago That The Best Way To Get People To Like You Is Not To Like Them Too Much.

Talking To A Drunk Person Was Like Talking To An Extremely Happy, Severely Brain-damaged Three-year-old.

Observation: It Would Be Awesome To Fly In A Superfast Airplane That Could Chase The Sunrise Around The World For A While.

We're All Just Facilitators. The Real Business Is Done By Readers.

3 Whole Catfish, Wrapped Separately Veet (it’s For Shaving Your Legs Only You Don’t Need A Razor. It’s With All The Girly Cosmetic Stuff) Vaseline Six Pack, Mountain Dew One Dozen Tulips One Bottle Of Water Tissues One Can Of Blue Spray Paint

I Love Being In Cities With Lots Of Other People, Because I'm Reminded That There Are Billions Of People Like Me, And We Are Each Stuck Inside Of Our Minds, Feverishly Trying To Crawl Out To Make Connections With Other People.

That's Always Seemed So Ridiculous To Me, That People Want To Be Around Someone Because They're Pretty. It's Like Picking Your Breakfeast Cereals Based On Color Instead Of Taste.

I Opened The Door. He Looked Down At My Shirt And Smiled. "funny," He Said. "don't Call My Boobs Funny," I Answered.

You Can’t Divorce Margo The Person From Margo The Body. You Can’t See One Without Seeing The Other. You Looked At Margo’s Eyes And You Saw Both Their Blueness And Their Margo-ness. In The End, You Could Not Say That Margo Roth Spiegelman Was Fat, Or That She Was Skinny, Any More Than You Can Say That The Eiffel Tower Is Or Is Not Lonely. Margo’s Beauty Was A Kind Of Sealed Vessel Of Perfection – Uncracked And Uncrackable.

I Don't Believe In Prom,' I Reminded Her As She Rounded A Corner. I Expertly Angled My Raisin Bran To Accomodate The G-forces. I'd Done This Before.

Dutch Is Not So Much A Language As An Ailment Of The Throat.

You Know How We Make A Scotch And Water In This Home?" "no, Sir," Gus Said. "we Pour Scotch Into A Glass And Then Call To Mind Thoughts Of Water, And Then We Mix The Actual Scotch With The Abstracted Idea Of Water.

But That Part Of Us Greater Than The Sum Of Our Parts Cannot Begin And Cannot End, And So It Cannot Fail

Margo's Beauty Was A Kind Of Sealed Vessel Of Perfection--uncracked And Uncrackable.

It's Fine," I Repeated. And Whatever. It Was Fine. It Had To Be.

Always' Was A Promise! How Can You Just Break The Promise?" "sometimes People Don't Always Understand The Promises They're Making When They Make Them," I Said. Isaac Shot Me A Look. "right, Of Course. But You Keep The Promise Anyway. That's What Love Is. Love Is Keeping The Promise Anyway. Don't You Believe In True Love?" I Didn't Answer. I Didn't Have An Answer. But I Thought That If True Love Did Exist, That Was A Pretty Good Definition Of It.

She Smiled With All The Delight Of A Kid On Christmas Morning And Said, "y'all Smoke To Enjoy It. I Smoke To Die." - Alaska

The Consequences Of Being Un-cool Feel So Big That A Lot Of Times You End Of Not Finding Ways To Have Open And Honest Conversations.

But Ultimately I Do Not Believe That She Was Only Matter. The Rest Of Her Must Be Recycled, Too. I Believe Now That We Are Greater Than The Sum Of Our Parts. If You Take Alaska's Genetic Code And You Add Her Life Experiences And The Relationships She Had With People, And Then You Take The Size And Shape Of Her Body, You Do Not Get Her. There Is Something Else Entirely. There Is A Part Of Her Greater Than The Sum Of Her Knowable Parts. And That Part Has To Go Somewhere, Because It Cannot Be Destroyed

A Drink This Good Deserves One's Best Posture.

What's The Point In Being Alive If You Don't At Least Try To Do Something Remarkable? How Very Odd, To Believe God Gave You Life, And Yet Not Think That Life Asks More Of You Than Watching Tv.

Radar Threw His Books Into His Locker And Shut It. Then The Din Of Conversation Around Us Quieted Just A Bit As He Turned His Eyes Toward The Heavens And Shouted, "it Is Not My Fault That My Parents Own The World's Largest Collection Of Black Santas.

To Be Abandoned Like That! Shut Out When You Most Need To Be Loved.

My Regret Was Immediate And Permanent And Useless.

By Saying You Don’t Care If The World Falls Apart, In Some Small Way You’re Saying You Want It To Stay Together, On Your Own Terms.

One Of The Pitfalls About Writing About Illness Is That It Is Very Easy To Imagine People With Cancer As Either These Wise-beyond-their-years Creatures Or These Sad-eyed Tragic People. And The Truth Is, People Living With Cancer Are Very Much Like People Who Are Not Living With Cancer. They're Every Bit As Funny And Complex And Diverse As Anyone Else.

He May Be A Malevolent Sorcerer, But Tiny Cooper Is His Own Goddamned Man, And If He Wants To Be A Gigantic Skipper, Then That's His Right As A Huge American.

I Don't Really Care How People Read. I Care If People Read.

Neither Novels Or Their Readers Benefit From Any Attempts To Divine Whether Any Facts Hide Inside A Story. Such Efforts Attack The Very Idea That Made-up Stories Can Matter, Which Is Sort Of The Foundational Assumption Of Our Species.

Made Up Stories

That’s Part Of What I Like About The Book In Some Ways. It Portrays Death Truthfully. You Die In The Middle Of Your Life, In The Middle Of A Sentence

Death And Dying

If You Don't Say The Honest Thing, It Never Becomes True.

When You Acknowledge That There Is Nothing Repulsive Or Unforgivable Or Shameful About Yourself, It Becomes Easier To Be That Authentic Person And Feel Like You're Living A Less Performed Life.

Augustus Waters Died Eight Days After His Prefuneral, At Memorial, In The Icu, When The Cancer, Which Was Made Of Him, Finally Stopped His Heart, Which Was Also Made Of Him.

In The Ensuing Silence, I Have Time To Contemplate The Word Cute— How Dismissive It Is, How It’s The Equivalent Of Calling Someone Little, How It Makes A Person Into A Baby, How The Word Is A Neon Sign Burning Through The Dark Reading, “feel Bad About Yourself.

And As We Kept Driving North, The Whole Family In The Care Together, It Got Darker, And Snowier, Until Finally The Road Delivered Us To The One Place That All My Youthful Trips West Never Could: Home.

Finally, I Decided That The Proper Strategy Was To Stare Back. Boys Do Not Have A Monopoly On The Staring Business.

He Missed His Imagined Future.

Because You're My Friend, Wingnut.

We Were Kissing. I Thought: This Is Good. I Thought: I Am Not Bad At This Kissing. Not Bad At All. I Thought: I Am Clearly The Greatest Kisser In The History Of The Universe. Suddenly She Laughed And Pulled Away From Me. She Wiggled A Hand Out Of Her Sleeping Bag And Wiped Her Face. "you Slobbered On My Nose," She Said, And Laughed

Tiny Cooper Is Splayed Out Across The Thin Carpet, Using His Backpack As A Pillow. He’s Wearing Skinny Jeans, Which Look Very Much Like Denim Sausage Casings.

One Of The Others Shouted A Translation: "the Beautiful Couple Is Beautiful.

Why Don’t We Break Up? I Guess I Stay With Her Because She Stays With Me. And That’s Not An Easy Thing To Do.

As Far As I Can Tell, There Are Two Basic (kissing) Rules: 1. Don't Bite Anything Without Permission. 2. The Human Tongue Is Like Wasabi: It's Very Powerful, And Should Be Used Sparingly.

Let's Make A Deal: You Figure Out What The Labyrinth Is And How To Get Out Of It, And I'll Get You Laid. -alaska Young

Imagine Others Complexly.

But It Was Only Hot Outside, And Generally I Only Walked Outside Between One Air-conditioned Place To Another.

Tobin," Mom Said Disapprovingly. She Wasn't A Particularly Funny Person. It Suited Her Professionally - I Mean, You Don't Want Your Cancer Surgeon To Walk Into The Examination Room And Be Like, "guy Walks Into A Bar. Bartender Says, 'what'll Ya Have?' And The Guy Says, 'whaddya Got?' And The Bartender Says, 'i Don't Know What I Got, But I Know What You Got: Stage Iv Melanoma.

I Just Want The Pleasure Of Noticing These Things At A Safe Distance.

Augustus," I Said. "really. You Don't Have To Do This." "sure I Do," He Said. "i Found My Wish." "god, You're The Best," I Told Him. "i Bet You Say That To All The Boys Who Finance Your International Travel," He Answered.

I Learned That Myth Doesn’t Mean A Lie; It Means A Traditional Story That Tells You Something About People And Their Worldview And What They Hold Sacred. Interesting.

I Laughed And Pointed Out That "hash Browns Mean Nothing Without You" Was A Pretty Good Name For A Band. "or A Song," The Duke Said, And Then She Started Singing All Glam Rock, A Glove Up To Her Face Holding An Imaginary Mic As She Rocked Out An A Cappella Power Ballad. "oh, I Deep Fried For You / But Now I Weep 'n' Cry For You / Oh, Babe, This Meal Was Made For Two / And These Hash Browns Mean Nothing, Oh These Hash Browns Mean Nothing, Yeah These Hash Browns Mean Nothin' Without You.

It's Like People Believe All You Need To Do Is Like The Same Bands In Order To Be Soulmates. Or Book. Oh My God...you Like The Outsiders Too...it's Like We're The Same Person! No, We're Not. It's Like We Have The Same English Teacher. There's A Difference.

I Think Forever Is An Incorrect Concept.

You Are Valuable And Rare And Worthy Of Love.

I’ve Stopped Thinking About It. I Don’t Have Time To Have A Girlfriend. I Have Like A Full-time Job Learning How To Be Blind.

"nothing Ever Happens Like You Imagine It Will," She Says. The Sky Is Like A Monochromatic Contemporary Painting, Drawing Me In With Its Illusion Of Depth, Pulling Me Up. "yeah, That's True," I Say. But Then After I Think About It For A Second, I Add, "but Then Again, If You Don't Imagine, Nothing Ever Happens At All."

It Is A Good Life, Hazel Grace.

Sometimes You Lose A Battle. But Mischief Always Wins The War

I’m On A Roller Coaster That Only Goes Up, My Friend.

But That Wasn't Quite Right. I Called It A Nine Because I Was Saving My Ten. And Here It Was, The Great And Terrible Ten, Slamming Me Again And Again As I Lay Still And Alone In My Bed Staring At The Ceiling, The Waves Tossing Me Against The Rocks Then Pulling Me Back Out To Sea So They Could Launch Me Again Into The Jagged Face Of The Cliff, Leaving Me Floating Faceup On The Water, Undrowned.

I Don't Really Want To Be The Costar Of Anyone's Life.

That's Absolutely True, About The Eight Glasses A Day. There's No Reason Whatsoever To Drink Eight Glasses Of Water A Day Unless You, For Whatever Reason, Particularly Like The Taste Of Water. Most Experts Agree That Unless There's Something Horribly Wrong With You, You Should Just Drink Water Whenever You're - Get This - Thirsty.

By Far The Best Cure For Hangovers Is Not Drinking Excessively The Night Before.this Cure Has A 100% Success Rate, And As You Save The Cost Of The Drinks You Would Have Otherwise Drunk, It Is Cheaper Than Free.

We Were Very Different, And We Disagreed About A Lot Of Things, But He Was Always So Interesting, You Know?

The Point Is That There Are Always Answers.

Nerd Girls Are The World’s Most Underutilized Romantic Resource. And Guys, Do Not Tell Me That Nerd Girls Are Not Hot Because That Shows A Paris Hilton-esque Failure To Understand Hotness.

But Monotony Doesn't Make For Painlessness.

The Nature Of Impending Fatherhood Is That You Are Doing Something That You're Unqualified To Do, And Then You Become Qualified While Doing It.

All Those Paper People Living In Their Paper Houses, Burning The Future To Stay Warm.

I'm Not Interested In Writing For Adults. I Like Them As People! I Don't Like The Way They Publish Books In That World. Nothing Ever Gets A Chance.

The Urge To Make Art Or Contemplate Philosophy Does Not Go Away When You Are Sick. Those Urges Just Become Transfigured By Illness.

You Can't Dingleberry That! That's A Flagrant Misuse Of The Dingleberry!

He Reached Up T0 Grab One And Came Down With Several, And They Kept Coming, Washing Over Him, Floating All Around Him. Never Have Tampon Strings Seemed So Beautiful As They Rolled Up And Down With The Wind, Landing On The Ground And Then Twirling And Floating Up Again, Falling And Rising And Falling And Rising.

I Leave, And The Leaving Is So Exhilarating I Know I Can Never Go Back. But Then What? Do I Just Keep Leaving Places, And Leaving Them, And Leaving Them, Tramping A Perpetual Journey?

You Have A Choice In This World, I Believe, About How To Tell Sad Stories, And We Made The Funny Choice.

What Else? She Is So Beautiful. You Don’t Get Tired Of Looking At Her. You Never Worry If She Is Smarter Than You: You Know She Is. She Is Funny Without Ever Being Mean. I Love Her. I Am So Lucky To Love Her, Van Houten. You Don’t Get To Choose If You Get Hurt In This World, Old Man, But You Do Have Some Say In Who Hurts You. I Like My Choices. I Hope She Likes Hers.

How Strange And How Lovely It Is To Be Anything At All.

The Rules Of Capitalization Are So Unfair To Words In The Middle Of A Sentence.

So Keeping The Box Closed Just Keeps You In The Dark, Not The Universe.

The Marks Humans Leave Are Too Often Scars.

What Do You Mean By Meant? Given The Final Futility Of Our Struggle, Is The Fleeting Jolt Of Meaning That Art Gives Us Valuable? Or Is It The Only Value Passing Time As Comfortably As Possible?

Hurt Tends To Drown Out Sorry.

If I Had Cared About Her As I Should Have, As I Thought I Did, How Could I Have Let Her Go?

One Swing Set, Well Worn But Structurally Sound, Seeks New Home. Make Memories With Your Kid Or Kids So That Someday He Or She Or They Will Look Into The Backyard And Feel The Ache Of Sentimentality As Desperately As I Did This Afternoon. It's All Fragile And Fleeting, Dear Reader, But With This Swing Set, Your Child(ren) Will Be Introduced To The Ups And Downs Of Human Life Gently And Safely, And May Also Learn The Most Important Lesson Of All: No Matter How Hard You Kick, No Matter How High You Get, You Can't Go All The Way Around.

I Spent Your Wish On That Doucheface,” I Said Into His Chest. “hazel Grace. No. I Will Grant You That You Did Spend My One And Only Wish, But You Did Not Spend It On Him. You Spent It On Us.

My One And Only

The Nature Of The Labyrinth, I Scribbled Into My Spiral Notebook, And The Way Out Of It. This Teacher Rocked. I Hated Discussion Classes. I Hated Talking, And I Hated Listening To Everyone Else Stumble On Their Words And Try To Phrase Things In The Vaguest Possible Way So They Wouldn't Sound Dumb, And I Hated How It Was All Just A Game Of Trying To Figure Out What The Teacher Wanted To Hear And Then Saying It. I'm In Class, So Teach Me.

A Paper Town For A Paper Girl.

Suffering Is Universal.

I've Lived Here For Eighteen Years And I Have Never Once In My Life Come Across Anyone Who Cares About Anything That Matters.

We Idealize Them As Gods Or Dismiss Them As Animals.

Becoming A Father Made Me Much More Interested In The Parent Character In My Novels. I've Never Found Parents That Interesting.

So How’s It Going?” “okay. Glad To Be Home, I Guess. Gus Told Me You Were In The Icu?” “yeah,” I Said. “sucks,” He Said. “i’m A Lot Better Now,” I Said. “i’m Going To Amsterdam Tomorrow With Gus.” “i Know. I’m Pretty Well Up-to-date On Your Life, Because Gus Never. Talks. About. Anything. Else.

‎"i Go To Seek A Great Perhaps.

I Just Want To Fly Under The Radar, Because When You Start To Make Yourself Into A Big Deal, That's When You Get Shot Down.

Long Week. Long Month. Long Life.

The Last Time I Was This Scared, I Peed Myself." "the Last Time I Was This Scared," Radar Says, "i Actually Had To Face A Dark Lord In Order To Make The World Safe For Wizards.

Isn't It Also That On Some Fundamental Level We Find It Difficult To Understand That Other People Are Human Beings In The Same Way That We Are? We Idealize Them As Gods Or Dismiss Them As Animals.

If You Don’t Know About Tumblr Then You Are Not Supposed To Know About Tumblr. It’s Like Fight Club.

You Should See It. V For Vendetta I Mean. "i'll Look It Up." No. With Me. At My House. Now

My Parents Always Liked It When I Cursed In Front Of Them. I Could See The Pleasure Of It In Their Faces. It Signified That I Trusted Them, That I Was Myself In Front Of Them.

The Marks Humans Leave Are Too Often Scars. You Build A Hideous Minimall Or Start A Coup Or Try To Become A Rock Star And You'll Think "they'll Remember Me Now," But (a) They Don't Remember You, And (b) All You Leave Behind Are More Scars. Your Coup Becomes A Dictatorship. Your Minimall Becomes A Lesion.

Your Driving Is Unpleasant, But It Isn't Technically Unsafe.

As I Recall, You Promised To Call When You Finished The Book, Not Text.

"nothing," I Said. "i’m Just…" I Couldn’t Finish The Sentence, Didn’t Know How To. "i’m Just Very, Very Fond Of You."

It Is Worth It To Leave Behing My Minor Life For Grander Maybes.

It Has Been My Experience That Maximizing Income Is A Helluva Lot Less Important Than Maximizing Passion And Fulfillment In Your Both Professionally And Personally.

Maybe Our Favorite Quotations Say More About Us Than About The Stories And People We're Quoting.

Like All Sick Children,' He Answered Dispassionately, 'you Say You Don't Want Pity, But Your Very Existence Depends Upon It.

The Only Way Out Of The Labyrinth Of Suffering Is To Forgive.

Do The Thing You're Good At. Not Many People Are Lucky Enough To Be So Good At Something.

The Z’s Will Kill Us All, And Then The Z’s Will Die Out And In Sixty Years There Will Be No One To Remember Our Silly War, Caroline’s Wasted Ammunition, My Year Of Zombic Survivalism, Rene Descartes’s Musings, Or Michelangelo’s Sculptures. And That Is Really Only The Sadness Here As I Drink A Thousand-dollar Bottle Of Wine Down Here In The Cellar: We Did A Few Things Worth Remembering, And I Wish For Someone To Remember Them.

The Challenge Is The Same Whether Or Not I'm Collaborating: To Empathize With Your Reader And To Tell A Story That Will Matter To Him Or Her. But The Mechanics Of Going About That Challenge Change When You're Collaborating, Because You Have Someone To Help Refine Your Thinking And Expand Your Vision Of What Might Happen.

Feeling - Probably For The First Time In My Life - The Fear And Excitement Of Living In A Place Where You Never Know What's Going To Happen Or When.

It Was Not Enough To Be The Last Guy She Kissed. I Wanted To Be The Last One She Loved.

I’ll Give You My Strength If I Can Have Your Remission.

I Hope We Get Pulled Over, He Says. I'd Like To See How The Cop Responds To A Black Man Wearing A Confederate T-shirt Over A Black Dress.

Sorry," I Said To The Duke. "eh, It's Not Your Fault. It's Carla's Fault. You Were Turning The Wheel. Carla Just Wasn't Listening. I Knew I Shouldn't Have Loved Her. She's Like All The Others, Tobin; As Soon As I Confess My Love, She Abandons Me." I Laughed. "i Never Abandoned You," I Said Patting On Her Back. "yeah, Well, (a.) I Never Confessed My Love To You, And (b.) I'm Not Even Female To You.

Stupid Truth, Always Resisting Simplicity

How Can You Read And Talk At The Same Time?” I Asked. “well, I Usually Can’t, But Neither The Book Nor The Conversation Is Particularly Intellectually Challenging.

I Inherited That Penchant For Intellectualism, A Character Flaw That These Days Can Only Be Thoroughly Eradicated By Getting Z’ed Up.

Study Broadly And Without Fear.

Those Of Us Who Frequent The Band Room Have Long Suspected That Becca Maintains Her Lovely Figure By Eating Nothing But The Souls Of Kittens And The Dreams Of Impoverished Children.

Was It Animal Pee Or Human Pee? Someone Asked. How Would I Know? What, Am I An Expert In The Study Of Pee?

Remember That Time In The Minivan, Twenty Minutes Ago, When We Didn't Die?

That Didn’t Happen, Of Course. Things Never Happened The Way I Imagined Them.

When We Read The Right Book Generously, It Can Change The Way Think About The World Around Us.

We'd Failed, Maybe, But Some Mysteries Aren't Meant To Be Solved.

How Can You Seperate Those Things Though? The People Are The Place Is The People.

I Think If You Keep The Box Closed Long Enough You Do Kill The Cat, Actually.

He Wanted To Draw Out The Moment Before The Moment- Because As Good As Kissing Feels, Nothing Feels As Good As The Anticipation Of It.

So I Let Her Go, Too. And I'm Sorry.

And In My Classes, I Will Talk Most Of The Time, And You Will Listen Most Of The Time. Because You May Be Smart, But I've Been Smart Longer.

You Never Know. It's Just. It's Like. Poof. And You're Gone.

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