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The Most Important Thing For A Writer To Do Is To Write. It Really Doesn't Matter What You Write As Long As You Are Able To Write Fluidly, Very Quickly, Very Effortlessly. It Needs To Become Not Second Nature But Really First Nature To You. And Read; You Need To Read And You Need To Read Excellent Books And Then Some Bad Books. Not As Many Bad Books, But Some Bad Books, So That You Can See What Both Look Like And Why Both Are What They Are.

-Augusten Burroughs

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The Most Important Thing

Augusten Burroughs

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The Most Important Thing For A Writer To Do Is To Write. It Really Doesn't Matter What You Write As Long As You Are Able To Write Fluidly, Very Quickly, Very Effortlessly. It Needs To Become Not Second Nature But Really First Nature To You. And Read; You Need To Read And You Need To Read Excellent Books And Then Some Bad Books. Not As Many Bad Books, But Some Bad Books, So That You Can See What Both Look Like And Why Both Are What They Are.

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I Never Listen To Music When I Write.

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Even When We Lose An Arm Or A Leg, There's Not Less Of Us But More. Human Experience Weighs More Than Human Tissue.

And She's A Nurse. Do You Know How Hard Nursing School Is? It's Like Medical School. So She's Obviously Smart.

When You Say, "i Need More Confidence," What You're Really Saying Is, "i Need Those People Over There To Approve Of Me." That Is The Desire To Control Other People And What They Think. The First Person Who Figures Out How To Do This Owns The World.

But I Am Not Here Ironically; I Am Here Sincerely.

Optimism Sprouts From The Knowledge That You Are In Control Of Your Own Life, Not Your Past And Not Those Around You. Part Of Being In Control Is Taking Responsibility For How You Feel. This Means Not Just Admitting To Uncomfortable Feelings But Then Examining Your Circumstances To See What Can Be Done To Change These Feelings At The Source.

But My Favorite Band Is Curbside Life, Out Of Chicago.

Imperfections Are Attractive When Their Owners Are Happy With Them.

I Like, Though, That People Have A Hunger To Connect With Other People. They're Desperate To Know That You're Not Lying To Them Or Misleading Them.

I Thought, I Can't Do Advertising Any More, So I Was Downloading All These Pdf Applications From Community Colleges. And I Thought, I'll Become A Paramedic. I'll Get A Two-year Associate Degree, If I Can Get In.

Self-pity Is The Bestiality Of Emotions: It Absolutely Disgusts People. When You're Feeling Pity For Yourself, And Somebody Says To You 'you Think Maybe It's Time For The Pity Party To Be Over? You Should Stop Feeling Sorry For Yourself And Try To Think Positive,' It Makes You Wish You Could Saw Their Head Off.

I Was On The Cover Of A Lot Of Newspapers. I Was On The Cover Of Usa Today For Every Single Day For A Month. I Was On The Masthead, So I Tend To Get Recognized A Lot, And In Weird Places. It's Always Flattering, And It's Always Odd. It's Always At The Worst Possible Time.

Writing Has Enriched My Life In Ways I Never Imaged.

Other People Sound Flat To My Ear; Their Words Just Hang In The Air. But When My Mother Says Something, The Ends Curl.

I've Overcome A Lot - Sexual Abuse, Death Of A Loved One, Bad Parents And Experienced Life. My Nature Is Such I Not Only Survived All This But I Have Thrived. I've Always Been Psychologically Ambitious In That I've Never Been Willing To Settle Emotionally For Anything Less Then What's Needed. I've Wanted More Then That From Life.

Death Of A Loved One

Throwing Things Horrified Me. I Suffered Extreme, Paralyzing Anxiety When It Came To Anything Remotely Athletic. I Wouldn't Even Run To Catch The School Bus Because I Knew I'd Trip And Then Get Teased For A Year.

His Laugh Is Made If Porch Swings And Lemonade

The Line Between Normal And Crazy Seemed Impossibly Thin. A Person Would Have To Be An Expert Tightrope Walker In Order Not To Fall.

There's Not Enough Of Me Left Over.

I Gazed Around The Room And My Eyes Stopped Dead On A Little Boy Standing In The Corner. This Was A Particularly Eerie Doll. Life-sized And Blond-haired And Blue-eyed. I Saw A Little Nazi Boy, Pockets Probably Stuffed With Scissors And Retractable Blades. My Grandfather On My Mother's Side Was Rumored To Be Half Jewish, Which Practically Makes Me Jerry Seinfeld's Brother, And Thus Wary Of Blond German Boys With Their Hands Out Of Sight.

It Was Unnerving, The Way She Could Go From Cool Efficiency To Sarcastic To Sweet Within The Space Of Thirty Seconds. I Found It Very Manipulative And Controlling. It Put The Other Person Constantly On-guard. And It Was Extremely Intimidating Because You Never Knew When She Was Going To Snap. I Made A Mental Note To Refine These Skills Within Myself.

And I Hope She Does Not Live In A Dark World. Because Even The Most Terrible Loss Doesn't Have To Make You Darker; It Can Make You Deeper.

Love Is A Helium-based Emotion; Love Always Takes The High Road.

Taking The High Road

The Most Mortifying Fact Of My Life Is Something That Happened When I Was Fourteen And I Have Never Admitted To Anyone: Not To Friends Nor Therapists; Not Even In Rehab When We Were Detailing Our Own Personal Spirals Of Shame Did I Confess. It Is This: I Am A Graduate Of The Barbizon School Of Modeling.

I Used To Feel So Alone In The City. All Those Gazillions Of People And Then Me, On The Outside. Because How Do You Meet A New Person? I Was Very Stunned By This For Many Years. And Then I Realized, You Just Say, "hi." They May Ignore You. Or You May Marry Them. And That Possibility Is Worth That One Word.

When You Have Your Health, You Have Everything. When You Do Not Have Your Health, Nothing Else Matters At All.

I'm Grateful For A Lot Of Things. One Is Not Being A Drunk Wreck. Or Losing All Four Limbs In Some Ridiculous East Village Bus Accident That I Was So Destined For.

Each Time My Mother Went Psychotic, I Hoped It Would Be The Last Time. Afterward She Would Tell Me, 'i Think That Was The Final Episode. I Think I Had A Breakthrough.' And I Would Believe-for A Few Months-that It Was True. That She Was Back To Stay. Maybe It Was Like Having A Rock Star Mother Who Was Always On The Road. Were There Benatar Children? Did They Sit Around And Wonder If Their Mom's Hell Is For Children Tour Was Going To Be Her Last Tour?

I Suppose Home Is, For Me, More Of A State Of Mind. It's Really More Of About Being Where I Want To Be With People I Care About.

I Once Read About A Guy Who Lost His Arms In A Fire. The Nurse Took Pity On Him And Gave Him A Hand Job. I Don't Even Get That.

Maybe You Feel Pressure To Be Positive Because So Many People Rely On Your Good, Fake-positive Energy? If That's The Case, Screw Everybody Else. You're Not A Bottle Of Valium.

Positive Energy

The Secret To Being A Writer Is That You Have To Write. It's Not Enough To Think About Writing Or To Study Literature Or Plan A Future Life As An Author. You Really Have To Lock Yourself Away, Alone, And Get To Work.

And Human Instinct Is Ancient And Reliable, Utterly Mysterious And Possibly Capable Of Great Genius. I Believe That Refined, Fluent Instincts Are A Person's Most Valuable Asset. My Own Instincts Have Repeatedly Guided Me Against The Grain Of Logic And Probability. When I Have Trusted And Followed Their Direction, They Have Never Been Wrong. I Don't Know How Or Why. But I Know That Every Significant Experience-positive Or Negative-sharpens Them And Makes Them More Accurate.

You Need To Grab Your Dream Out Of The Sky Like It's A Kite And Pinch The String Through Your Fingers Until You Reach The Spool.

This Is What Happens When You Go Against The Grain Of Truth. You Get Splinters Later On.

Nothing Made Sense To Me Anymore. I Knew I Was Young, I Knew I Was Small. But I Was Worried That I Might Already Be Ruined.

For Exactly The Same Reason, It Is Sometimes Satisfying To Cut Yourself And Bleed. On Those Gray [sic] Days Where Eight In The Morning Looks No Different From Noon And Nothing Has Happened And Nothing Is Going To Happen And You Are Washing A Glass In The Sink And It Breaks - Accidentally - And Punctures Your Skin. And Then There Is This Shocking Red, The Brightest Thing In The Day, So Vibrant It Buzzes, This Blood Of Yours. That Is Okay Sometimes Because At Least You Know You're Alive.

I'm Always Prepared For The Worst.

I Don't Read Memoirs. But If You Write A Memoir, I Would Think You'd Want People To Know, "o.k., Look, I've Taken Some Liberties Here." It's Just A Matter Of Being Open With Your Readers.

Even Painfully Shy And Awkward People Are Not Painfully Shy Or Awkward When They Are Alone. The Way To Access This Natural, Comfortable Alone-self When You Are With Others Is By Choosing To Forbid Yourself To Wonder What "they" Are Thinking. Instead, Force Yourself To Exist In The Instant, Then Take It- And Give It- As It Comes.

When I First Thought Of Being A Writer I Had Visions Of Stacks Of Books In Stores With My Name On Them, That Sort Of Thing. But I Never Imagined This Would Be The Reaction.

Most Of Us Have Love In Our Lives. Most Of Us Love Other People Are Are Ourselves Loved By Others. But Make No Mistake: You Are Alone In The World. You Were Born Alone, Even If You Were Born Conjoined. And You Die Alone, Unable To Bring A Single Person With You.

There's A Lot About Being "a Writer" That Has Nothing To Do With Writing. That's One Thing I've Discovered. You've Got To Meet With The Sales Force, And You've Got To Have All These Luncheons, And Be Gracious, And You've Got To Give A Lot Of Presentations And You've Got To Give A Lot Of Speeches, And You've Got To Be On Tour.

My Window Fogs And This Makes Me Feel Like There Is No World Outside Of The Car.

I Think Part Of The Reason I'm Attracted To Foster Is Because He's Such A Mess. I Mean, The People I Have Loved In My Life Have Never Been Easy To Love. I'm Not Used To Normal. I'm Used To Disaster. I Don't Know, As Messed Up As He Is, He's Also Sort Of Exciting, Sort Of A Challenge. I'm Accustomed To Working For Love.

Your Mind Is Like An Unsafe Neighborhood; Don't Go There Alone.

Bad News Should Be Followed With Soup. Then A Nap.

Nobody's Trying To Kill You, Deirdre. You're Killing Yourself.

Killing Yourself

With My Own Memoirs, They Are Truthful, And I Write Everything Fully Expecting To Some Day End Up Televised On Court Tv, And I'm Fully Prepared To Be Challenged Legally On It. Everything I Write Is The Truth And I Know That I Would Win.

Confidence Is A Reduction Of Your Own Interest In Whether Others Are Thinking About You And If So, What They're Thinking.

Thinking About You

My Attraction Had Been Immediate And Profound. And It Had Nothing To Do With The Way He Looked. My Attraction Was To What Resided Between His Lines.

[christmas] Holidays Are A Heavy, Heavy Time. We Make Light Of Them With Our Red And Green And Our Stockings And Candy Canes, But People Think Heavy Thoughts Over The Holidays Because That's When You're Thinking About Family. Are We Close? Or Are We Not As Close As Other People?

And In My Mind, This Settles The Issue. I Would Never Drink Cologne, And Am Therefore Not An Alcoholic.

But I Can Also Write In Crappy Motel Rooms, While Standing In Line, Or Sitting In The Dentist's Chair.

I Think Writers Tend To Be Experience Junkies, And I Think They Also Tend To Want To Be On The Outside Looking In.

So We Can Be Filled With Holes And Loss And Wide Expanses Of Unhealed Geography - And We Can Also Be Excited By Life And In Love And Content At The Exact Same Moment.

I Told Myself, 'all I Want Is A Normal Life'. But Was That True? I Wasn't So Sure. Because There Was A Part Of Me That Enjoyed Hating School, And The Drama Of Not Going, The Potential Consequences Whatever They Were. I Was Intrigued By The Unknown. I Was Even Slightly Thrilled That My Mother Was Such A Mess. Had I Become Addicted To Crisis? I Traced My Finger Along The Windowsill. 'want Something Normal, Want Something Normal, Want Something Normal', I Told Myself.

Maybe It Was A Patty Hearst Thing. Stockholm Syndrome Or Whatever It's Called When You're Being Held Against Your Will But Then You Become Sucked In And Fall In Love. Or If Not Exactly Love, You Fall Into Something You Can't See Out Of. 'i Can't Shoot A Machine Gun' Becomes 'hey, This Hardly Has Any Kick-back!

Falling In Love

If You Believe Suicide Will Bring You Peace, Or At The Very Least Just An End To Everything You Hate- You Are Displaying Self-caring Behavior. You Are Still Able To Actively Seek Solutions To Your Problems. You Are Willing To Go To Great Lengths To Provide What You Believe Will Be Soothing To Yourself. This Strikes Me As Optimistic.

Freshly Brainwashed From Rehab, I Carry The Bottle Into The Bathroom. I Hold It Up To The Light. See The Pretty Bottle? Isn't It Beautiful? Yes, It's Beautiful. I Unscrew The Cap And Pour It Into The Toilet. I Flush Twice. And Then I Think, Why Did I Flush Twice? The Answer, Is Of Course, Because I Truly Do Know Myself. I Cannot Be Sure I Won't Attempt To Drink From The Toilet, Like A Dog.

You Have An Incredible Body." He Reaches Out To Touch My Stomach. I Feel No Pleasure In His Compliment Or His Touch, Only Impatience. This Is The Only Feeling. I Feel Like The Paper On Which My Mood Chart Is Printed.

It Turned Out I Had Always Been A Smoker. I Just Hadn't Had Any Cigarettes.

Long Marriages Have Ended In Ruin Over Tiny And Insignificant Grievances That Were Never Properly Aired And Instead Grew Into A Brittle Barnacle Of Hatred.

So That's What I'm Here To Become. And Suddenly, This Word Fills Me With A Brand Of Sadness I Haven't Felt Since Childhood. The Kind Of Sadness You Feel At The End Of Summer. When The Fireflies Are Gone, The Ponds Have Dried Up And The Plants Are Wilted, Weary From Being So Green.

If You Find You Require Willpower, You Aren't Ready To Lose Weight.

I Did Not Consider Him To Be Any Kind Of A Genius. I Considered Him Deeply Lacking In The Area That Mattered Most In Life. Star Quality.

What Nobody Understood Then Is This: The Only Way That You Achieve What You Want And Fulfill Your Dreams And Become Great Is By Demanding That Sort Of Attention. You Have To Make It Happen.

Should I Just Sit Down, Right Here At Carousel Seven, And Shake Until Somebody's Arms Are Around Me And They're Saying, 'it's Okay, I'm Here, I'm Here, Come With Me To The Institute.

Part Of Me Believes That Love Is More Valuable When You Have To Work For It.

Just As I Had Long Suspected, A Person Didn't Really Need Math For Anything Anyway. Maybe Some People Did. Some Limited People.

The Past Does Not Haunt Us. We Haunt The Past. We Allow Our Minds To Focus In That Direction. We Open Memories And Examine Them. We Reexperience Emotions We Felt During The Painful Events We Experienced Because We Are Recalling Them In As Much Detail As We Can.

Fact: Upon Locking Yourself Our Of Your Apartment You Will Immediately Need To Use The Bathroom. Fact: And Then You Will Stand In Place And Watch Your Door. You Will Just Stare. As Though Rebuffed By It. As Though It Has Done This To You.

No Matter How Huge Your Loss, As Long As You Remain Engaged With Your Life, The Best Days Of Your Life May Still Be Ahead Of You. Don't Misunderstand Me: The Pain Of Your Loss Will Remain With You For The Rest Of Your Life. But Great Joy Will Be There Right Beside It. Deep Sorrow And Deep Joy Can Exist Within You, Side By Side. At Every Moment. And It's Not Confusing. And It's Not A Conflict.

I Don't Have A Fixed Routine. I Write Every Day But I Don't "write" Every Day, If That Makes Any Sense. In Other Words, I Email With My Friends Constantly And Sometimes I'll Pull Out Something I've Written And Save It.

In The Opening To The Mary Tyler Moore Show Mary's In The Supermarket, Hurrying Through The Aisles. She Pauses At The Meat Case, Picks Up A Steak And Checks The Price. Then Rolls Her Eyes, Shrugs And Tosses It In The Cart. That's Kind Of How I Feel. Sure I Would Have Liked Things To Be Different. But, 'roll Of Eyes' What Can You Do? 'shrug' I Threw The Meat In My Cart And Moved On.

What I Really Want Is To Sit Next To Someone Under An L.l. Bean Blanket On The Beach In The Fall And Drink Coffee From The Same Mug. I Don't Want Some Rusty '73 Ford Pinto With A Factory-defective Gas Tank That Causes It To Explode When It's Rear-ended In The Parking Lot Of The Supermarket. So Why Do I Keep Looking For Pintos?

As I Sat In The Hot, Salty Water, I Thought, 'no Wonder Mr. Bubble Always Gives Me A Urinary Tract Infection And Hives.' Mr. Bubble Was For Common People. Mr. Bubble Was For My So-called Brother, Their True Child. I Was A Vanderbilt. I Should Bathe In Condiments And Seasonings.

If I Were A Serial Killer, I Would Not Be The Kind That Stabs And Then Eats The Victim. I Would Be The Kind That Hides In A Tree And Shoots At The Aerobics Class.

I Never Could Have Written The Screenplay Because I Would Have Been Forced To Learn New Software And I Can't Learn One More Thing.

The More Obsessed One Is With Getting Thin, The More Certain It Becomes That One Will Never Get There.

He's A Really Nice Guy, If Only I Weren't Me.

I Always Tried To Learn Greek, But All I Got Out Of It Was, "poulaki Mou." ["my Little Chicken."]

He Was Raised Without A Proper Diagnosis.

Decisions Are Beautiful. They Are The Evidence Of Thought And Care. Decisions Are The Polishing Cloths Of Life.

After Was Better. Before Was Only There So After Could Happen.

The Only Other People Who Have Had Experiences Similar To Those Of This Man Were Locked Up Inside Institutions For The Criminally Insane. The Difference Is, This Guy Gets Business Cards.

I Saw A Monkey Walking On A Leash And Thought It Was An Ugly Foreign Child.

Women Smirk At Baldness. How Adorable Would They Find It If They Began To Lose Their Breasts In Their Late Twenties? If Both Tits Just Shrunk Up - Unevenly I Might Add - And Eventually Turned Into Wine-cork Nubs. Then It Would Be A Different Story. Then Men Would Get The Pity That They Deserve. As Far As I'm Concerned, Baldness Is The Male Breast Cancer Only Worse, Because Almost Everyone Gets It. True, It's Not Life Threatening. Just Social-life Threatening. But In New York City, There Is No Difference.

My Mother Is From Cairo, Georgia. This Makes Everything She Says Sound Like It Went Through A Curling Iron.

I Feel Like They Are Two Different Things, And When I Write Books, They're Just Books. If They Can Be Movies That's Okay. But I Would Write A Novel That Couldn't Be A Film.

I Knew That If I Wrote A New Book Every Six Months Or Every Year, If I Continued To Read Great Books, Eventually I Would Write Something Worthy Of Publication. I Understood I Might Be In My Forties Or My Fifties Or Even My Sixties, But I Felt Confident That It Would Happen.

Any Damage That's Been Done, You Have To Fix Yourself Because It Needs Fixing And There Is Nobody Else To Do The Work. Blame May Well Be Justified, But It's Not Going To Move You Forward In Your Life.

Childhood Is What Ended Me Up In The Hospital And Teetering On The Edge Of Deathly Alcoholism. It Was Really Good For Me To Accept It. To Accept All The Embarrassment And The Shame So I Don't Feel Like I Used To.

I Sit There And Think How It Isn't Fair That I Can't Drink At All, Even A Little. I Realize I Have Crammed An Entire Lifetime Of Moderate Drinking Into A Decade Of Hard-core Drinking And That Is Why. I Blew My Wad.

I Realized I Could Really Become Hooked On These Happy Pills. They Gave Me A Glorious Feeling Of General Well-being And Didn't Make Me Fat, Like Alcohol. I Wondered If There Was Any Harm In Being Addicted To Only These.

You Are Allowed To Be Alive. You Are Allowed To Be Somebody Different. You Are Allowed To Not Say Goodbye To Anybody Or Explain A Single Thing To Anyone, Ever.

I Just Look At Her And She Creeps Me Out. She Looks Like She Would Eat A Baby. Not That She's Fat. She Just Looks Hungry In Some Dangerous Way That Can't Be Explained. She's Always So Nice And Friendly. Exactly The Disposition Of A Baby Killer.

Think Of The Actual Physical Elements That Compose Our Bodies: We Are 98 Percent Hydrogen And Oxygen And Carbon. That's Table Sugar. You Are Made Of The Same Stuff As Table Sugar. Just A Couple Of Tiny Differences Here And There And Look What Happened To The Sugar: It Can Stand Upright And Send Tweets.

I Felt A Bottomless Sadness. So Completely Alone. Like One Of My Stuffed Animals At Home That I Was Too Old For Now, That Sat On The Shelf In My Closet, Mashed Against The Back Wall.

My Parents Had This Relationship That Was Really Terrifying. I Mean, The Level Of Hatred That They Had, And The Level Of Physical Abuse - My Mother Would Beat Up My Father, Basically - And I Think I Was Drawn To Images On Television That Were Bright And Reflective.

Everybody In Recovery Smokes. If You Don't Like Smoking, Don't Even Bother Trying To Get Sober. Just Stay Drunk.

I Could Write Another Collection Of Personal Essays From What Has Happened To Me In The Last Year Alone. I Don't Seek Out My Material - It Finds Me. I Am Magnetic, Somehow.

It Terrified Me To Consider: What If, As A Grown-up, I Craved Another Body Beside Me As Still As This One? What Then?

Stars Should Not Be Seen Alone. That's Why There Are So Many. Two People Should Stand Together And Look At Them. One Person Alone Will Surely Miss The Good Ones.

Do Not Wait For The Healing To Arrive. It Will Never Come. The Holes Will Never Leave Or Be Filled With Anything At All. But Holes Are Interesting Things.

I Don't Worry About Anything In The Internet Age. I Have Been Online Since I Was Aware Of It: 1985 In San Francisco. It Has Changed Everything In My Life. I Would Not Want To Even Be Alive In An Era That Did Not Have It Because It Is Essential To Our Evolution As A Species.

I Felt Deeply Tricked. Stunned. And Furious. I Also Felt My Default Emotion: Numbness.

You Can Make Almost Anything A Learning Or Positive Experience. I Think I Offer A Good Example Of How To Make The Most Out Of What Life Gives You And How To Keep Moving On.

I Can't Tell You How Much I Love Target And Costco, That Kind Of Culture, Because It's Something I Never Felt A Part Of. I've Always Felt Like A Tourist Because I Have Never Fit In Anywhere.

My Mistake Was In Underestimating The Emotional Force Of A Song You Have Already Hear A Thousand Times.

It Was Like Living In A New House. I Saw The Undersides Of Tables, Walked Through The Tangle Of Chair Legs. It Would Be Good To Be A Dog, I Thought. You Would Feel Safe Surrounded By All Of These Leggy Objects That Never Tried To Run Away.

I Was Like A Packet Of Powdered Sea Monkeys And They Were Like Water.

We Were Young. We Were Bored. And The Old Electroshock Therapy Machine Was Just Under The Stairs In A Box Next To The Hoover.

It's Weird - Sort Of Not Terribly Wise - To Take A Book That Was Successful And Then Change Its Cover.

I Read A Lot Of Science Books - I Love Cosmology, Quantum Theory, Particle Physics. So My Idea Of A Great Read Would Probably Put You Directly Into A Coma.

The Dark Side Of Blogging Is, Of Course, People Can Be (and Are) Just Savage And Uncivilized, Deeply Cruel And Fully Unaccountable.

When I Ate Vanilla Frosting Straight From The Can, I Could Feel God Standing Right Nest To Me Like A Real Best Friend, Watching, And Smiling, And Wishing He Had A Mouth.

The Truth About Not Having Everything You Need, Not Being Fully Equipped Or Qualified Or Allowed Is That These Limits Are The Nebula Of Creative Genius. When You Have Total Freedom I.e: No Limits At All. You Stop Trying To Make The Best Of Things

I Hate Feelings. Why Does Sobriety Have To Come With Feelings?

Some Damage Is Too Severe, Some Harm Endures. And What You Have To Do Is Accept It. And By Accept It I Mean, Don’t Be The Paralyzed Person In The Bed Who Is Waiting To Walk Again. Realize, It’s Never Gonna Happen. And Find Some Other Way To Get Around –swing From A Vine, Get A Mad Max Wheelchair. Anything But…wait.

I Think People Might Think, Oh, I Don't Want To Approach The Big Famous Author Because It's Embarrassing, But Then They Think For Two Seconds About It And Realize, This Is, Like, A Toilet Bowl Reader.

But Feelings, No Matter How Strong Or “ugly,” Are Not A Part Of Who You Are. They Are The Radio Stations Your Mind Listens To If You Don’t Give It Something Better To Do. Feelings Are Fluid And Dynamic; They Change Frequently. Feelings Are Something You Have, Not Something You Are. Like Physical Beauty, A Cold Sore, Or An Opinion. Admitting You Feel Rage Or Terrible Pain Or Regret Or Some Old, Rotten Blame Does Not Mean These Feelings Are Part Of Who You Are As A Person. What These Feelings Mean Is, You Have To Change Your Thinking To Be Free Of Them.

I Never Question The Way I Write. Writing Is The Only Thing That's Without Seams For Me. It's An Effort To Talk Because My Pictures Have To Be Turned Into These Sounds. It's An Effort To Be Alive. It's Work. But Writing Is Wonderful.

Acceptance, When It Comes, Arrives In Waves: Listen With Your Chest. You Will Feel A Pendulum Swing Within You, Favoring One Direction Or Another. And That Is Your Answer. The Answer Is Always Inside Your Chest. The Right Choice Weighs More. That's How You Know. It Causes You To Lean In Its Direction.

If I Were Blind I'd Rather Have Another Blind Person Leading Me Around Because They Know What I'm Dealing With And They're Experiencing The Same Things.

I Don't Sit Down At Nine In The Morning And Begin Writing And Then Take A Break For Lunch And Stop At Four. I Have No Structure Like That. I Am At My Computer Constantly, More Or Less Attached To It. I Live On-line And Hate Being Off-line And Don't Care How Unhealthy It Is.

Most Everybody Had Made At Least One Bad, Drunken Decision In Their Lives. Called An Ex At Two In The Morning. Or Perhaps Has A Little Too Much To Drink On A Second Date And Wept Inconsolably While Revealing How Simply Damaged One Was, While Nonetheless Retaining An Uncommonly Large Capacity For Love. That Kind Of Thing Was, While Regrettable, At Least Comprehensible. But Waking Up With Someone Generationally Inappropriate, Like Your Grandfather's Best Buddy?

And I Tend To Listen To Npr When I'm Not Writing.

My Mother Began To Go Crazy. Not In A 'let's Paint The Kitchen Red!' Sort Of Way. But Crazy In A 'gas Oven, Toothpaste Sandwhich, I Am God' Sort Of Way.

Glen Had A Disability More Disfiguring Than A Burn And More Terrifying Than Cancer. Glen Had Been Born On The Day After Christmas. "my Parents Just Combine My Birthday With Christmas, That's All," He Explained. But We Knew This Was A Lie. Glen's Parents Just Wrapped A Couple Of His Christmas Presents In Birthday-themed Wrapping Paper, Stuck Some Candles In A Supermarket Cake, And Had A Dinner Of Christmas Leftovers.

Life Would Be Fabric-softener, Tuna-salad-on-white, Pta-meeting Normal.

I Was Learning That If I Lived Slightly In The Future-what Will Happen Next-i Didn't Have To Feel So Much About What Was Going On In The Present.

You Manufacture Beauty With Your Mind

I Love To Both Give And Receive Very Old Books.

Giving And Receiving

No Matter What I've Written, Someone Somewhere Has Come Up To Me And Said, "me Too." The Truth Can Be Offensive, But It's Always Nourishing, In A Way. You Recognize It. You Can Feel It. And Even If [readers] Think, "my God, I Would Never Get In Those Situations," Within Those Ridiculous Circumstances That I Have Created For Myself, They Know The Way I Respond Is Probably What They Would Do Too.

There's Never A False Note In A Berg Novel.

The Most Valuable Moments And Experiences That Life Has To Offer Are Found Only Along Its Most Treacherous Paths.

I Don't Think Writers - In General - Ever Achieve The Fame Of Movie Stars. For The Simple Reason That Only A Fraction Of The Population Reads. But I Guess There Are Exceptions.

I Came To Think That Maybe God Was What You Believed In Because You Needed To Feel You Weren’t Alone. Maybe God Was Simply That Part Of Yourself That Was Always There And Always Strong, Even When You Were Not.

I Remember, No Matter How Impossible It Seemed That Any Given Day Would End, It Always Did. This One Would, Too.

Like Every Child, I Adored Her. Until I Formed A Brain And Got To Know Her.

I Don't Believe In The Concept Of A Soul Mate. Because We Are All Unique, But We're Also Simply Too Similar.

I Know Exactly How That Is. To Love Somebody Who Doesn't Deserve It.

I'll Always Write About What's Going On In My Life And The Reason For That Is It's Not Actually Because I'm So Fascinated With Myself, It's Because I Can't Think. I Can't Think Like Have Thoughts In My Head And Think Them Through And Come To A Conclusion. It's Like Math For Me.

Not Crazy In A 'let's Paint The Kitchen Bright Red!' Sort Of Way. But Crazy In A 'gas Oven, Toothpaste Sandwich, I Am God' Sort Of Way. Gone Were The Days When She Would Stand On The Deck Lighting Lemon-scented Candles Without Then Having To Eat The Wax.p28

After I Got My Coffee, I Leaned Against A Stop Sign And Sipped, Pretending It Was A Normal Day And I Was Only Up This Early So That I Could Go Running And Not Because I'd Just Been On A Killing Spree.

You Would Be Amazed By What You Can Give Up, Lose, Or Break, And Yet Still Be A Person Who Gets Happy Over Brownies.

Perfection Is The Satin-lined Casket Of Creativity And Originality. If You Are A Perfectionist, At Least Stop Telling Everybody You're One And Try To Get Over It Yourself, Alone In Your Home With The Lights Off

Truthfulness Itself Is Almost Medication, Even When It’s Served Without Advice Or Insight.

The Schnauzer Listens To Jazz. I Listen To Jazz Because He Likes It, And I Have Even Gone To Jazz Concerts With Him, But Truthfully I Would Rather Listen To Retarded Children Pounding On Pan Lids With Wooden Spoons.

I Tend To Really Enjoy Being Swept Up In Fiction. I Love A Good Story And I Admire Fiction Authors.

But She Did Love Him. I Believe It. I Know Exactly How That Is. To Love Somebody Who Doesn't Deserve It. Because They Are All You Have. Because Any Attention Is Better Than No Attention.

When People Meet Me, Many Times They're Very Surprised Because They Expect Someone Who Is Kind Of Wacky With Seven Piercings And Very Hip And Cool And New York City, And I'm Not.

There Is Nothing About Myself That I Wouldn't Reveal Or Write About. I Don't Care How Horrendous Or Ridiculous I May Appear In Person Or In Print. There Is Great Freedom In Not Caring What Other People Think.

Dennis Looked At The Puppy In The Window. We Both Did. It Was The Oddest Thing. Normally, Puppies In Pet Store Windows Sleep Or Pee Or Roll Around On Top Of Other Dogs. This One Ignored Us Its Window-mates And Was Instead Sitting With Its Nose Pressed Against The Glass, Looking At Us With An Extremely Serious Little Expression On Its Face. An Expression That Seemed To Me To Be Saying, "i Am A Sacred Cow. Get Out Your Wallet.

The Truth Is That Nobody Is Owed An Apology For Anything. Apologies Are Lovely When They Happen. But They Change Nothing. They Do Not Reverse Actions Or Correct Damage. They Are Merely Nice To Hear.

I've Just Finished My Next Collection, Possible Side Effects, And I'm Now Working On A Collection Of Holiday Stories As Well As A Memoir About My Relationship With My Father.

...handsome People Are Always Interesting To Watch. But A Handsome Person In Crisis Is Riveting.

I Love You," She Said, And I Knew She Meant It Because She Spoke The Words From The Heart At The Center Of Her Chest. This, At Least, Had Not Been Left Behind At The Hospital.

Marriage Is Overdone. As Long As There Are People, People Are Going To Find It Interesting.

My Instinct Was Always Have Your Gun In Your Hand. Especially When You Are Telling Somebody To Do Something. But, In Fact, The Police Academy Discourages This. They Feel Your Gun Should Rarely, If Ever, Be Brought Out Of Its Holster. Most Certainly Not When Children Are Involved, Which Is Exactly When I Saw Myself Using My Gun Most Often. A Truant Teenager Loitering Outside A Movie Theater Is Going To Be Far More Motivated To Return To School When He Has The Barrel Of A .45 Pressed Against His Cheek.

Real Optimism Is Not The Pep Talk You Give Yourself. It Is Earned Through The Labor Involved In Emotional Housekeeping.

The Most Important Thing For A Writer To Do Is To Write. It Really Doesn't Matter What You Write As Long As You Are Able To Write Fluidly, Very Quickly, Very Effortlessly. It Needs To Become Not Second Nature But Really First Nature To You. And Read; You Need To Read And You Need To Read Excellent Books And Then Some Bad Books. Not As Many Bad Books, But Some Bad Books, So That You Can See What Both Look Like And Why Both Are What They Are.

What I Think Of Blogs Is Just This: Some Are Beautifully Written And Many Are Not. But Even Blogs That Aren't Necessarily "well" Written Are Great For The Person Writing Them.

A Lot Of Being A Writer Doesn't Have Anything To Do With Writing. It's Ironic - I Have To Squeeze The Books In, Even Though That's What It's All About.

Sometimes When You Work In Advertising You'll Get A Product That's Really Garbage And You Have To Make It Seem Fantastic, Something That Is Essential To The Continued Quality Of Life.

I Think I Love Him, But I Also Think That You Can Love People Who Aren't Good For You.

My Thoughts Seem Thick, Ketchup Stuck In A Bottle. Like Trying To Feel Someone's Face While Wearing Goosedown Mittens.

I Was In Advertising For Years. That Was Cushy, You Know? It's Pretty Cushy In A Lot Of Ways, But I Hated It.

We Haven't Slept Together. But We've Napped

I've Learned How To Turn The Adversities In My Life Into Enriching Experiences. You Can Actually Gain A Lot From Adversities And They Make You The Person You Are Today.

Smoking Had Become My Favorite Thing In The World To Do. It Was Like Having Instant Comfort, No Matter Where Or When.

I Missed Him So Much That I Had Physical Sensations Of Loss, All Over My Body. Like One Minute I Was Missing An Arm, The Next My Spleen. It Was Making Me Feel Sick, Like Throwing Up.

Applause Is A Constant Thing In Aa. It's How We Buy Drinks For Each Other.

You Must Never Allow Something That Happened To You To Become A Morbidly Treasured Heirloom That You Carry, Show People, Put Back In Its Black Velvet Pouch And Then Tuck Back Into Your Jacket Where You Can Keep It Close To Your Heart.

I Am Prone To Envy. It Is One Of My Three Default Emotions, The Others Being Greed And Rage. I Have Also Experienced Compassion And Generosity, But Only Fleetingly And Usually While Drunk, So I Have Little Memory.

Thanksgiving Was Nothing More Than A Pilgrim-created Obstacle In The Way Of Christmas; A Dead Bird In The Street That Forced A Brief Detour.

I Loved Most When His Eyelashes Twitched And He Blinked, And Suddenly Happiness Was There Inside His Eyes. Unmistakable. Like A Single Word Printed On A Clean White Page.

Because Here Is The Truth: If You Want To Have A Chance At Meeting Somebody With Whom You Are Genuinely Compatible, Never Put Your Best Foot Forward.

Saying Just The Right Thing After A Considerable, Awkward Pause Is Far Less Effective Than Saying The Wrong Thing With Perfect Timing. I'm Telling You.

I Really Look At My Childhood As Being One Giant Rusty Tuna Can That I Continue To Recycle In Many Different Shapes.

And I Began To Let Him Go. Hour By Hour. Days Into Months. It Was A Physical Sensation, Like Letting Out The String Of A Kite. Except That The String Was Coming From My Center.

To Me, These People Were As Exotic As Animals In A Zoo. I'd Never Seen Anything Like Them. I Wasn't Sure Whether I Wanted To Be One Of Them Or Simply Live Among Them Taking Notes And Photographs.

And Of Course, The Answer Came To Me In The Same Way Jesus Comes To Those Who Drink In Trailers: As An Epiphany.

Tracy, The Leader Of The Cdh Group, Looks At Me With Eyes That Seem To Belong To Someone Three Times Her Age. It's Something Beyond Wisdom, All The Way To Insanity And Back. It's Like Her Eyes Are Scarred From All The Things She's Seen.

I Was Struck With A Bolt Of Distilled Horror Like I Have Never Known Before. Far Worse Than Suddenly Finding Yourself Walking Through A Prison Cafeteria Wearing Daisy Duke Shorts And A Jane Fonda Headband.

Finding Yourself

This Is What You Should Know About Losing Someone You Love. They Do Not Travel Alone. You Go With Them.

Someone You Love

I Think That The Internet Is Our Most Profound And Beautiful Achievement. It Is Magnificent. We Have The Internet As A Layer Of Our Thinking That Doesn't Control Us, We Control It, Yet We Don't Have To Be Aware Of It. It Will Be Like A Suit That Really Fits Well.

Our Lives Are One Endless Stretch Of Misery Punctuated By Processed Fast Foods And The Occasional Crisis Or Amusing Curiosity.

Because I've Lived In One Room My Entire Life, Working At The Same Table That You Use To Pay Bills At And Eat At. It's Going To Be Nice To Have Actual Space.

I Wouldn't Want To Waste Any Of My Brain Cells On Forgiving If It's Holding Me Back.

In The Same Way That A Tornado Rips The Roof Off A Double-wide Trailer, Leaving The Occupants Dazed And Staring At The Clouds From The Splinters Of What Used To Be Their Living Room, It Was Over.

(the New Boyfriend) Knows I Write Every Day For Hours But Has No Idea That All I’m Writing About Is Me. It Seems Wiser To Let Him Think I’m An Aspiring Novelist Instead Of Just An Alcoholic With A Year Of Sobriety Who Spends Eight Hours A Day Writing About The Other 16.

Red Hair Is Great. It's Rare, And Therefore Superior.

Although I Was Able To Maintain A Pleasant Expression, I Was Mentally Throwing Up In Her Face.

Reading Takes Solitude And It Takes Focus.

As A Child, I Was Never Drawn Toward Depraved Or Extreme Situations; I Really Wanted A Normal Little Childhood. Unfortunately, That's Just Not What Happened.

Before I'm A Writer, I'm Definitely A Reader And When I Read Memoir, I Really Want It To Be True.

I Think People Tend To See The Bigger Point, Which Is Maybe Not Fitting In And Feeling Like You Didn't Have The Childhood That You Expected You Would Have, Or That You Felt Lonely Or Struggled With Drugs And Alcohol Or Just That You Were Able To Achieve Your Dreams.

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