Sarah Dessen Quotes

But it was okay not to fit in everywhere, as long as you did somewhere.

But in the real world, you couldnt really just split a family down the middle, mom on one side, dad the other, with the child equally divided between. It was like when you ripped a piece of paper into two: no matter how you tried, the seams never fit exactly right again. It was what you couldn't see, those tiniest of pieces, that were lost in the severing, and their absence kept everything from being complete.

Right now, though, I wanted not to think forward or backward, but only to lose myself in the words.

Outside, the ocean was crashing, waves hitting sand, then pulling back to sea. I thought of everything being washed away, again and again. We make such messes in this life, both accidentally and on purpose. But wiping the surface clean doesn't really make anything neater. It just masks what is below. It's only when you really dig down deep, go underground, that you can see who you really are.

You, have this whole tall, dark stranger thing going on. Not to mention the tortured artist bit.

And you, have that whole blonde cool and collected perfect smart thing going on.

You're the boy all the girls want to rebel with.

You, are the unattainable girl in homeroom who never gives a guy the time of day.

If something doesn't work exactly right, or maybe needs some special treatment, you don't just throw it away. Everything can't be fully operational all the time. Sometimes, we need to have the patience to give something the little nudge it needs.

But sometimes you lose. Nothing you can do but admit it.
-Eli

The worst thing you can do if you miss or need someone is let them know it.

"I don't know," I said. "What else did you do for your first eighteen years?"
"Like I said," he said as I unlocked the car, "I'm not so sure that you should go by my example."
"Why not?"
"Because I have my regrets," he said. "Also, I'm a guy. And guys do different stuff."
"Like ride bikes?" I said.
"No," he replied. "Like have food fights. And break stuff. And set off firecrackers on people's front porches. And..."
"Girls can't set off firecrackers on people's front porches?"
"They can," he said... "But they're smart enough not to. That's the difference."

Are those the only options? Nothing or forever?

It's still a memory worth having, even if it's not exactly what you imagined.

He was the closest thing I'd ever had to something, or someone, that mattered. But in the end, close didn't count. You were either in, or you weren't.

Accepting all the good and bad about someone. It's a great thing to aspire to. The hard part is actually doing it.

It's so, so stupid what we do to ourselves because we're afraid. It's so stupid.

The bottom line is, what defines you isn't how many times you crash, but the number of times you get back on the bike. As long as it's one more. you're all good.