“If ifs and buts were candies and nuts we'd all have a very Merry Christmas, I heard my aunt Diane boom in my head. Those words had been the bane of my childhood, a constant reminder that nothing turned out right, not just for me but for anyone, and that's why someone had invented a saying like that. So we'd all know that we'd never have what we needed.” PeopleQuotesChildhoodWrongRightSayingsIfs And Buts Book:Dark Places Source: Dark Places
“...my father, [was] a mid-level phonecompany manager who treated my mother at best like an incompetent employee. At worst? He never beat her, but his pure, inarticulate fury would fill the house for days, weeks, at a time, making the air humid, hard to breathe, my father stalking around with his lower jaw jutting out, giving him the look of a wounded, vengeful boxer, grinding his teeth so loud you could hear it across the room ... I'm sure he told himself: 'I never hit her'. I'm sure because of this technicality he never saw himself as an abuser. But he turned our family life into an endless road trip with bad directions and a rage-clenched driver, a vacation that never got a chance to be fun.” LoveMotherFightingFatherSilenceFamilyChildhoodCommunicationHeartbreakAbuseAngerScaredTerrorDivorceRageParentsSexismParenthoodFightHeartbrokenParents And ChildrenEmotional AbuseFuryMaliceChildhood MemoriesAbusiveMental AbuseFightsLove LostAbusive ParentsBroken Home Book:Gone Girl Source: Gone Girl
“They thought more before nine a.m. than most people thought all month. I remember once declining cherry pie at dinner, and Rand cocked his head and said, 'Ahh! Iconoclast. Disdains the easy, symbolic patriotism.' And when I tried to laugh it off and said, well, I didn't like cherry cobbler either, Marybeth touched Rand's arm: 'Because of the divorce. All those comfort foods, the desserts a family eats together, those are just bad memories for Nick.' It was silly but incredibly sweet, these people spending so much energy trying to figure me out. The answer: I don't like cherries.” FunnyMemoriesPsychologyChildhoodThoughtsLogicSimplicityDivorceIronyPatriotismIronicPsychologistSymbolismChildhood MemoriesBad MemoriesThe MindOver ThinkingCherry PieIconoclastBroken Home Book:Gone Girl Source: Gone Girl
“We just want you to be happy...but they never explained how...I remember always being baffled by other children. I would be at a birthday party and watch the other kids giggling and making faces, and I would try to do that too, but I wouldn't understand why.” ChildrenChildhood Book:Gone Girl Source: Gone Girl
“I think maybe, when I was very young, I witnessed a chaste cheek kiss between the two when it was impossible to avoid. Christmas, birthdays. Dry lips. On their best married days, their communications were entirely transactional: 'We're out of milk again.' (I'll get some today.) 'I need this ironed properly.' (I'll do that today.) 'How hard is it to buy milk?' (Silence.) 'You forgot to call the plumber.' (Sigh.) 'Goddammit, put on your coat, right now, and go out and get some goddamn milk. Now.' These messages and orders brought to you by my father, a mid-level phonecompany manager who treated my mother at best like an incompetent employee.” LoveMotherFightingFatherSilenceFamilyRelationshipChildhoodCommunicationDepressionHeartbreakAbuseDivorceParentsSexismParenthoodFightParents And ChildrenChildhood MemoriesAbusiveAbusive RelationshipsFightsAbusive RelationshipLove LostBad ParentingBroken Home Book:Gone Girl Source: Gone Girl
“I prepared to get out of bed, tossing the covers aside, the sheets dank-smelling, gray from my body. I wondered how long it had been since I'd changed them. And then I wondered how often you were supposed to change them. These were the kinds of things you didn't learn. I changed bedclothes after sex, now, finally, and that I only learned a few years ago from a movie on TV: Glenn Close, some thriller, and she'd just had sex and is changing the sheets and I can't remember the rest, because all I was thinking was: Oh, I guess people change sheets after they have sex. It made sense, but I'd never thought of it. I was raised feral, and I mostly stayed that way.” Life LessonsChildhoodNeglect Book:Dark Places Source: Dark Places
“I remember always being baffled by other children. I would be at a birthday party and watch the other kids giggling and making faces, and I would try to do that, too, but I wouldn't understand why. I would site there with the tight elastic thread of the birthday hat parting the pudge of my underchin, with the grainy frosting of the cake bluing my teeth, and I would try to figure out why it was fun.” FictionChildhoodNot Fitting In Book:Gone Girl Source: Gone Girl
