2017.11.30 On Risk-Taking
“I have noticed that doing the sensible thing is only a good idea when the decision is quite small. For the life-changing things, you must risk it.” – Jeanette Winterson
When faced with a big decision, I often feel a little paralyzed. The peacekeeper between my reason and my passion paces full force back and forth in my mind, trying to find a way out of the mess.
I long for clarity. I crave a clear path. I desire security.
But I know there is none.
The future is and will be uncertain. I can not control the outcome. All I know is that I have the strength to endure, great love to give, and the longing to live a loud, exuberant life.
To change careers. To move across country. To love again.
These things change lives, and I must open myself to them if I am going to change mine.
“What you risk reveals what you value.” – Jeanette Winterson
“You’ll get over it…” It’s the clichés that cause the trouble. To lose someone you love is to alter your life for ever. You don’t get over it because ‘it” is the person you loved. The pain stops, there are new people, but the gap never closes. How could it? The particularness of someone who mattered enough to grieve over is not made anodyne by death. This hole in my heart is in the shape of you and no-one else can fit it. Why would I want them to?” – Jeanette Winterson
2016.05.19 On Solitude and Love
“What should I do about the wild and the tame? The wild heart that wants to be free, and the tame heart that wants to come home. I want to be held. I don’t want you to come too close. I want you to scoop me up and bring me home at nights. I don’t want to tell you where I am. I want to keep a place among the rocks where no one can find me. I want to be with you.” – Jeanette Winterson
The learning of holding space between myself and you; to love your fire but to not stand too close because you do not care who you burn down. You will burn me down.
I long for love, belonging. To be seen, held. And I want it from you. But I fear your touch. I dread your look. I anticipate your words with unease.
Is this love?
“I didn’t know what hate felt like, not the hate that comes after love. It’s huge and desperate and it longs to be proved wrong. And every day it’s proved right it grows a little more monstrous. If the love was passion, the hate will be obsession. A need to see the once-loved weak and cowed beneath pity. Disgust is close and dignity is far away. The hate is not only for the once loved, it’s for yourself too; how could you ever have loved this?” – Jeanette Winterson
“I want someone who is fierce and will love me until death and knows that love is as strong as death, and be on my side forever and ever. I want someone who will destroy and be destroyed by me.”
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson