Ellen Wittlinger Quotes
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This is why I don't like to argue with people. You say things you don't mean. Or, you kind of mean them, but the way you say it sounds arrogant and hurtful.
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But you can only lie about who you are for so long without going crazy.
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I trust the red sun setting, the leafless November trees. On Monday morning I look foward fearlessly to Friday’s eve. But humans are not as reliable as nature, as trees. I wonder if you’ll come back; I trust only that you leave.
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That's what I love about writing. Once you get the words down on paper, in print, they start to make sense. It's like you don't know what you think until it dribbles from your brain down your arm and into your hand and out through your fingers and shows up on the computer screen, and you read it and realize: That's really true; I believe that.
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I push my ice cream dish away. What's left in the bowl isn't cold and delicious anymore. Now it's just lukewarm, melted soup, because obviously nothing good lasts forever.
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People changed lots of other personal things all the time. They dyed their hair and dieted themselves to near death. They took steroids to build muscles and got breast implants and nose jobs so they'd resemble their favorite movie stars. They changed names and majors and jobs and husbands and wives. They changed religions and political parties. They moved across the country or the world -- even changed nationalities. Why was gender the one sacred thing we weren’t supposed to change? Who made that rule?
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I guess I'd just been thinking about it for so long that I forgot changing your gender was not even a question for most people. They just took for granted being a boy or a girl. I couldn't imagine what it would be like to be so sure of yourself.
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I was surprised at how much general fear and anxiety lurked inside me these days. I'd never been a fearful person, never even understood phobias like fear of heights of water or snakes or any of those things. And while I knew that my coming out as a transgender person was going to throw certain people for a loop, I somehow hadn't realized how much it would throw me.
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Why is it that people don't know what to say when something bad has happened to someone they know? Maybe because they think there are some magic words that will make everything all right again, only they don't know what the words are.
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I watched her walk away, first thinking: good riddance – who needs this abuse? And then after a minute thinking: she never really understood me anyway. Which rapidly changed to: I never understood her at all. And before long I was watching her small back disappear and thinking: there goes the only person who ever gave a damn about me.
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I believe in anything it would be nature - trees, clouds, rain - the life cycles that begin and end, season after season. that makes sense to me - nature as God.
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Sometimes people think they're above the laws the rest of us live by. they're blind to their own imperfections.
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I'm starting to think I'll probably never have a girlfriend, which would be okay too. On those few occasions when a girl has actually flirted with me, tipped her head sideways and laughed at some stupid remark, all it did was make me angry. It seemed like she was playing a game with idiotic rules. First you laugh, then you tell a pretty lie, then you stick your tongue in each other's mouths, then you say something really mean and hurtful to each other, then you go off to find somebody else who wants to play the game. This is an activity for intelligent people? I think not.
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It's a lie, you know, to pretend that nothing is important to you. It's hiding. Believe me, I know because I hid for a long time. But now I won't do it anymore. The truth is bioluminescent. I don't lie, and I don't waste time on people who do.
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I was only going to shoot you if he was in one band. And only if it had a name like Uncle Toejam's Acid Crematorium or something. But bluegrass is good, and hey, music is MY life too. Maybe I'll actually like the guy (assuming he's around long enough). Just don't write and tell me you're in the process of stirring up some baby Custard-Mustards.
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Well, it sounds strange, but when i think of God, i think of a soft whirring noise - like a spinning ball of energy - something i can tap into when i need it.
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How can your worst nightmare also be your wildest dream?
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All I meant was we all make choices in life. I don't think your mom made bad choices. It's just...if you make a left turn, you can't make a right turn at the same time.
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When there's an elephant in the room, you can't pretend it isn't there and just discuss the ants.
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I like to believe the happy ending lasts forever.
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When I decided I was a boy, I realized that if I wanted to pass, I'd have to learn to walk differently, talk differently, dress differently, basically act differently than I did as a girl. But why did we need to act at all?
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When people say they love you, you just have to decide to believe them, because you'll never know for sure.
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...and she said we all had to find God inside ourselves, in the things we loved most.
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I want to look at all my tears, she said. which made me shiver.