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d06fe09
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He stood right in front of me and pinched my arm and said, Can I see your room? Such relief. Even the pinch was good. I understood completely about needing to hurt someone at the same time that you are giving them something.
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Miranda July |
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09ece62
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Oh, the future. I see." A shadow fell over the doctor's face. "You're wondering if your son will get cancer? Or be hit by a car? Or be bipolar? Or have autism? Or drug problems? I don't know, I'm not a psychic. Welcome to parenthood."
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Miranda July |
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8878487
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Every night my plan was to make it to dawn and then feel out the options. But that was just it -- there were no options. There had been options, before the baby, but none of them had been pursued. I had not flown to Japan by myself to see what it was like there. I had not gone to nightclubs and said Tell me everything about yourself to strangers. I had not even gone to the movies by myself. I had been quiet when there was no reason to be qu..
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Miranda July |
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4982914
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He called the feeling between us "weird," and I had nothing to add. I kissed the backs of his legs and they sang. He reached around and pulled me down onto his back and I lay there, like on the warm sand of a beach. Just that. That is all there is. That is the whole point of everything."
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Miranda July |
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adddc57
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After passionately nursing this idea for about an hour, I suddenly had another idea: no I wouldn't. Of course I wouldn't make an entire city out of cereal boxes in the basement. The moment I had this second thought, I knew this was the real one.
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ideas
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Miranda July |
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2424089
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You know what? Forget what I just said. You're already a part of this. You will eat, you will laugh at stupid things, you will stay up all night just to see what it feels like, you will fall painfully in love, you will have babies of your own, you will doubt and regret and yearn and keep a secret. You will get old and decrepit, and you will die, exhausted from all that living.
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Miranda July |
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08d7020
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It was a new experience to walk across the city in tiny shorts and a half shirt... I often felt that I would be shot in the back with an arrow or gun, but this didn't happen. The world wasn't safer than I had thought; on the contrary, it was so dangerous that my practically naked self fit right in, like a car crash, it happened every day.
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Miranda July |
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5de7bb4
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I typed "royal family" into a dream-interpretation website, but they didn't have that in their database, so then I typed "butt" and hit "interpret," and this came back: To see your buttocks in your dream represents your instincts and urges. It also said: To dream that your buttocks are misshapen suggests undeveloped or wounded aspects of your psyche. But my butt was shaped all right, so that let me know my psyche was developed, and the firs..
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Miranda July |
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fa5f64c
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Will you date me when I ask you out? it asked. Yes. Even if I'm ugly and you don't like my personality? Yes. No, you won't. I will! You're just saying that because you're in a hurry. Well, it won't be my fault if I miss the bus. Goodbye, sweetness. Bye! Where's my backpack? It's on the counter. Oh. Bye!
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Miranda July |
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ba1a672
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Was everything redneck actually mystical?
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Miranda July |
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3ec48c4
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Teachers of subjects that this person wasn't even good at are kissing this person and renouncing the very subjects they taught. Math teachers are saying that math was just a funny way of saying "I love you."
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Miranda July |
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0b368e6
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I drove to the doctor's office as if I was starring in a movie Phillip was watching -- windows down, hair blowing, just one hand on the wheel. When I stopped at red lights, I kept my eyes mysteriously forward. Who is she? people might have been wondering. Who is that middle-aged woman in the blue Honda?
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Miranda July |
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c52f424
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This person has hoped and dreamed and now it is really happening and this person can hardly believe it. But believing is not an issue here, the time for faith and fantasy is over, it is really really happening. It involves stepping forward and bowing. Possibly there is some kneeling, such as when one is knighted. One is almost never knighted. But this person may kneel and receive a tap on each shoulder with a sword. Or, more likely, this pe..
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literature
humor
short-story
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Miranda July |
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8ead3d3
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Then one night I woke at three A.M. certain he was rotting like a chicken carcass. Only as I lowered him into the sink did I realize this was a crazy time to wash a baby and I began to cry because he was so trusting--I could do anything and he would go along with it, the little fool.
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Miranda July |
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642efba
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It wasn't just movies that couldn't contain the full cast of characters -- it was us. We had to winnow life down so we knew where to put our tenderness and attention; and that was a good, sweet thing. But together or alone, we were still embedded in a kaleidoscope, ruthlessly varied and continuous, until the end of the end. I knew I would forget this within the hour, and then remember, and forget, and remember. Each time I remembered it wou..
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Miranda July |
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8219028
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Was I like honey thinking it's a small bear, not realizing the bear is just the shape of its bottle?
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Miranda July |
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187c39f
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I hated my job, but I liked that I could do it
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Miranda July |
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f8e8f75
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We are social animals, and everything we do is because of other people, because we love them, or because we don't.
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Miranda July |
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50e93c2
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I wouldn't use a British accent out loud, but I'd be using one in my head and it would carry over.
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Miranda July |
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5989548
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People just need a little help because they are so used to not loving. It's like scoring the clay to make another piece of clay stick to it.
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Miranda July |
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10e24e0
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He didn't call me for a few weeks. This was customary within our friendship, confide and retreat, but I wondered. I wondered if perhaps our last conversation had been an overture. Not the conversation, exactly, but the silences within it. There had been many dark pits of tea-sipping silence; looking back, I could imagine placing my hand on his hand while kneeling in one of these dark pits. And in such a pit could one even be sure what one w..
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Miranda July |
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d67ec89
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That is my problem with life, I rush through it, like I'm being chased.
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Miranda July |
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9fa1149
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I checked to see if he and I had a special connection that was greater than his bond with his mother. We didn't.
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Miranda July |
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7dcb410
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The usual treatment is psychotherapy." "I know." I didn't explain that I was single. Therapy is for couples. So is Christmas. So is camping. So is beach camping."
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Miranda July |
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0bc6f42
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Did she think it was temporary? Or maybe that was the point of love: not to think.
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Miranda July |
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91c9646
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There was no apology in her eyes, no love or caring. But she saw me, I existed, and this lifted the beams off my shoulders. It takes so little.
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Miranda July |
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4b833d8
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We had loved people we really shouldn't have loved and then married other people in order to forget our impossible loves, or we had called out hello into the cauldron of the world and then run away before anyone could respond.
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Miranda July |
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aabde6a
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He loved me. He was a complex person with layers of percolating emotions, some of them spiritual, some tortured in a more secular way, and he burned for me. This complicated flame of being was mine.
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Miranda July |
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3f6b2c4
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We had fallen in love; that was still true. But given the right psychological conditions, a person could fall in love with anyone or anything. A wooden desk -- always on all fours, always prone, always there for you. What was the lifespan of these improbable loves? An hour. A week. A few months at best. The end was a natural thing, like the seasons, like getting older, fruit turning. That was the saddest part -- there was no one to blame an..
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Miranda July |
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f6ddc07
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When I leave my car my iPhone escorts me, letting everyone else in the post office know that I'm not really with them, I'm with my own people, who are so hilarious that I can't help smiling to myself as I text them back.
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Miranda July |
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821d4c4
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A howl was curdling inside me; the ache felt inhuman. Or maybe this was my first human feeling.
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Miranda July |
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771e3b5
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wynsnt hmsry drd bh nm hln. w ywnny st w mwhy blndy drd. rngshn khrdhst. mykhwstm mbdy adb bshm w ngwym khh rngshn khrdhst m fkhr nmykhnm brysh hmyty dshth bshd gr dygrn hm bdnnd rng mwhysh Tby`y nyst. Hl hm khh ryshhy mwh khwdshn r nshn ddhnd dygr qyfhsh khml shbyh khsy shdh khh mwhysh r rng khrdh. chh myshd gr mn w w dwstn Smymy bwdym. chh myshd gr lbshysh r bh mn qrD mydd w mygft, yn bh tw byshtr myad, pysht bmwnh. chh myshd gr dr myn sh..
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Miranda July |
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c9f28ff
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It was like a dream, where the most unlikely person can't get enough of you- a movie star or someone's husband. How can this be? But the attraction is mutual and undeniable; it is the reason for itself.
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Miranda July |
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72e9199
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But it had another layer to it, because imitating crass people was kind of liberating--like pretending to be a child or a crazy person. It was something you could do only with someone you really trusted, someone who knew how capable and good you actually were.
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Miranda July |
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0240cec
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People love to make life harder than it has to be.
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Miranda July |
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d93ef3a
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Let's say a person is down in the dumps, or maybe just lazy, and they stop doing the dishes. Soon the dishes are piled sky-high and it seems impossible to even clean a fork. So the person starts eating with dirty forks out of dirty dishes and this makes the person feel like a homeless person. So they stop bathing. Which makes it hard to leave the house. The person begins to throw trash anywhere and pee in cups because they're closer to the ..
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Miranda July |
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5bc13ba
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I decided, right there in the darkness of the hallway, that I wanted this.
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Miranda July |
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7595d75
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It must happen all the time, a fleeting passion overwhelms someone's true course and there's nothing to be done about it.
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Miranda July |
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23d09c2
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They were sparkling with the old love, the greatest love of my lifetime. And they were triumphant.
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Miranda July |
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27718fd
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We thrust our babies into the air again and again, showing them what it felt like to be a mother, to be terrifyingly in love without the option of getting off.
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Miranda July |
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96e80cd
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We still kissed frequently, usually a cluster of small pecks. An acronym for our early deep kisses. Which in a way was more intimate because only we knew what it stood for.
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kissing
love
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Miranda July |
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21ea7c4
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I didn't bathe him because I was too afraid he would slip out of my hands or his belly button would open. Then one night I woke at three A.M. certain he was rotting like a chicken carcass. Only as I lowered him into the sink did I realize this was a crazy time to wash a baby and I began to cry because he was so trusting--I could do anything and he would go along with it, the little fool.
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newborn
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Miranda July |
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e4ebb5c
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That said, the spaces between my features are in perfect proportion to each other. So far no one has noticed this. Also my ears: darling little shells. I wear my hair tucked behind them and try to enter crowded rooms ear-first, walking sideways.
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Miranda July |
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4dc433b
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We grew still and stared at each other. It seemed incredibly dangerous to look into each other's eyes, but we were doing it. For how long can you behold another person? Before you have to think of yourself again, like dipping the brush back in for more ink. For a very long time, you didn't need to get more ink, there was no reason to get anything else, because she was as good as me, she lived on earth like me, she suffered as I did.
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Miranda July |