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7cb8747
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then I must have dropped off. It wasn't much later that I awoke--the story of my life since my mate passed away. I get tired, wiped out, even, but can't seem to sleep more than a few hours at a stretch. It's such a weird time to be awake--noon. Spooky, really. There have been a few occasions when, tired of just standing there and hoping to fall back to sleep, I got up and flew around. The dining options were definitely interesting--lapdogs,..
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David Sedaris |
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36f2ae2
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When shit brings you down, just say 'fuck it,' and eat yourself some motherfucking candy.")"
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David Sedaris |
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936a03f
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I've been around for nearly half a century, yet still I'm afraid of everything and everyone. A child sits beside me on a plane and I make conversation, thinking how stupid I must sound. The downstairs neighbors invite me to a party and, after claiming that I have a previous engagement, I spend the entire evening confined to my bed, afraid to walk around because they might hear my footsteps.
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David Sedaris |
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b6efd70
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He told me that his sister is clinically depressed and read Naked during a month-long visit to a psychiatric hospital. According to him, once she'd finished, she loaned it to a fellow patient, who, in turn, loaned it to someone else. The book seemed to lift people's spirits, and as a result, the hospital has made it recommended reading. I'm not sure whether I believe this, but it's extremely flattering to think my book is being passed aroun..
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David Sedaris |
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075940a
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When it's my turn, I'll open my mouth, unable to speak, and feel a little tap on my wrist. Time to stand up, my watch will whisper. Then, before killing myself, I'll say one last time, "I am standing up."
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David Sedaris |
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58eb771
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A wise man once said that in order to communicate, you have to be able to speak in someone else's language.
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David Sedaris |
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2a803a9
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September 14, 2001 What killed me, what killed many of us, was the very end: "My home sweet home." Because, whatever else Paris might be, this _is not_ our home, it's just the place where we have our jobs or apartments. How could we have forgotten that?"
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september-11th
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David Sedaris |
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ba2dcea
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When you're young it's easy to believe that such a opportunity will come again, maybe even a better one.
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David Sedaris |
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6344f1a
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July 3, 1981 Raleigh There is a new cancer that strikes only homosexual men. I heard about it on the radio tonight.
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David Sedaris |
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de1bab4
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The approach of Christmas signifies three things: bad movies, unforgivable television, and even worse theater. I'm talking bone-crushing theater, the type our ancient ancestors used to oppress their enemies before the invention of the stretching rack.
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David Sedaris |
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2761134
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I once considered suing Farrah Fawcett for invasion of privacy. Hardly a day passed when I didn't see her on a magazine cover, an ad, a poster. She was destroying my life, but now she's OK.
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David Sedaris |
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c316ff3
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The word love was replaced by a heart shape I'm guessing they'll put on the typewriter keyboard any day now, right beside the exclamation point.
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David Sedaris |
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fb40f93
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After a year, you realize it takes time to rail against injustice, time you might better spend questioning fondue or describing those ferrets you couldn't afford. Unless, of course, social injustice is you thing, in which case- knock yourself out. The point is to find out who you are and to be true to that person. Because so often you can't. Won't people turn away if they know the real me? you wonder.
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David Sedaris |
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4f3bcb4
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Randall, the gay alcoholic in the house next door, boldly peeps through my windows. 'Boy, you sure rock in that chair a lot,' he said last week, his face pressed against my screen. This time I was lying on my bed with Katherine's cats. I'm watching them while she's out of town. I can be very mushy, and he watched me kissing them and saying that all the other cats in the neighborhood were jealous of their beauty.
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David Sedaris |
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6a7c418
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He spends a lot of time telling you how smart he is, which is odd because, if you're truly all that bright, people can usually figure it out on their own.
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David Sedaris |
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cc0448d
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If some people are "outed," are other people "inned"? Can we say that someone has been "besided" or "overed"?"
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inned
outed
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David Sedaris |
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53dbdeb
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I'm going to have you fired!" and I wanted to lean over and say, "I'm going to have you killed."
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David Sedaris |
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7015c69
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I was still hoping that it might be a phase, that I'd wake up the next day and be normal. In the best of times, it seemed like such a short leap. I did fantasize about having a girlfriend--never the sex part, but the rest of it I had down. I knew what she'd look like and how she'd hold her long hair back from the flame when bending over a lit candle. I imagined us getting married the summer after I graduated from college, and then I imagine..
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David Sedaris |
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614cfff
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The fact is that, unless we're with friends or family, we're all like talking dolls, endlessly repeating the same trite and tiresome lines: "Hello, how are you?" "Hot enough out there?" "Don't work too "hard!" I'm often misunderstood at my supermarket in Sussex, not because of my accent but because I tend to deviate from the script. Cashier: Hello, how are you this evening? Me: Has your house ever been burgled?
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non-sequitur
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David Sedaris |
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e23f42c
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The writers she prefers are long dead and are on the wordy side. If the novel on the sofa is 700 pages long, and the author photo is an engraving, it's either hers or Hugh's.
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David Sedaris |
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3e59cb7
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Neither of them had ever picked up a pen in their life, but all of a sudden they're poets, right, like that's all it takes--being in love.
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David Sedaris |
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3935d1b
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You're not supposed to talk about your good deeds, I know. It effectively negates them and in the process makes people hate you. If there's a disaster, for instance, and someone tells me he donated five thousand dollars to the relief effort--this while I gave a lesser amount, or nothing at all--I don't think, Goodness, how bighearted you are, but, rather, Fuck you for making me look selfish.
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David Sedaris |
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fea6cfb
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We're forever blaming the airline industry for turning us into monsters: it's the fault of the ticket agents, the baggage handlers, the slowpokes at the newsstands and the fast food restaurants. But what if this is who we truly are, and the airport's just a forum that allows us to be our real selves, not just hateful but gloriously so?
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David Sedaris |
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95117d1
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Buy it." This is my sister Amy's advice in regard to everything, from a taxidermied horse head to a camouflage thong. "Just get it," she says. "You'll feel better." Eye something closely or pick it up for further inspection, and she'll move in to justify the cost. "It's not really that expensive, and, besides, won't you be getting a tax refund? Go on. Treat yourself."
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David Sedaris |
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724c168
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You're trying to convince me?" Amy asked. "The one who has a second apartment two blocks from her first apartment just so she can get away from her rabbit for a couple of hours a day?"
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David Sedaris |
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3129c29
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but that's what fantasies are for: they allow you to skip the degradation and head straight to the top.
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David Sedaris |
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f801c69
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Watch this. 'Buenos Dios, Miguel.'" A small, dark-eyed man looked up from his wood splitting, alarmed.
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David Sedaris |
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be7a43e
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She lit a cigarette and spent a moment identifying with the smoldering match.
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David Sedaris |
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cd22bb3
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February 13, 1989 Chicago Tonight at Barbara's Bookstore, Tobias Wolff read from his new memoir, This Boy's Life.
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David Sedaris |
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56b75a2
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Pointing to the oversized crate that served as a manger, one particularly insufficient wise man proclaimed, "A child is bored." Yes, well, so was this adult."
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David Sedaris |
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2ea036f
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I don't think of myself as overly prissy, but it bothered me to find a finger on my bedroom floor.
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David Sedaris |
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fdba522
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I wanted it, I wanted it, I wanted it, but the moment it was mine, it ceased to interest me.
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David Sedaris |
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92e194a
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admh bh an ndzhy khh mhrbn hstnd Hmq nystnd!
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David Sedaris |
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da43f96
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I'm not sure how long I lay there, blissed-out and farting.
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David Sedaris |
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46c0bc1
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if you're not cute, you might as well be clever.
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David Sedaris |
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5c1dc43
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Sex is what you boast about when you have no exterior signs of wealth. It's a way of saying, "Look, I might not own a fancy sport coat, or even a carry-on bag, but I do have two women and all the intercourse I can handle"
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sex
wealth
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David Sedaris |
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497ad93
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Get Your Ya-Ya's Out! It was for many years my family's habit to drive from North Carolina to western New York State to visit the relatives we had left behind. After spending ten days with my mother's family in Binghamton, we would drive the half hour to Cortland and spend an afternoon with my father's mother, the woman we addressed as Ya Ya. Ya Ya owned a newsstand/candy store, a long narrow room fitted with magazine racks and the high, wa..
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David Sedaris |
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67e8161
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It was the stupidest thing the cat had ever heard of, an AA program in prison.
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David Sedaris |
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35c93e5
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She regarded her grandchildren as if we were savings bonds, something certain to multiply in value through the majesty of arithmetic. Ya Ya and her husband had produced one child, who in turn had yielded five, a wealth of hearty field hands destined to return to the village, where we might crush olives or stucco windmills or whatever it was they did in her hometown. She was always pushing up our sleeves to examine our muscles, frowning at t..
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David Sedaris |
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0d068ba
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Whereas our other grandparents asked what grade we were in or which was our favorite ashtray, Ya Ya never expressed any interest in that sort of thing. Childhood was something you endured until you were old enough to work, and money was the only thing that mattered.
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David Sedaris |
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13fbf77
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We would pass the afternoon at Ya Ya's table, eating stringy boiled meat served with spinach pie. The food tasted as though it had been cooked weeks beforehand and left to age in a musty trunk. Her meals had been marinated in something dank and foreign and were cooked not in pots and pans, but in the same blackened kettles used by witches. Once we'd been served, she performed an epic version of grace. Delivered in both Greek and broken Engl..
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David Sedaris |
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91c07f4
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Lisa and I groaned, cursing our stupidity. Once again we'd been duped. There was nothing worse than spending an afternoon on a golf course. We knew what was in store for us and understood that the next few hours would pass like days or maybe even weeks. Our watches would yawn, the minute and hour hands joining each other in a series of periodic naps.
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David Sedaris |
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f87c7ae
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Seeing the pros in person was no more interesting than eating an ice-cold hamburger,
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David Sedaris |
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28dab35
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Every clue was italicized with a burst of surging trumpets, and under questioning, the suspects snapped like toothpicks, buckling in less time than it took to soft-boil an egg.
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David Sedaris |