I felt deeply tricked. Stunned. And furious. I also felt my default emotion: numbness. Augusten Burroughs More Quotes by Augusten Burroughs More Quotes From Augusten Burroughs Optimism sprouts from the knowledge that you are in control of your own life, not your past and not those around you. Part of being in control is taking responsibility for how you feel. This means not just admitting to uncomfortable feelings but then examining your circumstances to see what can be done to change these feelings at the source. Augusten Burroughs responsibility mean past I knew that he was as reliable as a mathematical formula. Augusten Burroughs mathematical formulas I really look at my childhood as being one giant rusty tuna can that I continue to recycle in many different shapes. Augusten Burroughs childhood giants different No matter your spiritual beliefs, if you hold any, the answer is the same: sometimes, why is not knowable. If you open the refrigerator door and a tub of Kozy Shack tapioca pudding tumbles out and splats open onto the floor, you clean it. You don’t stand there and question why it happened, how it was possible. Why doesn’t matter now. Augusten Burroughs pudding spiritual doors Not crazy in a 'let's paint the kitchen bright red!' sort of way. But crazy in a 'gas oven, toothpaste sandwich, I am God' sort of way. Gone were the days when she would stand on the deck lighting lemon-scented candles without then having to eat the wax.p28 Augusten Burroughs kitchen crazy gone I gazed around the room and my eyes stopped dead on a little boy standing in the corner. This was a particularly eerie doll. Life-sized and blond-haired and blue-eyed. I saw a little Nazi boy, pockets probably stuffed with scissors and retractable blades. My grandfather on my mother's side was rumored to be half Jewish, which practically makes me Jerry Seinfeld's brother, and thus wary of blond German boys with their hands out of sight. Augusten Burroughs eye brother mother While I liked hamsters, too, the Habitrail cage was expensive. Even I could see that the interconnecting boxes, tubes, and spheres could easily bankrupt a family and lead to addiction later in life. Because, how would you know when to stop? How could you stop? An entire city could be built with a Habitrail. Augusten Burroughs addiction later-in-life cities I hate feelings. Why does sobriety have to come with feelings? Augusten Burroughs sobriety hate feelings Life would be fabric-softener, tuna-salad-on-white, PTA-meeting normal. Augusten Burroughs tuna would-be white My mother began to go crazy. Not in a 'Let's paint the kitchen red!' sort of way. But crazy in a 'gas oven, toothpaste sandwhich, I am God' sort of way. Augusten Burroughs kitchen crazy mother I am prone to envy. It is one of my three default emotions, the others being greed and rage. I have also experienced compassion and generosity, but only fleetingly and usually while drunk, so I have little memory. Augusten Burroughs drunk compassion memories I couldn't help but think, This car is taking me to a mental hospital and my mother is treating it like open-mic night at a Greenwich Village café. Augusten Burroughs mother night thinking Tracy, the leader of the CDH group, looks at me with eyes that seem to belong to someone three times her age. It's something beyond wisdom, all the way to insanity and back. It's like her eyes are scarred from all the things she's seen. Augusten Burroughs eye leader insanity Sometimes when you work in advertising you'll get a product that's really garbage and you have to make it seem fantastic, something that is essential to the continued quality of life. Augusten Burroughs garbage quality essentials Miracles do happen. You must believe this. No matter what else you believe about life, you must believe in miracles. Augusten Burroughs miracle matter believe My brother was born without taste or the desire to be professionally lit. Augusten Burroughs taste brother desire We were young. We were bored. And the old electroshock therapy machine was just under the stairs in a box next to the Hoover. Augusten Burroughs machines next bored The more obsessed one is with getting thin, the more certain it becomes that one will never get there. Augusten Burroughs obsessed certain and she's a nurse. do you know how hard nursing school is? it's like medical school. so she's obviously smart. Augusten Burroughs nursing smart school In the opening to the Mary Tyler Moore Show Mary's in the supermarket, hurrying through the aisles. She pauses at the meat case, picks up a steak and checks the price. Then rolls her eyes, shrugs and tosses it in the cart. That's kind of how I feel. Sure I would have liked things to be different. But, 'roll of eyes' what can you do? 'shrug' I threw the meat in my cart and moved on. Augusten Burroughs moved-on meat eye
