Susan Beth Pfeffer

“Well, no one says you can be happy about everything," I said. "I know I should be glad for you, Megan, but frankly I think you're crazy. And if Reverend Marshall is making you this way, I think he's evil. This life, this everyday existence, is the one gift we're given. To throw it away, to want to be dead, to me that's the sin.”

“The Christmas after Mom & Dad split up, they both went crazy buying us presents. Matt, Jonny, and I were showered with gifts at home and at Dads apartment. I thought that was great. I was all in favor of my love being paid for with presents. This year all I got was a diary and a secondhand watch. Okay, I know this is corny, but this really is what Christmas is all about.”

“I guess I always felt even if the world came to an end, McDonald's would still be open.”

“We're all alive. We're all healthy. These are the good times.”

“I wonder if I'll ever have to decide which is worse, life as we're living or no life at all.”

“But she's wrong about hell. You don't have to wait until you're dead to get there.”

“Because if I let myself feel the pain and the anger, I think it might kill me. Or I might kill someone else. I know it's wrong to feel that way about God and I know its's wrong to not feel anything. I hate it. I don't hate God. I hate not loving Him.”

“I thought about the earth then, really thought about it, the tsunami's and earthquakes and volcanoes, all the horrors I haven't witnessed but have changed my life, the lives of everyone I know, all the people I'll never know. I thought about life without the sun, the moon, stars, without flowers and warm days in May. I thought about a year ago and all the good things I'd taken for granted and all the unbearable things that had replaced those simple blessings. And even though I hated the thought of crying in from of Syl, tears streamed down my face.”

“If God wanted a world filled with saints, He never would have created adolescence.”

“I wonder if I cry whether my tears would be gray.”

“Sometimes the rules don't work. Sometimes the rules cause the anarchy.”

“Which means every tomorrow is going to be worse than every today. Why feel sorry for myself today when tomorrow's bound to be worse?”