Quotes from Annabelle Gurwitch

Kissing is a means of getting two people so close together that they can't see anything wrong with each other." —RENE YASENEK

It's also at that moment that I realize I am able to maintain the level of judgmentalness that I so cherish only because I have someone in my life who knows me so well and still manages to love me. Isn't that what love is? Knowing someone's life story and not using it against them? OK, maybe it's more like knowing someone's life story, using it against them, and still loving them.

So, fuck you, fifty, I own you. You're my bitch.

Jeff and I signed a Jewish marriage contract, a ketubah, promising to cherish each other in the "way that Jewish men and women had cherished each other through the ages." This probably doesn't refer to King Solomon, who reportedly had 700 hundred wives and 300 concubines but much of the document was written in Hebrew so we really have no idea what we agreed to.

Having grown up at the intersection of laissez-faire and benign neglect, by the time I was in high school, my comings and goings garnered little to none of my parents' attention.

A family mission statement formed in my head: 'We're a family that tells tall tales to add a little magic to our realism.

I have no idea what the future looks like but I can still dive in and I intend to keep doing it.

There's a saying, "There are no atheists in foxholes," but it should be amended to add ". . . or in penitentiaries."* If I am ever incarcerated you can bet I'll be signing up for every form of religious education offered. They have the best snacks; they observe holidays and often meet in air-conditioned halls.

Despite being raised in a working-class family, she has always had an innate elegance and an eye for quality.

Being an atheist had never stopped me from enjoying the ritual, community singing, gay friendly and general do-unto-others-as-you-would-have-them-do-unto-you sentiment of the school's chapel services, plus, the school had amazing camping trips. A camping trip that includes margaritas? What's not to like?

I was beginning to understand why marriage "experts" like to say that if a couple gets through the first year of marriage they stand a good chance of making it. They all seem to agree that year one is the most difficult. (After thirteen years of marriage, I would tend to agree with them, except that they left out years two through twelve.)

There is no upside to downward financial mobility,

recent survey indicated that people who've had plastic surgery appeared to have shed only three years on average off of their age. Which three years, I wonder? Fourteen to seventeen were relatively breezy but I barely slept for the first three years of my son's life and if I could reverse that damage, it might be worth it.

With any luck, I'd go instantly—with my new health insurance, I couldn't afford a slow decline.

I was keenly aware that I had nowhere near the challenges facing millions of people around the globe. That I was well aware of this only made me feel worse. To feel immobilized when perfectly aware of your privilege made death by inconsequential traffic incident seem even more desirable.