They had, finally, the only thing anyone really wants in life: someone to hold your hand when you die.
Lorrie MooreRead
I tried not to think about my life. I did not have any good solid plans for it long-term - no bad plans either, no plans at all - and the lostness of that, compared with the clear ambitions of my friends (marriage, children, law school), sometimes shamed me. Other times in my mind I defended such a condition as morally and intellectually superior - my life was open and ready and free - but that did not make it less lonely.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects the struggle of grappling with a lack of direction in life and the loneliness that can accompany it.
Lorrie Moore illustrates the tension between the societal expectations of having clear long-term plans, such as marriage and career choices, and the personal experience of feeling lost and directionless. While the speaker sometimes finds solace in the freedom of having no rigid plans, the contrasting feelings of shame and loneliness highlight the complex nature of life choices and the pressure to conform to conventional paths.
Themes
LostFreedomPlansLonelinessLife Choices
In practice
Example use cases
This quote could be shared in a graduation speech to relate to those feeling uncertain about their future paths.
More from Lorrie Moore
All quotes →You couldn't pretend you had lost nothing... you had to begin there, not let your blood freeze over. If your heart turned away at this, it would turn away at something greater, then more and more until your heart stayed averted, immobile, your imagination redistributed away from the world and back only toward the bad maps of yourself, the sour pools of your own pulse, your own tiny, mean, and pointless wants.
Lorrie MooreRead
She was not good on the phone. She needed the face, the pattern of eyes, nose, trembling mouth... People talking were meant to look at a face, the disastrous cupcake of it, the hide-and-seek of the heart dashing across. With a phone, you said words, but you never watched them go in. You saw them off at the airport but never knew whether there was anyone there to greet them when they got off the plane.
Lorrie MooreRead
No matter that you anticipate a thing; you get so used to it as part of the future that its actuality, its arrival, its force and presence, startles you, takes you by surprise, as would a ghost suddenly appearing in the room wearing familiar perfume and boots.
Lorrie MooreRead
When I was in graduate school, I had a teacher who said to me, 'Women writers should marry somebody who thinks writing is cute. Because if they really realised what writing was, they would run a mile.'
Lorrie MooreRead
She was unequal to anyone's wistfulness. She had made too little of her life. Its loneliness shamed her like a crime.
Lorrie MooreRead
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