Being a stranger was like being dead, and brought to mind how, in a book he had read that most folks misunderstood one common state: The flip side of love is indifference, not hate.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that indifference is a greater emotional absence than hate, especially in the context of love.
David Rakoff's quote reflects the idea that being emotionally distant or indifferent towards someone can be more damaging than outright animosity. This perspective emphasizes that love's true opposite is not hatred but rather a lack of feeling or concern, which can leave a void more profound than expressed negative emotions.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion about the complexities of love and emotional detachment during a relationship workshop.
Fantastic days are what you wish upon those who have so few sunrises left, those whose lungs are so lesion-spangled with new cancer that they should be embracing as much life as they can. Time's a-wasting, go out and have yourself a fantastic day! Fantastic days are for goners.
Those weeks before diagnosis can be among the most torturous times. There is a reason you're called a patient once the plastic bracelet goes on.
Before I sat down and became a writer, before I began to do it habitually and for my living, there was a decades-long stretch when I was terrified that it would suck, so I didn't write. I think that marks a lot of people, a real terror at being bad at something, and unfortunately, you are always bad before you can get a little better.
Look, the Black community is diverse. We have generational divides. We have class divides. We have parts of the Black community that are fairly centrist, parts that are extremely activist.
There had not been this many words sounded in our house for a long time, and it was going to take a while to clean them out.
A million faces at my feet but all I see are dark eyes.
And she keeps saying, how can you do this to me? And i want to scream, what do you mean, how can I do this to you? Aren't we confusing our pronouns here? The question, really, is How could I do this to myself?
To be friends with God means to pray with simplicity, like children talking to their parents.
...though she had not had the strength to shake off the spell that bound her to him she had lost all spontaneity of feeling, and seemed to herself to be passively awaiting a fate she could not avert.
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