Margaret Quotes in Reckoning
While it was me, it didn’t feel like it was me. I felt as though I were possessed by some evil spirit. No one knew very much about weight loss back then. The consensus was: eat less. But I didn’t seem to be able to do that. I was plagued with questions that I could not answer, except as condemnations. I called myself cruel names: weak, greedy, lazy.
He was reproaching her—for what? Her weakness?—and he was recasting her response as self-indulgent. A useless thing that was no help to anyone.
As a man his job was not to feel. It was to act, to do something. Maybe Izabella’s father was right—feelings are what get people killed.
But dear God, if you cannot weep at Auschwitz?
I was thirty-one years old. I was a brave Pole. I felt the expectation to man up, and my emotions fell into step with my father’s. They floated off like vapor. I felt, at that moment, nothing except irritation with my mother’s weakness.
Was I too soft, too privileged? Yet again I was unsure which was the mad response—feeling or not feeling. And which response was more useful—mindfulness or denial.
Margaret Quotes in Reckoning
While it was me, it didn’t feel like it was me. I felt as though I were possessed by some evil spirit. No one knew very much about weight loss back then. The consensus was: eat less. But I didn’t seem to be able to do that. I was plagued with questions that I could not answer, except as condemnations. I called myself cruel names: weak, greedy, lazy.
He was reproaching her—for what? Her weakness?—and he was recasting her response as self-indulgent. A useless thing that was no help to anyone.
As a man his job was not to feel. It was to act, to do something. Maybe Izabella’s father was right—feelings are what get people killed.
But dear God, if you cannot weep at Auschwitz?
I was thirty-one years old. I was a brave Pole. I felt the expectation to man up, and my emotions fell into step with my father’s. They floated off like vapor. I felt, at that moment, nothing except irritation with my mother’s weakness.
Was I too soft, too privileged? Yet again I was unsure which was the mad response—feeling or not feeling. And which response was more useful—mindfulness or denial.
