Talk:Elizabeth Curtis Sittenfeld

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And so then I’d thought, not only was I wrong, but my life turned out the opposite of how I expected. Meaning, it wasn’t my appearance - that’s not the bad thing about me. It’s my personality. But how do I know which part? I have no idea. I’ve tried to think about if it’s one thing in isolation or everything together, or what I can do to fix it, or how I can convince you. Then I thought, maybe it is my looks, maybe I was right before. And I never figured it out. Obviously, I didn’t. But I’ve spent a lot of time this year trying. And the reason I’m telling you all this is that I want you to know no one in my life has ever made me feel worse about myself than you

But to be seen as pretty was to be fundamentally misunderstood... If a guy believed my value to lie in my looks, it meant either that he'd somehow been misled and would eventually be disappointed, or that he had very low standards.

Cross would never want me to be his girlfriend; things like weather or certain songs could make me forget it sometimes, but I was always still myself.

During my time at Ault, I’d always felt I had things to hide, reasons to apologize. But I hadn’t, I saw now. In a strange way, it was as if all along I’d anticipated what would happen with The New York Times, I’d known how it would end.

I always found the times when another person recognizes you to be strangely sad; I suspect the pathos of these moments is their rareness, the way they contrast with most daily encounters. That reminder that it can be different, that you need not go through your life unknown but that you probably still will- that is the part that’s almost unbearable.

I believe that reflecting is very important in developing as a person and realizing one’s priorities.

I had no reason to ever go back, no real reason- from now on, it was all optional.

I heard a thousand times that a boy, or a man, can’t make you happy, that you have to be happy on your own before you can be happy with another person. All I can say is, I wish it were true.

I just don’t understand what you were doing with me,” I said. “I mean ever. Sometimes I try to see this all from your perspective, and none of it makes sense."

I let the piece of paper sit untouched on my lap, like a napkin. But the truth was, I felt cornered by it. Yes there were things I didn't like about Ms. Moray, but they had little to do with her clothes. And besides, didn't Aspeth and Dede understand that written words trapped you? A piece of paper could slip from a notebook, flutter out a window, be lifted from the trash and uncrumpled, whereas an incriminating remark made in conversation was weightless and invisible, deniable in a later moment.

I looked at her, and, as I did, I realized for the first time that she was very attractive: not pretty exactly, but striking, or maybe handsome.
I nodded, though I was pretty sure I had no idea; I’d never heard someone close to my own age talk the way she was talking.

I overestimated you,” Conchita said. “I thought you were smart and neat. But you’re shallow and conformist. You don’t have any identity so you define yourself by who you spend time with, and you get nervous that you’re spending time with the wrong people. I feel sorry for Martha because I bet she has no idea what you’re like.

I think that everything, or at least the part of everything that happened to me, started with the Roman architecture mix-up.

I thought of how many times I’d wondered if things were awry between us, if I was displeasing him or he’d lost interest. All those times, I’d suppressed my impulse to ask, and I was glad that I had because maybe asking would have hastened the end. And because- I understood this now- you really didn’t need to ask. When it was over, you knew.

I thought of how my life at Ault was a series of interactions and avoidance of interactions in which I pretended not to mind that I was almost always by myself. I could not last for long this way, certainly not for the next three years. I’d been at Ault only seven months, and already, my loneliness felt physically exhausting.