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Truly great people emit a light that warms the hearts of those around them. When that light has been put out, a heavy shadow of despair descends.

Banana Yoshimoto

It didn’t matter whether he was nearby or far away. His image would drift up into your mind just when you least expected it, shocking you, making your chest pound. Making your heart ache.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Heart Matter Mind
Someday, without fail, everyone will disappear, scattered into the blackness of time.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Disappear Failing Someday
Here in this ocean, in the midst of all this water, with the red flags on those distant buoys flapping in the sea breeze, I find myself unable to treat our house in Tokyo as anything but a dream.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Breeze Dream Ocean Sea
The night glittered brilliantly then.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Brilliant Glitter Night
The place I like best in this world is the kitchen. No matter where it is, no matter what kind, if it’s a kitchen, if it’s a place where they make food, it’s fine with me. Ideally it should be well broken in. Lots of tea towels, dry and immaculate. Where tile catching the light (ting! Ting!)” (p. 3).
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Broken Kitchen Light
People who are going to get along really well know it almost as soon as they meet. You spend a little while talking and everyone starts to feel this conviction, you’re all equally sure that you’re at the beginning of something good. That’s how it is when you meet people you’re going to be with for a long time.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Long People Talking
But I have my life, I’m living it. It’s twisted, exhausting, uncertain, and full of guilt, but nonetheless, there’s something there.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Guilt Twist Uncertain
Inching one’s way along a steep cliff in the dark: on reaching the highway, one breathes a sigh of relief. Just when one can’t take any more, one sees the moonlight. Beauty that seems to infuse itself into the heart: I know about that
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Dark Heart relief Sigh
To the extent that I had come to understand that despair does not necessarily result in annihilation, that one can go on as usual in spite of it, I had become hardened. Was this what it means to be an adult, to live with ugly ambiguities? I didn’t like it, but it made it easier to go on.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Adults Despair Mean
Nothing exists in this world but me and my bed…” (p. 141).
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Bed Exist Nothing World
Although I was raised with love, I was always lonely.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Although Always Lonely Raised
Truly great people emit a light that warms the hearts of those around them. When that light has been put out, a heavy shadow of despair descends.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Heart Light People
Recognizing how totally ignorant you are is the only honest way to deal with people who’ve been through something traumatic.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Ignorant People Way
No matter where you are, you’re always a bit on your own, always an outsider.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Inspire Matter Travel
Over and over, we begin again.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Bare Over Tree
No matter what, I want to continue living with the awareness that I will die. Without that, I am not alive.
BANANA YOSHIMOTO

Alive Matter Want

Truly great people emit a light that warms the hearts of those around them. When that light has been put out, a heavy shadow of despair descends.

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Truly great people emit a light that warms the hearts of those around them. When that light has been put out, a heavy shadow of despair descends.

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