and if we fail to see the good...

"Love, it turns out, is as undemocratic as money, so it accumulates around people who have plenty of it already: the sane, the healthy, the lovable."  — Nick Hornby (How to Be Good)

I think I'll be just fine, regardless.

I only quote books I've read. Sometimes I fold the pages over like a triangle to keep track of the places where something's struck me in the gut. This book wasn't the best book I've ever read, but none of them probably are. But I noticed that there were good parts, and I kept going.  I'm glad that I do that, but still wonder now and then whether I've spent too much time on a book, and whether I'm really loving it enough. Sometimes I have to love the bad ones more so that I know I've given it my best or that I didn't give up for the wrong reasons.

I just finished Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger, and had I not made it through one or three so so stories, I wouldn't have read Teddy, the last and best story. That one earned a couple of paper triangles, and I'm even considering underlining some lines just in case I forget what I thought was important at the time.

The nice thing about reading is that you can learn without getting hurt or hurting anyone else. Even so, there's something to be said about living. I have a lot of practice, and with any luck all of these little paper triangles will amount to something I'll feel in the end was worthwhile. Underline.