Because she made me cry happy tears
Books are more than adventures for me. The setting is my home, and the characters are my teachers. The ones who admitted they sucked ass at pre-calculus taught me I’d live past failing math. The black gay guy who was waiting on a Standford scholarship made me realize being different didn’t mean being unsuccessful. The unconventional troll who had a fucked up mother taught me to look at the bright side, because it’s always there. Even that seventeen-year-old metalhead virgin who smoked pot and barfed on his ex taught me to live my life on my own principles. They’ve taught me lessons no-one else in my mundane life ever could. Perhaps, the most important lesson I’ve ever ripped from those pages is to never judge. That tattooed English professor who refuses to speak a word of Filipino is probably more than just her accented English or aversion to Tag-lish. Maybe she grew up in New Jersey. Maybe she walked on broken glass when she was drunk outside a pub. Maybe she has a thing for the Irish. Maybe she has a story to tell. Maybe we all do. We just need to look past the Oxford shoes and red lipstick to see it.