In his or her own way, everyone I saw before me looked happy. Whether they were really happy or just looked it, I couldn't tell. But they did look happy on this pleasant early afternoon in late September, and because of that I felt a kind of loneliness new to me, as if I were the only one here who was not truly part of the scene.
happiness loneliness outsider september
One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
birth chaos creative-process creativity inspirational mental-illness outsider self-discovery
I am not an outsider. I am an insider who discovered that everyone else had gone out.
discovery insider isolation misfit outsider philosophy
Tremendous beauty and tremendous ugliness puts you on the outside of things.
beauty dorothy-swenson irony outsider
Along the way I stopped into a coffee shop. All around me normal, everyday city types were going about their normal, everyday affairs. Lovers were whispering to each other, businessmen were poring over spread sheets, college kids were planning their next ski trip and discussing the new Police album. We could have been in any city in Japan. Transplant this coffee shop scene to Yokohama or Fukuoka and nothing would seem out of place. In spite of which -- or, rather, all the more because -- here I was, sitting in this coffee shop, drinking my coffee, feeling a desperate loneliness. I alone was the outsider. I had no place here. Of course, by the same token, I couldn't really say I belonged to Tokyo and its coffee shops. But I had never felt this loneliness there. I could drink my coffee, read my book, pass the time of day without any special thought, all because I was part of the regular scenery. Here I had no ties to anyone. Fact is, I'd come to reclaim myself.
city-life coffee-shops loneliness normality outsider reclaim ties tokyo
Half of the time I don't know what they're talking about; their jokes seem to relate to a past that everyone but me has shared. I'm a foreigner in the world and I don't understand the language.
loneliness lonely out-of-place outcast outsider
I assure you; while I look like a ghost, I'm no spirit or demon. I'm nothing but a girl struggling to make her way in an intolerant world. I bleed, I love, and someday, I'll die.
ghosts life-and-death miss-percy-parker outsider strangely-beautiful