13 Funny, Wise, and Wonderful Quotes From Gabourey Sidibe's New Memoir
This Is Just My Face is a must-read.
By Patti Greco
Gabourey Sidibe's memoir, This Is Just My Face: Try Not to Stare, isn't your average celebrity memoir. It's good. Really good. And not just because it's revealing (although that it is), but because it's well-written. Gabourey shares some of her deepest childhood wounds, her struggle with depression, and other personal stories (some less harrowing too) — and she does so with a voice that's observant and funny, but not indulgent or try-hard. Here, some of the wit and wisdom from her book.
1. "I could lose weight. That is a fact. But I am dope at any and every size. I am smart. I am funny. I am talented. I am gorgeous. I am black. I am fat. Sometimes I'm a bitch. At all times, I am a bad bitch. (The word bitch is pretty confusing, right?)"
2. "I was born a cynical, suspicious, forty-five-year-old divorcée."
3. "My hair and I have been through a lot (it's been on fire twice). There are many more hair battles to come, but I know my strength and beauty start at the roots. I've realized that black women have the most beautiful hair: long hair, weaves or natural; bobs, cut straight or asymmetrical; braids; dreads; Afros; shaved bald; faded with a flat top. Our hair can be anything! Choose a color, choose a texture, and our hair can do it. There's an entire Black Woman Hair Universe of Possibilities."
4. "I hate that sarcasm is hard to convey in a text. There should be a special font for sarcasm so people can tell when I'm being an asshole."
5. "Fuck Twitter yo. I hate Twitter. I love Twitter. I need it to get through a day, but it is also systematically messing with my health and sanity."
6. "Not everyone in the world shares my sense of humor. That's how the world works. People are different. If we were all the same, we'd all be making out with one another all the time and we'd never get anything done."
7. "Honestly, I block people [on Twitter] all the time … I prefer my world to smell like strawberries and look like rainbows, and at least on Twitter I can block negative comments, fighting, and opinions about what I should be doing in my life. I am compulsive about keeping those dark clouds out of my life. Choose your tweets wisely."
8. "I sometimes get so mad at myself. Mad at my body. I call it 'my personal 9/11' when I am feeling really down. My body sometimes feels like a tragedy. But I'm trying very hard to change my mind about that. This is my body. It's going to be with me forever. For all the ways it's failed me, it's come through for me a million times more."
9. "I'm still pretty boy crazy. My mom tells me to call them 'men,' but that seems too grown-up a word, and frankly, I'm not there yet. But to clarify, when I say 'boys,' I definitely mean age twenty-five and older."
10. "I usually spend my Friday nights out with my friends. Or I spend them at home writing. Most important, I spend my Friday nights doing whatever I want to do. I know that if I had a boyfriend, or, even worse, a husband, I'd spend my Friday nights compromising. I don't think I really want to do that yet."
11. "Full disclosure, I don't know dick about dating."
12. "How many psychics does it take to convince a sad little girl that she can be much more than the world is telling her she is? None. She's got to be able to convince herself to show up for her own life."
13. "When I say that I'm beautiful, I don't say it so someone will clap and think I'm brave. I'm not doing it so that someone will comment on how confident I am. I don't say it with ego and I don't say it defensively. I don't say it meaning that people who look like me are better than people who look like you. I say it because I believe it. I've earned every centimeter of my beauty."
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Patti Greco Writer Patti Greco is a freelance writer and editor based in Brooklyn.
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