The Sweet Hereafter

p. 43

Billy Ansel (who has lost his twin children in a school bus crash) speaks:

“Mourning can be very selfish. When someone you love has died, you tend to recall best those few moments and incidents that helped to clarify your sense, not of the person who died, but of your own self. And if you loved the person a great deal as I loved Lydia and my children, your sense of who you are will have been clarified many times, and so you will have many such moments to remember.”