Belonging
Arriving somewhere and not being sure it was worth the cost of arriving.
The memoir is precise about the arithmetic of advancement: the rooms that smell of bergamot and other people's money, the expensive grief of people who have arrived and are not sure it was worth the fare.
Belonging, in this account, is never granted once. It is renewed, conditionally, by performance — and the terms are set elsewhere.
From the text
“The specific, expensive grief of people who have arrived somewhere and are not sure it was worth the cost of arriving.”
Prologue