The girls in California were probably prettier in a standard sense than the New York girls--blonder and in better health, I guess; but I still preferred the way the girls in New York looked--stranger and more neurotic (a girl always looked more beautiful and fragile when she was about to have a nervous breakdown).
There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever. There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn't matter anymore.