You know, Chihiro, darling- all it takes is one little wrong step and you end up feeling frustrated your whole life, like me.

To the extent that I had come to understand that despair does not necessarily result in annihilation, that one can go on as usual in spite of it, I had become hardened. Was this what it means to be an adult, to live with ugly ambiguities? I didn't like it, but it made it easier to go on.

For ten years I had been protected, wrapped up in something like a blanket that had been stitched together from all kinds of different things. But people never notice that warmth until after they've emerged. You don't even notice that you've been inside until it's too late for you ever to go back-- that's how perfect the temperature of that blanket is.

Everything in life has some good in it. And when something awful happens, the goodness stands out even more--it's sad, but that's the truth.

People aren't overcome by situations or outside forces. Defeat comes from within.

Time expands and contracts. When it expands, it’s like pitch: it folds people in its arms and holds them forever in its embrace. It doesn’t let us go so easily. Sometimes you go back again to the place you’ve just come from, stop and close your eyes, and realize that not a second has passed, and time just leaves you there, stranded, in the darkness

What was important wasn't the fireworks, it was that we were together this evening, together in this place, looking up into the sky at the same time.