you're a product just as much. a product of a product. the people who design cars, they're products, your teachers, products. the minister in your church, another product.

Think of a rock polisher, one of those drums, goes round and round, rolls twenty-four/seven, full of water and rocks and gravel. Grinding it all up. Round and round. Polishing those ugly rocks into gemstones. That’s the earth. Why it goes around. We’re the rocks. And what happens to us—the drama and pain and joy and war and sickness and victory and abuse—why, that’s just the water and sand to erode us. Grind us down. To polish us up, nice and bright.

You couldn't have small, dying children in a movie without really bringing everyone down, but you can in comics.

Which is worse, hell or nothing?

As we grow older I always think, why didn't I do more when I was young, why didn't I risk more?

Everyone holds a certain type of power. For young people, it's their youth, their attractiveness, and their energy. But they're terrified that as those qualities fade, what are they going to replace that form of power with?

Kids grow up connected to nothing these days, plugged in and living lives boosted to them from other people.