I believe in something. But I don't believe that anything can hold a grudge for long enough to condemn its creation to eternal punishment. Nobody can hold a grudge that long, even God.

I didn't use anybody's story. I used the context and the structure of the situation. People were so, so desperate to tell their story and begin to digest their experience - like turning it into a story - that after the fist few weeks I could go with a pad and pencil and take notes. People didn't seem at all bothered by that.

I write because it's a way of presenting something without having to be there.

Marla's philosophy of life, she told me, is that she can die at any moment. The tragedy of her life is that she doesn't.

You're not getting this back you know. Consider it an asshole tax.

What we don't understand we can make mean anything.

Dude, the place is filling up," I say. "It feels like we're living in the bottom half of an hourglass." Like somehow we're running out of time.