Like you, she will have been with other people, but I've got a feeling there's something between you.

I am determined to live without illusions. I want to look at reality straight. Without hiding.

Dear God, teach me to be careless.

The cruellest thing you can do to Kerouac is reread him at thirty-eight.

At the same time, you have to find the right distance between people. Too close, and they overwhelm you, too far and they abandon you. How to hold them in the right relation?

My father was a civil servant, so having a regular job, being respectable is a big deal for me. Respectable in the sense that I support my family. That's what I mean by respectability.

I began to enjoy my own generosity; I felt the pleasure of pleasing others, especially as this was accompanied by money-power. I was paying for them; they were grateful, they had to be; and they could no longer see me as a failure.