But didn't you say you were satisfied with your life?" "Word games," I dismissed. "Every army needs a flag.

Whenever an occasion arose in which she needed an opinion on something in the wider world, she borrowed her husband's. If this had been all there was to her, she wouldn't have bothered anyone, but as is so often the case with such women, she suffered from an incurable case of of pretentiousness. Lacking any internalized values of her own, such people can arrive at a standpoint only by adopting other people's standards or views. The only principle that governs their minds is the question "How do I look?

Whenever I write a novel, music just sort of naturally slips in (much like cats do, I suppose).

Love and used Subarus were two different things. Weren't they?

Being alive, if you had to define it, meant emitting a variety of smells.

What’s most important is what you can’t see but can feel in your heart. To be able to grasp something of value, sometimes you have to perform seemingly inefficient acts. But even activities that appear fruitless don’t necessarily end up so. That’s the feeling I have, as someone who’s felt this, who’s experienced it.

I'm an average person. Is just that I like reading.