I saw my bulky person in the windows of the passing storefronts and wondered, when will that man there find himself to be loved?

We can all of us be hurt, and no one is exclusively safe from worry and sadness.

I do not know what it was about that boy but just looking at him, even I wanted to clout him on the head. It was a head that invited violence.

Luck was something you either earned or invented through strength of character. You had to come by it honestly; you could not trick or bluff your way into it.

Mayfield said, "You asked what I was thinking. Well, I will tell you. I was thinking that a man like myself, after suffering such a blow as you men have struck on this day, has two distinct paths he might travel in his life. He might walk out into the world with a wounded heart, intent on sharing his mad hatred with every person he passes; or, he might start out anew with an empty heart, and he should take care to fill it up with only proud things from then on, so as to nourish his desolate mind-set and cultivate something positive or new.

...things I had come to find humor in would make your honest man swoon.

I lay in the dark thinking about the difficulties of family, how crazy and crooked the stories of a bloodline can be.