You can't recall someone whose name has worn away.

Gradually the feeling wears off, and I feel swamped again by the inexplicable pettiness of being alive.

Life can be lived at a remove. You trade in futures, and then you trade in derivatives of futures. Banks make more money trading derivatives than they do trading actual commodities.

The thought of all that happiness was hard to bear. What's the point of happiness when all it does is throw the facts of dying into clear relief?

I know. I was there. I saw the great void in your soul, and you saw mine.

I want to be careful not to throw all this away. This is happiness. I think this is what happiness is. I haven't got it yet, but I can sense it out there. I feel I'm close to it. Some days, I'm so close I can almost smell it.

A bit of the vagueness of music stops you going completely mad, I imagine.