Small things start us in new ways of thinking

What was past was past. I suppose that was the general attitude.

It isn't that there's no right and wrong here. There's no right.

Judgment is contained in the act of trying to understand.

I often wonder what would have happened to me if I hadn't made that decision. I suppose I would have sunk. I suppose I would have found some kind of hole and tried to hide or pass. After all, we make ourselves according to the ideas we have of our possibilities. I would have hidden in my hole and been crippled by my sentimentality, doing what I was doing, and doing it well, but always looking for the wailing wall. And I would never have seen the world as the rich place that it is. You wouldn't have seen me here in Africa, doing what I do.

Whenever I have had to write fiction, I've always had to invent a character who roughly has my background.

People come and go all the time; the world has always been in movement.