“For the next few minutes, there was a thorough rehashing of the courses (That meat was delicious. The sauce was perfect. And ooh that chocolate mousse.) This was a social nicety that seemed more prevalent the higher you climbed the social ladder and the less your hostess cooked.”

“On the morning of Friday, July first, I had a low-paying job at a waning publisher and a dwindling circle of semi-acquaintances. On Friday, July eighth, I had one foot in the door of Condé Nast and the other in the door of the Knickerbocker Club—the professional and social circles that would define the next thirty years of my life.That’s how quickly New York City comes about—like a weather vane—or the head of a cobra. Time tells which.”

“After meeting someone by chance and throwing off a few sparks, can there be any substance to the feeling that you've known each other your whole lives? After those first few hours of conversation, can you really be sure that your connection is so uncommon that it belongs outside the bounds of time and convention?”

“Emily Post says that talking about oneself isn't very polite.' 'I'm sure Miss Post is perfectly correct, but that doesn't seem to stop the rest of us.”

“...you could just tell that if Rosie couldn't romance her way to the top of the Empire State Building, she was prepared to climb it like King Kong.”

“In our twenties, when there is still so much time ahead of us, time that seems ample for a hundred indecisions, for a hundred visions and revisions—we draw a card, and we must decide right then and there whether to keep that card and discard the next, or discard the first card and keep the second. And before we know it, the deck has been played out and the decisions we have just made will shape our lives for decades to come.”

“You see that thirty-year-old blonde next to Jake? That’s his fiancée, Carrie Clapboard. Carrie moved all manner of heaven and earth to get into that chair. And soon she will happily oversee scullery maids and table settings and the reupholstering of antique chairs at three different houses; which is all well and good. But if I were your age, I wouldn’t be trying to figure out how to get into Carrie’s shoes—I’d be trying to figure out how to get into Jake’s.”