“One thing was certain: I would be in their Tang commercial. And if any of the other children tried to get in the way, I would use my pencil to blind them”

“...But what is it all about, what am I trying to do, is there a message? Nobody knows, and I certainly don't. If one could answer these questions in any other way than by writing what one has written, then there would be no point in writing at all.”

“I used to watch the world as if it was a performance and I would realize that certain things that people did moved me, and certain things didn't move me, and I tried to analyze, even at that age, six and seven and eight, why I was moved by certain things they did”

“I saw the other loners the way everyone else did-as unappealing, as to be avoided at all costs. If I hung out with one of them, I thought, my unpopular status would get worse, not better, because it would be magnified by association.”

“Things do not always happen the way I would have wanted, and it's best that I get used to that.”

“I thought the best thing to do would be nothing, and in that way things couldn’t get any worse.”