“I've always been serious that way, trying to evolve to a more conscious state. Funny thing about that,though. You tweak yourself,looking for more love, less lust, more compassion, less jealousy. You keep tweaking, keep adjusting those knobs until you can no longer find the original settings. In some sense,the original settings are exactly what I'm looking for-a return to the easygoing guy i was before my world got complicated, the nice guy who took things as they came and laughed so hard the blues would blow away in the summer wind.”

“You know I can't do that. Pete's probably already spent a ton of money. He's a nice guy. I can'tjust bail--"Pete's not as nice as you think," Daniel grumbled.I laughed. "Are you jealous? Pete's just a friend--"Daniel grabbed me by the hips. "Of course I'm jealous, Gracie. You just told me that you love mebut you are going out with another guy. But this is more important than my jealousy. If I'mstaying here, then you have to stay in. I've got enough to keep my eye on. I can't have you outthere. Not tonight.”

“Next time you're about to rule out some guy because he's not your ideal, try to focus on the good things about him, because some guy is going to have to focus on the good things about you, even though he may have wanted someone more easygoing or taller. Every time you start to dissect some guy, note that he's willfully ignoring all of this in order to go out with you.”

“People must believe what they can, and those who believe more must not be hard upon those who believe less. I doubt if you would have believed it all yourself if you hadn't seen some of it.”

“Jocelyn: 'I've dated a few nice boys. Though if things got serious, I ended it. I didn't want to involve some poor guy in all the stuff I was carrying around.'Noah: 'Excess baggage, you mean?'Jocelyn: 'More like three suitcases, a couple of steamer trunks, and a carry-on.”

“These guys, my guys, are a bunch of assholes and I have to dig deep to find things about them I like so I can keep their secrets and keep them alive. Then they do these things, they betray me, and I have to let go of the love I worked so hard to find and splatter their brains all over the wall. ”