“it was like any other relationship, there wasjealousy on both sides,there were split-ups and reconciliations.there were also fragmented moments ofgreat peace and beauty.I often tried to get away from her andshe tied to get away from mebut it was difficult:Cupid, in his strange way, was reallythere.”

“Getting drunk was good. I decided that I would always like getting drunk. It took away the obvious and maybe if you could get away from the obvious often enough, you wouldn't become so obvious yourself.”

“the best often die by their own hand just to get away, and those left behindcan never quite understand why anybodywould ever want to get away from them”

“And my own affairs were as bad, as dismal, as the day I had been born. The only difference was that now I could drink now and then, though never often enough. Drink was the only thing that kept a man from feeling forever stunned and useless. Everything else just kept picking and picking, hacking away. And nothing was interesting, nothing. The people were restrictive and careful, all alike. And I've got to live with these fuckers for the rest of my life, I thought. God, they all had assholes and sexual organs and their mouths and their armpits. They shit and they chattered and they were dull as horse dung. The girls looked good from a distance, the sun shining through their dresses, their hair. But get up close and listen to their minds running out of their mouths, you felt like digging in under a hill and hiding out with a tommy-gun. I would certainly never be able to be happy, to get married, I could never have children. Hell, I couldn't even get a job as a dishwasher.”

“Censorship is the tool of those who have the need to hide actualities from themselves and from others. Their fear is only their inability to face what is real, and I can't vent any anger against them. I only feel this appalling sadness. Somewhere, in their upbringing, they were shielded against the total facts of our existence. They were only taught to look one way when many ways exist.”

“one day Manuel returned to the place, andshe was gone - no argument, no note, justgone, all her clothesall her stuff, andManuel sat by the window and looked outand didn't make his jobthe next day or thenext day orthe day after, hedidn't phone in, helost his job, got aticket for parking, smokedfour hundred and sixty cigarettes, gotpicked up for common drunk, bailedout, wentto court and pleadedguilty.when the rent was up he moved from Beacon street, heleft the cat and went to live with his brother andthey'd get drunkevery nightand talk about how terriblelife was.Manuel never again smokedlong slim cigarsbecause Shirley always saidhowhandsome he lookedwhen he did.”

“I had no interests. I had no interest in anything. I had no idea how I was going to escape. At least the others had some taste for life. They seemed to understand something that I didn’t understand. Maybe I was lacking. It was possible. I often felt inferior. I just wanted to get away from them. But there was no place to go. Suicide? Jesus Christ, just more work. I felt like sleeping for five years but they wouldn’t let me.”