“At the time, my life just seemed too complete, and maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.”

“...and maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.”

“And maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.”

“Maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.”

“...by the time we understand the pattern we are in, the definition we are making for ourselves, it's too late to break out of the box. We can only live in terms of the definition, like the prisoner in the cage in which he cannot lie or stand or sit, hung up in justice to be viewed by the populace. Yet the definition we have made of ourselves is ourselves. To break out of it, we must make a new self. But how can the self make a new self when the selfness which it is, is the only substance from which the new self can be made?”

“Seems like nothing's getting safer or better," I said. "Seems like everything's getting worse." "Maybe that's what's gotta happen," Willa Mae said. "Maybe everything's gotta break lose and fall apart before we can put it back together again right.”