“The explanations for the things we do in life are many and complex. Supposedly mature adults should live by logic, listen to their reason. Think things out before they act.But maybe they never heard what Dr. London told me one, Freud said that for the little things in life we should react according to our reason. But for really big decisions, we should heed what our unconscious tells us.”

“Quiet heroism or youthful idealism, or both? What do we know? That life without heroism and idealism is not worth living - or that either can be fatal?”

“But what does he do to qualify as a sonovabitch?” Jenny asked.“Make me”, I replied.“Beg pardon?”“Make me”, I repeated.Her eyes widened like saucers. “You mean like incest?” she asked.“Don’t give me your family problems, Jen. I have enough of my own.”“Like what, Oliver?” she asked, “like just what is it he makes you do?”“The ‘right things’”, I said. “What’s wrong with the ‘right things’?” she asked, delighting in the apparent paradox.”

“We have turned doctors into gods and worship their deity by offering up our bodies and our souls - not to mention our worldly goods.And yet paradoxically, they are the most vulnerable of human beings. Their suicide rate is eight times the national average. Their percentage of drug addiction is one hundred times higherAnd because they are painfully aware that they cannot live up to our expectations, their anguish is unquantifiably intense. They have aptly been called 'wounded healers.' "~ Barney Livingston, M.D.(Doctors, 1989)”

“Part of being a big winner is the ability to be a big loser. There is no paradox involved. It is a distinctly Harvard thing to be able to turn any defeat into victory”

“Either way I don't come first, which for some stupid reason bothers hell out of me, having grown up with the notion that I always had to be number one. Family heritage, don't you know?”

“I think the Peace Corps is a fine thing, don't you?" he said."Well," I replied, "it's certainly better than War Corps.”