“but if a girl were possibleas I am possiblethen marriage would be possible...”

“I want to meet and marry a girl with the same last name as me, so I can show how modern and feminist I am by taking on her last name after marriage.
”

“I wonder what I would find if I could go back and decipher the layers, if it were possible to delve into my past that way, but realize that, even if it were possible, it would be futile.”

“I have never fit into this town, this marriage, this skin. I am the child who was picked last to play tag; I am the girl who laughed although she did not get the joke; I am the piecemeal part of you that you pretend doesn't exist, except it is all I am, all the time. ”

“I am a practical girl, and a life is only so long. It should be spent in as much peace and good eating and good reading as possible and no undue excitement. That is all I am after.”

“he'd told her that young girls were always happiest with older men. Innocence and experience make for a perfect marriage.”