“Galinda didn't often stop to consider whether she believed in what she said or not; the whole point of conversations was flow.”

“Sometimes I don't get you,' I said. She didn't even glance at me. She just smiled toward the television and said, 'You never get me. That's the whole point.”

“Galinda didn't see the verdant world through the glass of the carriage; she saw her own reflection instead. She had the nearsightedness of youth. She reasoned that because she was beautiful she was significant, though what she signified, and to whom, was not clear yet...She was, after all, on her way to Shiz because she was smart. But there was more than one way to be smart.”

“People said things they didn't mean all the time. Everybody else in the world seemed able to factor it in. But not Lena. Why did she believe the things people said? Why did she cling to them so literally? Why did she think she knew people when she clearly didn't? Why did she imagine that the world didn't change, when it did? Maybe she didn't change. She believed what people said and she stayed the same." (Lena, 211)”

“Single Mind:If I love you with all my heart, she said, what will you give me? & then she stopped & said I didn't have to answer that because she was going to do it anyway.”

“Blood is thicker than water, my mother had always said when I was growing up, a sentiment I’d often disputed. But it turned out that it didn’t matter whether she was right or wrong. They both flowed out of my cupped palms.”