“You're barely older than me.''Than I,' he corrected me with a little smile.”

“I’ll never be as old as someone older than me, but I can be older than them if I outlive their lifespan.”

“Kim was more than a little inclined to snarl at him, but in the past few days she had learned that snarling at Mairelon did little good. He simply smiled and corrected her grammar.”

“You're very old, aren't you?""Just as old as my tongue and a little older than my teeth.”

“To me old age is always fifteen years older than I am.”

“Sometimes I forget that the world is not on the same schedule as I. That everything is not dying, or that if it is dying it will return to life, what with a little sun and the usual encouragement. Sometimes I think: I am older than this tree, older than this bench, older than the rain. And yet. I'm not older than the rain. It's been falling for years and after I go it will keep on falling.”