“You're not going to die?""Not right this minute." And of course, saying something like that usually resulted in immediate dying. I braced myself for a stray meteorite falling through the roof to crush my skull.”

“It was a real whale, a photograph of a real whale. I looked into its tiny wise eye and wondered where that eye was now. Was it alive and swimming, or had it died long ago, or was it dying now, right this second? When a whale dies, it falls down through the ocean slowly, over the course of a day. All the other fish see it fall, like a giant statue, like a building, but slowly, slowly.”

“ Valerie Sherwood, I said to myself, you're going to die. ”

“I might face death any minute now! But I should try not to put myself in harms' way as long as I can live. Of course it is not important if I die, because this is going to happen anyway. I know my purpose, my purpose is: How will my life or death impact the lives of others?”

“You're not going to die. I forbid it. All right?""All right," he whispers.”

“They forget that we, too, have earned the right to live! So I say if we are going to die, my friend, let us die trying, not sitting.”