“We all have our own patterns, I guess ... And whether we like it or not, they persist.”

“All our lives are symbols. Everything we do is part of a pattern we have at least some say in. The strong make their own patterns and influence other people's, the weak have their courses mapped out for them. The weak and the unlucky, and the stupid.”

“The strands (the gods) weave out of our mortal lives are like a pattern visible only from the heavens; we here on earth can only guess at their designs”

“Whether we like it or not, we all come from someplace. And at some point in our lives, we have to make peace with that place.”

“By now we are even unsure whether we have the right to talk about the events of our own lives.”

“This vast life - the real, interior one in which we remain linked to the dead (because the dream inside us ignores trivialities like breath, or absence) - this vast life is not under our control. Everything we have seen and everyone we have known goes into us and constitutes us, whether we like it or not. We are linked together in a pattern we cannot see and whose effects we cannot know.”