“I'm the dumb kid from the West Side of Chicago who has no business being at a place like this. I've got one long, tough road ahead of me.”

“I'm starting to realize that I can't be a child forever, that I don't want to be a child forever. I've had my turn, and now it's time to grow up.”

“I'm taking inorganic chem and physics not because I want to but because I have to. Not every doctor wants to be a scientist. Some of us just want to take care of sick people. I can't help thinking that medicine is more closely aligned to the humanities than to the sciences. I can't help thinking that I could learn more about being a good doctor from William Shakespeare than I could from Isaac Newton. After all, isn't understanding people at least as important as understanding pathology?”

“We, who should know better, reinforce every patient's desire to hide from the reality of his own mortality.”

“And of course she's sad about losing her leg, but she says it's made her realise how many things she hasn't lost...it's like a millionaire who loses a thousand dollars- he's sad, but he's still not that bad off.”

“I guess the basic reason I run is that I think a body, like a brain, should be used, stretched, forced to its limits...I feel sorry for those who will never know the desperate pound of 180 beats per minute, or the golden afterglow of recovery from it. The body, like a flying machine, can be operated with greater enjoyment, poise, and confidence if one has explored its limits.”

“At times it felt like I was killing myself. And yet the only thing I could recall at that moment was how much fun it had been, and how wonderful it was to do this for a living.”