“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.”

“A successful college president once complained to me, I'm so busy that I'm going to have to get a helicopter! Well, I answered, you'll be ahead so long as you're the only president who has one. But don't get it. Everyone will expect more out of you.”

“My love life since I moved to New York from Chicago has been like a desert. I've had tiny little interactions of love, like finding shallow pools of water to drink from, and then I've moved on, hoping that I've stored enough love and affection and excitement to get me to the next place.”

“There are hermit souls that live withdrawn In the place of their self-content; There are souls like stars, that dwell apart, In a fellowless firmament; There are pioneer souls that blaze their pathsWhere highways never ran- But let me live by the side of the road And be a friend to man. -Let me live in a house by the side of the road, Where the race of men go by- The men who are good and the men who are bad, As good and as bad as I. I would not sit in the scorner's seat, Or hurl the cynic's ban- Let me live in a house by the side of the road And be a friend to man. -I see from my house by the side of the road, By the side of the highway of life,The men who press with the ardor of hope, The men who are faint with the strife. But I turn not away from their smiles nor their tears, Both parts of an infinite plan- Let me live in a house by the side of the road And be a friend to man. I know there are brook-gladdened meadows ahead And mountains of wearisome height; That the road passes on through the long afternoon And stretches away to the night. But still I rejoice when the travelers rejoice. And weep with the strangers that moan, Nor live in my house by the side of the road Like a man who dwells alone. -Let me live in my house by the side of the road- It's here the race of men go by. They are good, they are bad, they are weak, they are strong, Wise, foolish- so am I; Then why should I sit in the scorner's seat, Or hurl the cynic's ban? Let me live in my house by the side of the road And be a friend to man.”

“You West Virginia girls are one tough breed," he said.You got that right," I told him.”

“I think that's how Chicago got started. A bunch of people in New Yorksaid, 'Gee, I'm enjoying the crime and the poverty, but it just isn't cold enough. Let's go west.”