“I had a sudden understanding of tattooing's true appeal: It'sTroll-collecting for biker types.”

“In the middle of my depression, somebody told me about a self-helpgroup for people who wanted to persue personal visions, and I thoughtthat might be just the thing for me, since I no longer had any. So Iwent to this Goals Meeting. It was in an Episcopal church in the leafysuburbs, and when I walked inside, a nice lady was explaing that herGoal was to get out of debt and buy a pony for her little daughter. Then this other fellow got up to share. He was a white boy in adashiki. He said, "My name is Ira and I have a Goal. Right now I'munemployed and in debt and I'm living with my parents, who don'tunderstand me at all. But my faith in this program is so huge that Iknow that one year from today I'm going to be traveling across theUnited States with my Spirit Guide. My Spirit Guide is going to be awhile malamute dog named Isis. I mean, I know this as clearly as I'veknown anything in my life. My Goal is for Isis to guide me to thehomes of my favorite self-help authoers. Isis is going to take me tomeet John Bradshaw and Louise Hay and M. Scott Peck, and I'm going toget them to mentor me!" He kind of bellowed this. And I wasn't surewhether Ira was exactly what John Bradshaw and Louise Hay and M. ScottPeck deserved or whether I hoped they kept shotguns in their homes. Iwas honestly torn.”

“The philosopher Berkley claimed that everything in the universeexists solely as a thought in the mind of God. In response to thisSamuel Johnson is supposed to have kicked a stone and said, "I refusehim thus!" Nowhere is it written that Johnson stubbed his toe when he kickedthat stone. But he probably did and it probably hurt.”

“She hops expectantly into the sink. I turn on the tap for her; she laps without a glance in my direction, like a duchess so used to being ministered to that she no longer notices the servants and sees only a world where objects dumbly bend to her wishes, doors opening, faucets discharging cool water, delicious things appearing in her dish.”

“...most people would rather feel guilty than feel helpless. ”

“The daguerreotype reproduces what appeared before a lens at a particular moment and never again-its appearance is simultaneous with its disappearance, its death.”

“Somewhere between what the lens depicts and what the caption interprets, a mental picture intervenes, a cultural ideology defining what and how to see, what to recognize as significant.”