“It's just a crazy damned life, that's all ...”

“To be sure, I'm not perfect wife material: I'm neurotic. I'm compulsive. I speak before I think and can't cook worth a damn. I'm messy and germaphobic all at once, and it's not entirely unheard of for me to get hold of the wrong end of the stick and then hang there like a pitbull.”

“My platitudes don't hold their interest and I can hardly blame them for that. My real stories are all out of date. So what if I can speak firsthand about the Spanish flu, the advent of the automobile, world wars, cold wars, guerrilla wars, and Sputnik — that's all ancient history now. But what else do I have to offer? Nothing happens to me anymore. That's the reality of getting old, and I guess that's really the crux of the matter. I'm not ready to be old yet.”

“Age is terrible thief. Just when you're getting the hang of life, it knocks your legs out from under you and stoops your back”

“All I can do is put in time waiting for the inevitable, observing as the ghost of my past rattle around my vacuous present. They crash and bang and make themselves at home, mostly because there's no competition. I've stopped fighting them. They're crashing and banging around in there now. Make yourselves at home, boys. Stay awhile. Oh, sorry- I see you already have. Damn ghost.”

“Just when you're getting the hang of life, it knocks your legs out from under you and stoops your back. It makes you ache and muddies your head...”

“I've decided it's not about me at all. It's a protective mechanism for them, a way of buffering themselves against my future death, like when teenagers distance themselves from their parents in preparation for leaving home.”