“It's like many other things in life, Ellie. You keep on the path and all's well. You get off it and the next thing you know you're lost if you're not lucky.”

“If you get down, all you need to do is act like you're feeling good, and next thing you know, you are.”

“Computers are great because when you're working with them you get immediate results that let you know if your program works. It's feedback you don't get from many other things.”

“Mothers! They promise you they'll never get married again, and next thing you know you're a bridesmaid.”

“Sometimes in the mountains the animals make paths by using the same route again and again. If you don't know what you're doing, you might think it's a path made by humans--it looks that way. If you follow that path, the path of beasts, you won't get anywhere at all. People lost in the wilderness, they follow these paths and only get more and more lost. Sometimes they lose their way and they die. It's not a path for humans, it's a dangerous diversion. Are you sure that's the road you want to take? It won't get you where you want to go.”

“Fate never promises to tell you everything up front. You aren't always shown the path in life you're supposed to take. But if there was one thing she'd learned in the past few weeks, it was that sometimes, when you're really lucky, you meet someone with a map.”