“Sir Gerald Moore: I was at dinner last evening, and halfway through the pudding, this four-year-old child came alone, dragging a little toy cart. And on the cart was a fresh turd. Her own, I suppose. The parents just shook their heads and smiled. I've made a big investment in you, Peter. Time and money, and it's not working. Now, I could just shake my head and smile. But in my house, when a turd appears, we throw it out. We dispose of it. We flush it away. We don't put it on the table and call it caviar.”

“I shift my position on the sofa, so my head is on a big, lumpy pillow in Greenie's lap and Georgia is leanign back against my middle and Claire is just about asleep on the floor. Allison and I catch eyes, and she tilts her head and smiles, and when I smile back, we both well up with tears, I think beause we both recognize that whatever else may be unfolding, this is happiness.”

“I haven't yet figured out who I want to be, dear," Ruth says, answering both my questions, and then throws her head back in a hearty, unselfconscious laugh. "I'm not kidding. I haven't figure it out yet. But don't tell my daughters that. I lie to them every day. I tell them they will figure it out, with time. To just keep doing what they are doing. But let me let you in on a little secret, because I think you can handle it.' She leans in to whisper in my ear.All parents lie to their children. It's our duty. But the truth of the matter is, I don't think many of us know what we are doing. We all walk around much of the time confused and very much alone.”

“I'd thought about this for a long time. "That bank loses that much money in bad loans every month. They make that much money in interest every day. They're a big bank. The money I took was small change to them. No depositor was hurt."She shook her head. "I still can't approve of it. I don't think it's right."I felt my face go remote, still. I crossed my arms and felt cold.She spread her hands. "It doesn't change the fact that I still love you. I've missed you terribly. I've missed your phone calls, and I've missed your body in bed next to me. I don't know what to do about this. My loving you goes way beyond my disapproval of your theft."I uncrossed my arms and reached across the table for her. She leaned forward and we kissed until the candle burned a hole in my shirt. Then we laughed and I held an ice cube to the burn and the food came and everything was all right.”

“Nay, Sir, it was not the WINE that made your head ache, but the SENSE that I put into it''What, Sir! will sense make the head ache?''Yes, Sir, (with a smile,) when it is not used to it.”

“When we gaze at a star in the Milky Way which is 50,000 light-years away from our sun, we are looking back 50,000 years in time.""The idea is much too big for my little head.""The only way we can look out into space, then, is to look back in time. We can never know what the universe is like now. We only know what it was like then. When we look up at a star that is thousands of light-years away, we are really traveling thousands of years back in the history of space.”