“There was something else, she often told herself, that spring brought teachers. A sort of sadness--other people felt something like it, she supposed, at the end of the calendar year--a sadness that came from realizing that they hadn't kept the resolutions they had made in September. Resolutions to read more, to go to more concerts and plays, to get better acquainted in the community. They meant to do these things, and they usually hadn't, and they felt in the spring that they probably never would.”

“She hadn't lied. She hadn't betrayed anyone's trust; still, she felt she had done something wrong. Or rather, she had not yet done the right thing. Was there a difference between these two sins?”

“The truth was that in the end, sad felt better than rage - a lot better. But rage came easier. Sad felt like the world was ending. (150)”

“She recognized the strange happiness that came from loving something without knowing why you did, that strange happiness that was sometimes so big that it felt like sadness. It was the way she felt when she looked at the stars.”

“He had never felt anything like that before - yet somehow he knew that from now on he would always feel like that, always, and something caught at his throat as he realized what a strange sad adventure life might get to be, strange and sad and still much more beautiful and amazing than he could ever have imagined because it was so really, strangely sad.”

“Caroline had felt more comfortable thinking of beauty as something separate from her, like a scarf or a coat you could check before going in to a show. She wondered now, however, if she had treated more things as a part of herself rather than an accessory, perhaps everything would have turned out differently.”