" Loneliness adds beauty to life. It puts a special burn on sunsets and makes night air smell better "

" You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing, and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life. "

" What is straight? A line can be straight, or a street, but the human heart, oh, no, it’s curved like a road through mountains. "

" Boys are rarely told that their virginity is a gift, or indeed that their sexuality is about “giving” something to another person – lightly or not. Boys “get laid”, “get lucky”, “get some”. They “take a girl’s virginity”, “take advantage”; if they’re thoughtful, they “take their time”. Boys are not taught to think of themselves or their virginity as something to be offered up, unwrapped and enjoyed. "

" From Martha Stewart, IKEA catalogues, and HGTV, we’re led to believe each of our objects is a synecdoche for our true selves, and so we invest our sense of individuality in them, but you are not a collection of miscellaneous objects assembled out of the environment any more than an ant is an anthill. You are just yourself, a consciousness in a brain in a skull. That is all. "