We Are The Total Of Our Longings.

There Was Some Sadness In How That Could Happen, Tai Thought: Falling Out Of Love With Something That Had Shaped You. Or Even People Who Had? But If You Didn't Change At Least A Little, Where Were The Passages Of A Life? Didn't Learning, Changing, Sometimes Mean Letting Go Of What Had Once Been Seen As True?

My Youngest Brother Had A Wonderful Schtick From Some Time In High School, Through To Graduating Medicine. He Had A Card In His Wallet That Read, ‘if I Am Found With Amnesia, Please Give Me The Following Books To Read …’ And It Listed Half A Dozen Books Where He Longed To Recapture That First Glorious Sense Of Needing To Find Out ‘what Happens Next’ … The Feeling That Keeps You Up Half The Night. The Feeling That Comes Before The Plot’s Been Learned.

A Hand Fought Best When It Made A Fist.

There Are Kinds Of Action, For Good Or Ill, That Lie So Far Outside The Boundaries Of Normal Behavior That They Force Us, In Acknowledging That They Have Occurred, To Restructure Our Own Understanding Of Reality. We Have To Make Room For Them.

We Must Be What We Are, Or We Become Our Enemies.