“…. he said it was interesting. He used the word 'textured'. He said 'smooth' is boring but 'textured' was interesting, and the scar meant that I was stronger than whatever had tried to hurt me.”

“I take small interest in politics,” he said. “The subject repels me.”

“Just those three words, said and meant. I love you.

They were quite hopeless. He said it as he might have said, I have cancer.

His fairy story.”

“I was in school studying civil engineering. A guy approached me on the street and said that I had a interesting look-very exotic. He told me I should try to be in the industry.”

““Try to be a man about whom nothing is known,” our father said, when we were young. Our father said several other interesting things, but we have forgotten what they were. “Keep quiet,” he said. That we remember. He wished more quiet. One tends to want that, in a National Park. Our father was a man about whom nothing was known. Nothing is known about him still. He gave us the recipes. He was not very interesting. A tree is more interesting. A suitcase is more interesting. A canned good is more interesting. When we sing the father hymn, we notice that he was not very interesting. The words of the hymn notice it. It is explictly commented upon, in the text.”

“I snuck a look to see how Eric was taking this, and he was staring at me the same way the Monroe vampires had. Thoughtful. Hungry.
"That's interesting," he said. "I had a psychic once. It was incredible."
"Did the psychic think so?”

“He said "I'll punch your head!" I said "Whose?" He said "Yours!"
I said "Mine?" He said "Yes!" I said "Oh?"
He said "Want a fight?" I said "Who?" He said "You!"
I said "Me?" He said "Yes!" I said "No!"
So we then came to words, he said "You're a cad!"
I said "Cad?" He said "Yes!" I said "Who?"
He said "Who?" I said "Yes." He said "You!"”

“For too long, and despite what people told me, I had fallen for what the culture said about beauty, youth, features, heights, weights, hair textures, upper arms.”

“Sometimes it hurts to look at you,” I said. I loved that I could say that and he knew exactly what I meant.”

“[T]he tribal conscience ought for the sake of social welfare to be stronger than private interest...”