“Well, maybe 'tis natural. Of course things you don't know about are always nicer'n things you do, same as the pertater on 'tother side of the plate is always the biggest. But I wish I looked that way ter somebody 'way off. Wouldn't it be jest great, now, if only somebody over in India wanted ME?”

“If I wanted to kill somebody, I'd take this book and beat you to death with it, and I wouldn't feel a thing.”

“I was four years old, and had long since reasoned that it was folly to expect the big things from people. It was enough to get the little things. The biggest thing, of course, was love, the nearness of somebody you love when you need somebody to be near.”

“Don't you know that what happens to you once always happens again? You always react in the same way to the same thing. It's no accident when you make a mess. Then you do it again. It's called destiny.”

“(On Ricky asking him to do a diary next year)No I wouldn't, you know, cos you do the same stuff ever year don't ya? It's set up the same way: January, February it's the same thing, it's the same routine”

“Read – and be curious. And if somebody says to you: 'Things are this way. You can't change it' - don't believe a word.”

“…So I wasn't death to this guy, I was just a one-way ticket home. Now I don't know if you've ever stuck a.38 in somebody's navel, but if they look at you and say "Praise the Lord," I guarantee you one thing, it'll separate your head from your shoulders!”

“Then I turned the page and at the top it said THINGS I MISS ABOUT M and there was a list of 15 things, and the first was THE WAY HE HOLDS THINGS. I did not understand how you can miss the way somebody holds things.”

“Garner: Before we get off the electoral process, they wanted me to run for Governor [of California] about 8 years ago--ahem--and I didn't want to do it. I wasn't gonna get in with that--
Tavis Smiley: Now you wish you had.
Garner: No, no, no.
Tavis Smiley: Hey, Arnold [Schwarzenegger] won.
Garner: No. I think I could have won easy, but I don't think that they ought to have somebody like me or Schwarzenegger as Governor. It's no way to run a state.”

“I see that there will be no end to imperfection, or to doing things the wrong way. Even if you grow up, no matter how hard you scrub, whatever you do, there will always be some other stain or spot on your face or stupid act, somebody frowning.”