“Every day proves to me more and more that this American world was not made for me.”

“Every day I see or hear something that more or less kills me with delight, that leaves me like a needle in the haystack of light.”

“Despite all the divisions and discord within our democracy, I see the grit and determination and common goodness of the American people every single day –- and that makes me more confident than ever about our country’s future.”

“My books promised me that life wasn’t just made up of workday tasks and prosaic things. The world is bigger and more colorful and more important than that.”

“But I think the most important thing those books gave me was a kind of faith. My books promised me that life wasn’t just made up of workaday tasks and prosaic things. The world is bigger and more colorful and more important than that.”

“Every day, the people I meet inspire me, every day, they make me proud, every day they remind me how blessed we are to live in the greatest nation on earth.”

“It was pretty sad, because for the first time I found how stupid people could be. It sort of made me feel alone in the world. The more people pointed at me in scorn the more stubborn I got and when they began calling me the Bad Girl of West Seattle High, I tried to live up to it.”

“There's no other art form in the world that affects me more.”

“Limited by the world, which I oppose, jagged by it, I shall be all the more handsome and sparkling as the angles which wound me and give me shape are more acute and the jagging more cruel.”

“There is so much more to this world then outward appearances. Our society basks in the illusion of normalcy every day, and hides from the truth every night.”