“Love is like breathing. You take it in and let it out.”

“Her shut-eyed smile transformed itself into something else: the smile of someone brave and knowing, someone whose pain had made her wise.”

“All the dead bolts, pulled shades and hidden knives in the world couldn't protect you from the truth.”

“People had always amazed him, he began. But they amazed him more since the sickness. For as long as the two of them had been together, he said, Garys mother had accepted him as her sons lover, had ...”

“Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of life's longing for itself.”

“That time we separated was my idea. I thought, well, I'm fifty years old and there might be someone else out there. People waste their happiness - that's what makes me sad. Everyone's so scared to ...”

“Disobey God and you are forgiven. Disobey Nature and you get disease.”

“Whenever you read a cancer booklet or website or whatever, they always list depression among the side effects of cancer. But, in fact, depression is not a side effect of cancer. Depression is a sid...”

“Cancer. The word meant the same to me as tsunami or piranha. I had never seen them; I wasn't even quite sure what they were, but I knew they were bad and I knew in many cases they were deadly.”

“For the crown of our life as it closesIs darkness, the fruit there of dust;No thorns go as deep as the rose's,And love is more cruel than lust.Time turns the old days to derision,Our loves into cor...”

“Here is a girl who is pretty in a quiet way. I bet she's had a very sad life.”

“You know what 'Dolores' means? It's Latin, means sadness. Our Lady of Sorrow. Why are you so sad?”

“We fatties have a bond, dude. It's like a secret society. We got all kinds of shit you don't know about. Handshakes, special fat people dances-we got these secret fugging lairs in the center of the...”

“Because theres a silent, shrugging, stoical acceptance of all the things in the world we can never be part of: shorts, swimming pools, strappy dresses, country walks, roller-skating, ra-ra skirts, ...”

“My fat years were when I was not human shaped. I was a 16-stone triangle, with inverted triangle legs, and no real neck. And thats because I wasnt doing human things. I didnt walk or run or dance o...”