“Making the best of things is... a damn poor way of dealing with them. My whole life has been a series of escapes from that quicksand.”

“I loved every second of Catholic church. I loved the sickly sweet rotting-pomegranate smells of the incense. I loved the overwrought altar, the birdbath of holy water, the votive candles; I loved that there was a poor box, the stations of the cross rendered in stained glass on the windows.”