After college, I went to San Francisco and worked as a secretary in a reinsurance company. That was a pretty dismal job. It was a real small place. Guys would come in, and they'd sort of stick out their arms like wings so I could take their coats off. They'd tell me, 'Two,' and I'd put two lumps of sugar in their coffee.

There have been times when I'm writing about things that are personally embarrassing. Like any human being, sometimes I can't help but wonder - 'What are the people I know going to think about this?' So I have to remind myself that all is permissible. Art has to be a free space. Language has to be a free space.

The case of Afghanistan vs. the Soviet Union is the clearest case of good against evil that I've seen in my lifetime. I thought it was terrific the way they got their country back.

My father hates organized religion, probably because he hates the God who killed his little girl back in 1968. I find religions variously bemusing.

I looked death in the eye - and it was a terrible experience.

Only those who spread treachery, fire, and death out of hatred for the prosperity of others are undeserving of pity.

Death is a release from the impressions of the senses, and from desires that make us their puppets, and from the vagaries of the mind, and from the hard service of the flesh.

There are no Hollywood stars speaking out for the elderly. They're forgotten, bewildered, and I don't think it's because people are cruel or don't care. It's because you don't want to think about your own mortality. I think people don't talk about it enough.