"Having to talk to people was one thing, but soliciting conversation was something else entirely. If I acted squirmy or didn’t make eye contact, they would want to know what was wrong, and I would have to say “nothing,” since nothing really was wrong. Nothing is an easy thing to feel but a difficult thing to express. It’s impossible to describe nothing without seeming sneaky."

"We were excited about getting jobs; we hardly went anywhere without filling out an application. But once we were hired - as furniture sanders - we could not believe this was really what people did all day. Everything we had thought of as The World was actually the result of someone’s job. Each line on the sidewalk, each saltine. Everyone had a rotting carpet and a door to pay for. Aghast, we quit. There had to be a more dignified way to live. We needed time to consider ourselves, to come up with a theory about who we were and set it to music."