Every man sees in his relatives, and especially in his cousins, a series of grotesque caricatures of himself.

I hope they get here soon. The kids are biting at the chomp.

The roaring of the wind is my wife and the stars through the window pane are my children. The mighty abstract idea I have of beauty in all things stifles the more divided and minute domestic happiness.

Nobody has ever before asked the nuclear family to live all by itself in a box the way we do. With no relatives, no support, we've put us in an impossible situation.

'I'm not beautiful, I'm pretty!' (Angrily at age 2 and a half. After getting into his sister's toy makeup case and being called beautiful...)