But cities aren’t like people; they live on and on, even though their reason for being where they are has gone downriver and out to sea. - John Updike

The fiction writer is the ombudsman who argues our humble, dubious case in the halls of eternal record.

...a sense of defeat the years have brought back to him, after what seemed for a while to be triumphs.

You don’t stop caring, champ. You still care about that little girl whose underpants you saw in kindergarten. Once you care, you always care. That’s how stupid we are.