You never hear about a sportsman losing his sense of smell in a tragic accident, and for good reason; in order for the universe to teach excruciating… - Steve Toltz

It's too late now," he said. "You can't stop a tidal wave of hatred once it's reached the shore.

When you withdraw from the world, the world withdraws too, in equal measure. It's a two-step, you and the world. I didn't look for trouble, and it wore me down that none found me. Doing nothing is as tumultuous for me as working on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on the morning of a market crash. It's how I'm made. Nothing happened to me in three years and it was very, very stressful.

That's the wonderful thing about democracy: you can hold public office legitimately while still being despised by 49.9 percent of the suspicious eyes on the street.