“It bothers me that I won't live to see the end of the century, because...” — Harold Brodkey Quote

“It bothers me that I won't live to see the end of the century, because, when I was young, in St. Louis, I remember saying to Marilyn, my sister by adoption, that that was how long I wanted to live: seventy years.”

“I am sensible of the velocity of the moments, and entering that part of my head alert to the motion of the world I am aware that life was never perfect, never absolute. This bestows contentment, even a fearlessness.”

“I am in an adolescence in reverse, as mysterious as the first, except that this time I feel it as a decay of the odds that I might live for a while, that I can sleep it off.”

“I had this sister that was born who was given up for adoption, and I never knew it.”

“I want to say that, in general, when it works, open adoption is great.”

“There are young people having babies every day that cannot possibly take care of them, and, as people who believe that every life is beautiful, we need to make them aware of another choice - to give that beautiful life up for adoption.”