At 14 you are still in most respects a dependent youth, in some respects a child. At 24 you are an adult. In between, extraordinary turbulences take place.
Children are caterpillars and adults are butterflies. No butterfly ever remembers what it felt like being a caterpillar.
I'm all for bringing back the birch, but only between consenting adults.
I was not a lovable child, and I'd grown into a deeply unlovable adult. Draw a picture of my soul, and it'd be a scribble with fangs.
As you become an adult and start to make your way in life, you realize how much your friends are your family - though you get to make fun of your friends, too.
The youngest child in any family is always a jokemaker, because a joke is the only way he can enter into an adult conversation.
I'm for absolute autonomy of the individual, and an adult, competent woman has absolute autonomy. It's her choice.
Children, as I have said, use back ways and hidden paths, while adults take roads and official paths.
Just go with it. It won't hurt.' I stared at him. Adults only ever said that when it, whatever it happened to be, was going to hurt so much.
I knew enough about adults to know that if did tell them what had happened, I would not be believed. Adults rarely seemed to believe me when I told the truth anyway.