"...One thing nobody can do better than you is be you." (p164) — Elizabeth Moon

"Autistic is different, not bad. It is not wrong to be different. Sometimes it is hard, but it is not wrong." (p319)

I like it that order exists somewhere even if it shatters near me. (p242)

Questions, always questions. They didn't wait for the answers, either. They rushed on, piling questions on questions, covering every moment with questions, blocking off every sensation but the thorn stab of questions. And orders. If it wasn't, "Lou, what is this?" it was, "Tell me what this is." A bowl. The same bowl, time after time. It is a bowl and it is an ugly bowl, a boring bowl, a bowl of total and complete boring blandness, uninteresting. I am uninterested in that uninteresting bowl. If they aren't going to listen, why should I talk? I know better than to say that out loud. Everything in my life that I value has been gained at the cost of not saying what I really think and saying what they want me to say. In this office, where I am evaluated and advised four times a year the psychiatrist is no less certain of the line between us than all the others have been. Her certainty is painful to see, so I try not to look at her more than I have to. That has its own dangers; like the others, she thinks I should make more eye contact than I do. I glance at her now. Dr. Fornum, crisp and professional, raises an eyebrow and shakes her head not quite imperceptibly. Autistic persons do not understand these signals; the book says so. I have read the book, so I know what it is I do not understand. What I haven't figured out yet is the range of things they don't understand. The normals. The reals. The ones who have the degrees and sit behind the desks in comfortable chairs. (beginning of Chapter One)