“What if he’s right? We’ve seen great countries fall into ruin virtually overnight. What if we’re next in line? That thought fills me with a kind of epochal sadness.If this little back street is anything to go by, perhaps the unraveling has already begun. Everything has suddenly fallen quiet. All the construction has stopped. The laborers have disappeared. Where are the whores and the homosexuals and the dogs with fancy coats? I miss them. How could it all disappear so quickly?I mustn’t keep standing here, like some nostalgic old fool.Things will get better. They must.”

“There is a great deal of ruin in a nation.”

“Time was the most precious thing in the world to me, and I’d just given her all of it. Because I was falling for her. Because I cared for her. Because I wanted to give her something to remember me by, even if it would eventually fade like its namesake. Time… what an absolute horror-inducing word”

“Woe, destruction, ruin, and decay; the worst is death and death will have his day.”

“Do not allow haters to ruin your happiness.”

“Don’t ruin your own happiness by letting someone’s wickedness hurt you.”

“Falling into ruin was a bit like falling in love: Both descents stripped you bare and left you as you were at your core. And both endings are equally painful.”