The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time.

I have to change to stay the same.

The attitude that nature is chaotic and that the artist puts order into it is a very absurd point of view, I think. All that we can hope for is to put some order into ourselves.

I don't paint to live, I live to paint.

What you do when you paint, you take a brush full of paint, get paint on the picture, and you have faith.

The drawings that interest me most are made with closed eyes. With eyes closed, I feel my hand slide down on the paper. I have an image in mind, but the results always surprise me.

Whatever an artist's personal feelings are, as soon as an artist fills a certain area on the canvas or circumscribes it, he becomes historical. He acts from or upon other artists.

It's really absurd to make... a human image, with paint, today, when you think about it... But then all of a sudden, it was even more absurd not to do it.

I might work on a painting for a month, but it has too look like I painted it in a minute.

Spiritually I am wherever my spirit allows me to be, and that is not necessarily in the future... Art never seems to make me peaceful or pure.

Not even for a million dollars would I paint a tree.

Saul's vitals were not human, but familiar:he never told me he was from another world:I never told him I was from his future.

Life like war is a series of mistakes and he is best who wins the most splendid victories by the retrieval of mistakes.

Childhood is a short season.

I am a bit of a health nut. I really like to mix it up a lot. I do a lot of yoga, and I do a lot of Pilates, but I also like to run. That's kind of my meditation, I guess.

I write funny nonfiction adventure books about crazy, serious worlds.

When you're married with kids, you just think differently.

Others follow patterns; we alone are unpredictable.

Tea Party people know that I stood against the Wall Street scam from Day One, that I voted against TARP, that I voted against repealing Glass-Steagall Act that kept these guys under some control.

Remember, it's not conditions but decisions that determine our lives.

And then the conditions of safety - or lack of safety - for teachers in public schools, and the disparity between public schools and private schools is shameful.