But then the amazing thing is to look back. It looks like it all was a straight line. You can see the straight line of light and that makes us who we are.

Then at the time of retirement, that's a big problem in Sweden, as a retired person, because then you are pushed off. I was fortunate even from that point of view because I got a very good research collaboration agreement with Upjohn, the American Upjohn company. So that could help me to go on with my research.

I ignored my stand-up career for 25 years, but now, having finished this memoir, I view this time with surprising warmth. One can have, it turns out, an affection for the war years.

We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives.

There are three teachers who are still involved in my life. Ray Wilson — who is my office manager, and who was a teacher in my high school, as well as my basketball coach in high school — is very much involved in my life, and is a real father figure for me. A gentleman named Earl Mosley, who never specifically taught me, but was always there, and was a role model for me, was a coach when I was a freshman. And then a guy named Charles McIlwaine, who is a teacher and a coach. In my high school years those three really stood out, really helped to become part of the support group that’s necessary when you’re experiencing all types of physical changes and mental changes, to help to explain things, and put them in the proper perspective.

Being respected, because I have to deal with this each and every day of my life. Each and every day of my life, when I go to a public place, someone might recognize me, or might not, that doesn’t make or break my day. The thing that I walk in expecting is that, whether they recognize me or not, I’m going to be treated with respect.