Not my words, but became parts of me -

"What did you sense in Molly Hendricks? That she was going to be hurt?"

"That she'd already been hurt."

"And that looked like ... what?"

"Helplessness. Like someone was holding her down."

"Why didn't I see it?"

"Because it's never happened to you."

(Places in the Dark, Thomas H. Cook)

***

"The triumph of the human condition was to face one small defeat after another and to survive them relatively intact. The tragedy was to face the worst defeat too soon and never to recover." 

(The Ice House, Minette Walters)